FR2802379A1 - SELECTION OF ACCESSIBLE RADIOCOMMUNICATION NETWORKS FOR A MULTIMODE RECEIVER TERMINAL - Google Patents

Abstract

Detection occurs in a terminal, which is at least a receive terminal (TM ), of the region where the terminal is localized. At least one of the accessible networks (RT,RD) in said region is subsequently selected, since the radiocommunication network lists are pre-stored. One of several radiocommunication processing means included in the terminal and being compatible with the selected accessible network is activated. The terminal is thus adapted to radiocommunication networks according to the localization thereof.

Description

<B> selection of <B> radio <B> networks </ B> <B> accessible for a receiver terminal </ B> multimode The present invention relates to radio receiver terminals at least third generation that they are particular mobile or non-mobile radiotelephone terminals, audio or video receivers, or even a multimedia terminal. It relates more particularly to the optimization of radio resources made available to the terminal depending on the geographical location where the terminal is located.

Furthermore, it is known that a location system, such as the Global Positioning System (GPS), will have to be included in new mobile radiotelephone terminals, notably American ones, including a Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) radio interface for localization purposes. and synchronization.

The present invention aims to adapt a less receiver terminal to radiocommunication networks in dependence on the terminal location.

For this purpose, according to the invention, the method for selecting radio communication networks implemented in at least one receiver terminal, is characterized by the following steps: - first register lists of radio communication networks by geographical region, - locate geographically the terminal to determine the region where the terminal is located, - select one of the accessible networks in the location region of the terminal, and - activate one of several radiocommunication processing means included in the terminal and compatible with the network accessible selected.

With location means included in the terminal periodically providing, or on demand, the geographical coordinates of the terminal, the terminal knows the accessible communication networks through which it is likely to communicate in the region where it is located.

At the step of recording, the lists of radio networks are previously downloaded to a non-volatile memory reprogrammable terminal that can be included in a removable integrated circuit module. In practice, the user of the receiving terminal or receiver / transmitter can only access the radio networks authorized by its subscription profiles. In this case, a list of authorized radiocommunication networks is previously stored in the terminal, and the authorized radiocommunication networks are searched among the radio networks accessible in the location region of the terminal in order to select one of the accessible radiocommunication networks and allowed as the selected accessible network.

The selection of a radiocommunication network among the accessible networks may depend on a manual selection, among types or categories of radiocommunication network, and / or an automatic selection according to a priority order, and / or or the cost of radiocommunication, and / or the radiocommunication rate.

The steps of selecting, or the steps of locating and selecting, can be performed again when the selected radio network is unavailable, or when the terminal goes out of the radio coverage of the selected radio network.

According to other features of the invention, the terminal may comprise a nonvolatile memory addressable by terminal location means according to an address of the terminal location region for storing lists of radio networks by geographical region. and access authorization means containing a list of authorized radio networks through which only the terminal is allowed to communicate, so that one of the accessible radio networks is selected from said list of authorized radio networks. The non-volatile memory and the access authorization means may be included in a removable module of the terminal which is personal to a user, such as a SIM card for a radiotelephone terminal.

According to another preferred embodiment, the radiocommunication processing means respectively compatible with radiocommunication networks are individually removable from the terminal, the activated radiocommunication processing means preferably being introduced into the terminal when the name of the selected accessible network is signaled the terminal . This feature helps to reduce the weight and volume of the terminal. After introduction, the selected processing means can receive frequency and protocol characteristics of the selected network, provided by the terminal.

The invention thus also relates to a terminal implementing the method of the invention.

Other features and advantages of the present invention will appear more clearly on reading the following description of several preferred embodiments of the invention with reference to the corresponding appended drawings in which - Figure 1 is a partial schematic block diagram of a terminal multimedia multimode according to the invention; FIG. 2 is a frequency distribution diagram for three geographical regions; FIG. 3 is an algorithm of the radiocommunication network selection method according to the invention; and FIG. 4 is a graph illustrating an example of a selection of radiocommunication networks in a mobile radiotelephone terminal according to the invention. Reference is made hereinafter to a multimode multimode terminal TM shown schematically in FIG. 1. The terminal TM is capable in particular of participating in radiocommunications with any type of telephone or radiotelephone terminal through radio telephone networks RT and broadcasting networks. RD data broadcasting, for example, radio programs and / or television programs. However, the invention is not limited to this type of multimedia terminal and relates to any radio receiver terminal capable of communicating through at least two of the radiotelephone and broadcast networks.

Multimode multimode terminal TM is organized around a microprocessor PR and comprises means IRL-LOC for geographically locating the terminal and IRS radio interfaces. The microprocessor PR conventionally comprises a CPU central processing unit with data memories and a ROM containing operating system memory, and can be for example a DSP (Digital Signal Processor) processor. The processor PR is conventionally associated with nonvolatile EEPROM memory containing programs and particularly applications relating to radiocommunications through the RT and RD networks with which the terminal is likely to communicate. The processor PR is also associated through an input-output interface ES to an access authorization circuit AA and in particular other peripherals such as an AF display which can be a large screen, a keyboard CL which can be analogous to a radio telephone keypad or a computer, a MOD modem, etc.

The means for geographically locating the terminal comprises an IRL location radio interface connected to a location circuit LOC. Typically, the location circuit LOC is constituted by a calculator calculating coordinates of the location where the terminal TM is located, that is to say the longitude X and the latitude Y of the terminal, in accordance with the GPS positioning system ( Global Positioning System). The IRL interface is a GPS-type interface capable of receiving the two frequencies at approximately 1.2 GHz and 1.5 GHz transmitted by the twenty-four satellites of the GPS system so that the location circuit LOC determines the position with great precision. of the TM terminal with respect to four satellites of the GPS system, either at the manual or automatic request, or periodically, typically every hundred milliseconds or approximately every second, or at longer time intervals, typically every minute to decrease the power consumption of the terminal.

According to other variants, the means for geographically locating the terminal TM comprises a set of location calculator a location interface adapted to receive location messages from at least three transmitting stations in order to derive by triangulation the geographical coordinates X and Y of the TM terminal. For example, the transmitting stations may be base stations of a radiotelephone network in the areas of coverage of which the terminal is at a given moment, or stations transmitting a radiolocation or radionavigation system.

The processor PR is also connected to an EEPROM reprogrammable non-volatile memory containing a list table of radio communication networks TRC. These lists contain frequency and protocol characteristics of radio networks RT and / or RD with which the terminal TM is likely to communicate. The TRC table corresponds to each of these radiocommunication networks a geographical address, for example a geographical area in a country, or a country, or a "continental" region such as Europe, Asia or North America. The location circuit LOC produces a location address AL corresponding to the area, or country, or region where the terminal TM is located, based on the calculated geographical coordinates X and Y, in order to select in the table TRC the networks RC radio available at the AL address where the TM terminal is located.

The memory, also designated by TRC in Figure 1, in which the table is contained is programmable, that is to say, is downloadable on the one hand to start the TM terminal according to its applications and its mobi It is also useful for an update according to changes in the frequency and / or protocol characteristics of the radiocommunication networks already recorded and / or for the recording of the frequency and protocol characteristics of new radiocommunication networks. The download can be performed either conventionally by electrical connection with the TRC memory from a local server of a radiocommunication service provider, or the terminal manufacturer TM, or from a server connected to the terminal TM through the fixed network of one of the radio radiotelephone networks RT, for example through a mobile service switch MSC of a GSM radio telephone network which is connected to a data packet switching network with management of the radio network. mobility and radio access GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) which allows packet data to be broadcast from a server to a plurality of mobile radiotelephone terminals.

The download can also be made at the home of the user holding the terminal by connecting it to a user telephone line directly, or through a local radio base according to the standard DECT (Digital Enhanced Cordless Telephone) or a standard similar.

By way of example, the table of radio communication networks TRC contains at least in part the frequency distribution plan shown in FIG. 2, which corresponds to a location address AL that can belong to one of three "continental" regions such that an R1 region corresponding to Europe, a region R2 corresponding to Asia and a region R3 corresponding to North America, to several RC radio networks, such as RT radio networks and RD broadcasting networks , with the frequency characteristics of these. The various radiocommunication networks shown in the figure can be classified in the following four categories C1 to C4 - C1: local or neighborhood radiotelephone networks CT2 (Cordless Telephone Digital), DECT (Digital Enhanced Cordless Telephone), PHS (Personal Handyphone System) ) and RLAN (Radio Local Area Network) or HYPERLAN; - C2. GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications), DCS 1800 (Digital Cellular System), PDC (Personal Digital Cellular), IS 95 (Intermediate Standard), D-AMPS (Advanced Mobile Phone System) digital networks with "spread spectrum" "CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access), and UMTS (Universal Mobile Telecommunication System) corresponding to the international acronym IMT-2000 (International Mobile Telecommunications); - C3 non-geostationary satellite radiocommunication networks with low orbit MSS (Mobile Satellite System) for example of the IRIDIUM or GLOBALSTAR type; and - C4: Digital broadcasting networks for broadcasting DAB (Digital Audio Broadcasting) radio programs and DVB (Digital Video Broadcasting) television programs, in particular MPEG-2 (Moving Pictures Expert Group) standards. .

Although the geographical location of the terminal is considered at the level of a "mainland" region in FIG. 1, the geographical location of the terminal according to the invention can also be determined in relation to groups of countries such as the European Economic Community. , in relation to a country such as France, or in relation to the coverage area of a radiocommunication network antenna, or more generally in relation to the entire earth. The IRS block in FIG. 1 comprises radio interfaces that are respectively radio-compatible with the various radio communication networks through which terminal TM can communicate certain radio interfaces that may be common to several radio communication networks, particularly to several radio networks having radio bands. neighboring useful frequencies. Typically, an IRS radio interface for reception includes an antenna, one or more frequency transposition circuits, an analog-to-digital converter, and a demodulator. When the radio interface also provides a radiocommunication signal transmission, it further comprises digital-analog converter, a modulator, one or more frequency transposition circuits and a reception channel duplexer connected to the antenna. Each of the IRS radio interfaces is connected to a respective one of coding / decoding circuits CD adapted to the signals supported by a corresponding radio communication network. For example, when a coding / decoding circuit relates to a radio telephone network RT, this a speech coding-decoding circuit connected to a microphone and a speaker of the terminal; when the coding-decoding circuit is relative to the RD broadcast network, the latter is a digital circuit connected to at least one loudspeaker or screen for coding and decoding data packets according to the DAB standard or the DVB standard .

As a variant, each set comprising an IRS radio interface and a coding / decoding circuit relating to a respective radiocommunication network, as well as a microcontroller controlling the latter and connectable to the processor PR, is included in an interchangeable removable module that can be plugged into the terminal. TM. Depending on the radio network selected by the processor PR by the user, whose name is indicated by the terminal, for example by presenting it on an AF display as will be detailed later, the user enters the terminal TM the module - CD compatible with the selected network.

The access authorization circuit AA contains addresses, preferably corresponding to names, radio networks to which the user of the terminal TM can access according to subscriptions it has subscribed. As will be seen in the method of the invention, among the accessible RC radio networks chosen automatically in the TRC table as a function of the terminal location address AL, the processor PR eliminates the selection of all the accessible networks whose addresses can not be read in the AA circuit in correspondence with an authorization 'access.

According to a preferred embodiment, access authorization circuit AA is a removable module of integrated circuit card type, also called smart card, as a removable SIM card (Suscriber Identity Module) of a mobile radiotelephone terminal. In this embodiment, the circuit AA comprises a microcontroller with a volatile reprogrammable EEPROM memory which contains in particular all the characteristics of the user's subscription profiles relating to the authorized radio communication networks RC (RT and / or RD) likely to be accessible. by the terminal TM during its mobility, and a table matching these subscription profiles with the authorized radio network addresses. The EEPROM in the access circuit AA also includes programs relating to the authentication of authorized radiocommunication networks and applications related to these networks. As a variant, the EEPROM memory comprises the contents of the table of the radio communication networks TRC instead of the memory TRC '11 illustrated in the terminal TM. For this variant, the download especially for updating the TRC table is directly performed in the removable module constituting the access authorization circuit AA. The update can also be performed by an exchange of the AA module.

With reference to FIG. 3, the method for selecting radio communication networks for the multimode receiver TM comprises main steps E0 to E10.

Initially, before putting the terminal TM into operation, an EO step downloads lists of radio networks RT, RD, one by geographic region with a classification by category. Each list contains the frequency and protocol characteristics of radiocommunication networks which at least partially cover a respective one of several regions, for example the regions R1 to R3 according to the frequency distribution plane shown in FIG. 2. It is also assumed that the circuit AA has previously stored a list of authorized radio networks.

After a TM terminal operation by pressing an ON / OFF button and often followed by the validation of a PIN composed on the CL keyboard, location circuit LOC locates the terminal TM geographically by determining its geographical coordinates such as longitude X latitude Y to deduce the location address AL from the geographical region where the terminal is at step E2.

According to the location address in step E3, the processor PR searches in the lists of table TRC for the list of RC radio networks accessible in the region where the terminal TM is located, which list is designated by the address AL. If the region designated AL does not contain any accessible radio network, the process returns to step E1.

In the opposite case, the memory communicates to the processor PR the list of RC radio networks accessible in the region designated by the address AL. The list of accessible radiocommunication networks can be constituted in a tree way from several lists, by taking from the TRC table for example designations of networks accessible locally, then networks accessible throughout the country where the terminal is located, accessible networks. on any continent where the terminal is located, and finally networks covering the entire earth. The processor PR searches for the next step E4 in the access authorization circuit AA the radio networks that are authorized according to the user's terminal subscription profiles, among the radio networks accessible in the region of terminal location and indicated by the TRC memory. If no accessible radio network is allowed by the AA circuit, the process returns to step E1. In the opposite case, the access authorization circuit AA supplies the processor PR with a list of the addresses, such as names, of the accessible and authorized radio communication networks.

If in the next step E5 the user does not wish to manually select a network among the accessible and authorized radio communication networks, the method continues in step E6 so that the processor PR selects one of the radiocommunication networks. accessible and authorized based on at least one of the following four criteria.

According to a first criterion, the processor PR invites the user via, for example, the display AF and an elevator key to select the type of radio network RT or radio RD, this selection being validated by the solicitation a key on the CL keyboard; the processor PR then automatically selects one of the accessible and authorized networks according to the selected type RT or RD according to one of the second, third and fourth criteria below.

According to the second criterion, a radio network is selected according to an order of priority which may for example depend on the frequency band of the network; for example, the radio network offering the highest frequency band is selected in priority.

According to the third criterion, the selection of an accessible and authorized radiocommunication network depends on the comparison of average radiocommunication costs in accessible and authorized networks. for example, if a category C1 radio network (CT2, PHS, DECT, PHS, RLAN, HYPERLAN) and a category C2 radio network (GSM, DCS 1800, UMTS, PDC, AMPS, etc.) are accessible and authorized networks, it is preferable to select one of these two networks offering the lowest cost of radiocommunication.

According to the fourth criterion, a radio communication network is selected from the authorized accessible networks according to the radiocommunication rates offered by them. For example, when the terminal TM is intended to often receive data, it is interesting that they are communicated as quickly as possible so that the communication is as short as possible; in this case, the processor PR chooses the radio network offering the highest bit rate among the accessible and authorized networks.

Returning to step E5, if the manual selection is chosen by the user, the PR processor controls the presentation of the names of the radio networks accessible and authorized in the AF display by displaying the names of the networks arranged by type of network. and by category, example in step E51. Then the user selects and validates a radio network using the keyboard CL in step E52.

As a variant, the display and the selection by keyboard can be replaced or supplemented by voice messages and voice commands in the terminal After step E6 or E52, the processor knows the accessible, authorized and selected RC radio network and reads the characteristics frequency and network protocol selected in the TRC memory. In step E7, the processor PR selects and activates the IRS radio interface and the coding-decoding circuit CD which are compatible with the selected radio communication network in order to control them according to the frequency and protocol characteristics corresponding to the selected network read. in the TRC memory.

According to the variant already presented, instead of the processor PR controlling the communications in the terminal TM relating to the selected radio communication network, the processor PR communicates the frequency and protocol characteristics corresponding to the selected network read in the memory TRC, to a microcontroller which is included with the IRS radio interface and the CD coding / decoding circuit in a module compatible with the selected radio network. Step E7 ends with the display of the network name selected on the AF display. The module compatible with the selected accessible network is introduced into the terminal at step E7 according to the name of the selected network indicated by the display AF or by a voice message broadcast by the terminal.

In the next step E8, the processor verifies the selected radio network for a given type of service is available to establish a communication or simply receive data in the terminal TM. If the selected network is unavailable, the method returns to step E4 to select another radio network from the authorized radio networks and accessible in the location region of the terminal. In a variant, when the selected network is unavailable in step E8, the method proceeds to step E2 in order to re-locate the terminal which may have changed geographical region since last location.

If the selected network is available in step E8, the processor PR can propose the user on the display AF a network change selected in step E9; if the selected network is to be changed, the process also returns to step E4.

Finally, in step E10, the processor PR signals to the user on the display AF a loss of radio coverage of the selected radio network when the terminal TM moves from a radio-covered area by the selected network to an area not covered radioelectrically. by the network selects. In case of passage of the terminal out of the radio coverage of the selected network, the method proceeds from step E10 to step E4 for a slow moving mobile, or more generally to step E2 so as to locate the terminal again. TM in a region, since the location performed by the location circuit LOC is not periodic. On the other hand, if the determination of the geographical coordinates X and Y of the location of the terminal TM is periodic, the method goes directly from step E10 to step E3 to search again for a list of accessible radio networks. By way of example, it is assumed with reference to FIG. 4 that the location circuit LOC has determined XY geographical coordinates corresponding to the location of the terminal TM in the city of Rennes, capital of the Brittany region having for address The terminal TM is assumed to have a radiotelephone function and a radio program listening function and is connected to a PC microcomputer for receiving and transmitting data. Furthermore, it is assumed that the memory has recorded the data. frequency and protocol characteristics of twelve radiocommunication networks which are accessible in various earth regions, the AA access authorization circuit in the TM terminal has only registered seven authorized radio network names according to the subscription profiles of the user.

It is assumed that the user of the terminal TM simply wishes to listen to a radio program for example through the DAB broadcast network, while being able to communicate with a remote party through a radio network. Firstly, in a step E5, the user imposes the choice of the DAB broadcast network for a next step E7 the PR processor selects and activates the radio interface IRS2 and the coding-decoding circuit CD2 corresponding to the network. Then at other stages E5 and E6, the user leaves it to the processor PR to select one authorized from the five accessible radio networks RC for the address ALB which offers according to said third criterion a lower cost of communication. if the radiocommunication concerns speech, or offers according to said fourth criterion the highest rate if the radiocommunication concerns data. The processor PR then selects and activates the radio interface IRS1 and the coding-decoding circuit CD1 corresponding to the accessible, authorized and selected radio communication network.

Claims (1)

1 - A method for selecting radio communication networks implemented in a receiving terminal (TM), characterized by the following steps previously recording (E0) lists of radio networks (RT, RD) by geographical region (R1, R2, R3), geographically locate (E2) the terminal (TM) to determine the region (X, Y, AL) where the terminal is located, select (E3 to E6) one (RC) accessible networks in the region of location of the terminal, and activate (E7) one of a plurality of radiocommunication processing means (IRS, CD) included in the terminal (TM) and compatible with the selected accessible network (RC). - Process according to claim 1, wherein the step of recording (E0) is to download lists of radio networks in a non-volatile reprogrammable memory (TRC) of the terminal. 3 - Process according to claim 2, wherein the step of locating (E2) is performed by a location means (IRS, LOC) included in the terminal (TM) periodically providing, on demand, the geographical coordinates of the terminal (TM). 4 - Process according to any one of claims 1 to 3, comprising the steps - previously store (E1) a list of authorized radio networks, and - <B> seek (E4) authorized radio networks </ b> among the <B> radio networks (RC) accessible in the terminal location region to select (E6; E51) one of the accessible and authorized radio networks as a selected accessible network. 5 - A method according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the selection of a radio network among the accessible networks depends on a manual selection (E52), among types (RT, RD) or categories of radio network, and / or an automatic selection according to an order of priority, and / or the radiocommunication cost and / or the radiocommunication rate. 6 - Process according to any one of claims 1 to 5, wherein the steps of selecting (E3 to E7), or the steps of locating and selecting (E2 to E7), are performed again when the radio network selected is unavailable, or when the terminal (TM) goes out of the radio coverage of the selected radio network. 7 - Process according to any one of claims 1 to 6, wherein the terminal (TM) comprises a non-volatile memory (TRC) addressable by terminal location means (IRS, LOC) according to an address (AL) the location region of the terminal for storing lists of radio networks by geographical region (R1, R2, R3). The method according to claim 1, wherein the terminal (TM) comprises access authorization means (AA) containing a list of authorized radio networks through which only the terminal is allowed to communicate, so that the one of the accessible radiocommunication networks (RC) is selected from said list of authorized radiocommunication networks. 9 - Process according to claims 7 and 8, wherein the non-volatile memory (TRC) and the access authorization means (AA) is included in a removable module of the terminal (TM). 10 - Process according to any one of claims 1 to 9, wherein the radiocommunication processing means (CD) respectively compatible with radiocommunication networks are individually removable from the terminal, the activated radiocommunication processing means being preferably introduced into the terminal (TM) when the selected accessible network name is signaled by the terminal. 11 - Terminal implementing the method according to any one of claims 1 to 10.