Classifications

• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04W—WIRELESS COMMUNICATION NETWORKS
  • H04W8/00—Network data management
  • H04W8/005—Discovery of network devices, e.g. terminals
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04L—TRANSMISSION OF DIGITAL INFORMATION, e.g. TELEGRAPHIC COMMUNICATION
  • H04L5/00—Arrangements affording multiple use of the transmission path
  • H04L5/003—Arrangements for allocating sub-channels of the transmission path
  • H04L5/0048—Allocation of pilot signals, i.e. of signals known to the receiver
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04W—WIRELESS COMMUNICATION NETWORKS
  • H04W24/00—Supervisory, monitoring or testing arrangements
  • H04W24/08—Testing, supervising or monitoring using real traffic
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04W—WIRELESS COMMUNICATION NETWORKS
  • H04W4/00—Services specially adapted for wireless communication networks; Facilities therefor
  • H04W4/02—Services making use of location information
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04W—WIRELESS COMMUNICATION NETWORKS
  • H04W40/00—Communication routing or communication path finding
  • H04W40/02—Communication route or path selection, e.g. power-based or shortest path routing
  • H04W40/22—Communication route or path selection, e.g. power-based or shortest path routing using selective relaying for reaching a BTS [Base Transceiver Station] or an access point
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04W—WIRELESS COMMUNICATION NETWORKS
  • H04W72/00—Local resource management
  • H04W72/20—Control channels or signalling for resource management
  • H04W72/27—Control channels or signalling for resource management between access points
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04W—WIRELESS COMMUNICATION NETWORKS
  • H04W76/00—Connection management
  • H04W76/10—Connection setup
  • H04W76/14—Direct-mode setup
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04B—TRANSMISSION
  • H04B7/00—Radio transmission systems, i.e. using radiation field
  • H04B7/24—Radio transmission systems, i.e. using radiation field for communication between two or more posts
  • H04B7/26—Radio transmission systems, i.e. using radiation field for communication between two or more posts at least one of which is mobile
  • H04B7/2603—Arrangements for wireless physical layer control
  • H04B7/2606—Arrangements for base station coverage control, e.g. by using relays in tunnels
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04W—WIRELESS COMMUNICATION NETWORKS
  • H04W88/00—Devices specially adapted for wireless communication networks, e.g. terminals, base stations or access point devices
  • H04W88/02—Terminal devices
  • H04W88/04—Terminal devices adapted for relaying to or from another terminal or user

Definitions

• the present disclosure relates generally to communication systems, and more particularly, to device-to-device communication.
• Wireless communication systems are widely deployed to provide various telecommunication services such as telephony, video, data, messaging, and broadcasts.
• Typical wireless communication systems may employ multiple-access technologies capable of supporting communication with multiple users by sharing available system resources. Examples of such multiple-access technologies include code division multiple access (CDMA) systems, time division multiple access (TDMA) systems, frequency division multiple access (FDMA) systems, orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) systems, single-carrier frequency division multiple access (SC-FDMA) systems, and time division synchronous code division multiple access (TD-SCDMA) systems.
• CDMA code division multiple access
• TDMA time division multiple access
• FDMA frequency division multiple access
• OFDMA orthogonal frequency division multiple access
• SC-FDMA single-carrier frequency division multiple access
• TD-SCDMA time division synchronous code division multiple access
• LTE Long Term Evolution
• UMTS Universal Mobile Telecommunications System
• 3GPP Third Generation Partnership Project
• LTE is designed to support mobile broadband access through improved spectral efficiency, lowered costs, and improved services using OFDMA on the downlink, SC-FDMA on the uplink, and multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) antenna technology.
• MIMO multiple-input multiple-output
• Mobile devices may be out of network coverage, and thus may not be able to communicate with the network. However, a mobile device that is out of network coverage may still want to communicate with the network. Therefore, an approach for a mobile device out of network to communicate with the network is desired.
• a method, a computer-readable medium, and an apparatus are provided.
• the apparatus may be a UE.
• the apparatus receives one or more device-to-device (D2D) signals respectively from one or more proximate UEs.
• the apparatus measures signal strength of the one or more D2D signals based, at least in part, on at least one of signal strength of one or more resource elements used for receiving one or more reference signals of the one or more D2D signals or signal strength of one or more resource elements used for receiving one or more data parts of the one or more D2D signals.
• the apparatus may be a UE.
• the apparatus includes means for receiving one or more D2D signals respectively from one or more proximate UEs.
• the apparatus includes means for measuring signal strength of the one or more D2D signals based, at least in part, on at least one of signal strength of one or more resource elements used for receiving one or more reference signals of the one or more D2D signals or signal strength of one or more resource elements used for receiving one or more data parts of the one or more D2D signals.
• the apparatus may be a UE including a memory and at least one processor coupled to the memory.
• the at least one processor is configured to: receive one or more D2D signals respectively from one or more proximate UEs, and measure signal strength of the one or more D2D signals based, at least in part, on at least one of signal strength of one or more resource elements used for receiving one or more reference signals of the one or more D2D signals or signal strength of one or more resource elements used for receiving one or more data parts of the one or more D2D signals.
• a computer-readable medium storing computer executable code for wireless communication includes code to: receive one or more D2D signals respectively from one or more proximate UEs, and measure signal strength of the one or more D2D signals based, at least in part, on at least one of signal strength of one or more resource elements used for receiving one or more reference signals of the one or more D2D signals or signal strength of one or more resource elements used for receiving one or more data parts of the one or more D2D signals.
• FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating an example of a wireless communications system and an access network.
• FIGs. 2A, 2B, 2C, and 2D are diagrams illustrating LTE examples of a DL frame structure, DL channels within the DL frame structure, an UL frame structure, and UL channels within the UL frame structure, respectively.
• FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an example of an evolved Node B (eNB) and user equipment (UE) in an access network.
• eNB evolved Node B
• UE user equipment
• FIG. 5 is an example diagram illustrating communication between various UEs.
• FIG. 6 is a flowchart of a method of wireless communication.
• FIG. 7 is a flowchart of a method of wireless communication, expanding from the flowchart of FIG. 6.
• FIG. 9 is a diagram illustrating an example of a hardware implementation for an apparatus employing a processing system.
• processors include microprocessors, microcontrollers, graphics processing units (GPUs), central processing units (CPUs), application processors, digital signal processors (DSPs), reduced instruction set computing (RISC) processors, systems on a chip (SoC), baseband processors, field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), programmable logic devices (PLDs), state machines, gated logic, discrete hardware circuits, and other suitable hardware configured to perform the various functionality described throughout this disclosure.
• processors in the processing system may execute software.
• the functions described may be implemented in hardware, software, or any combination thereof. If implemented in software, the functions may be stored on or encoded as one or more instructions or code on a computer-readable medium.
• Computer-readable media includes computer storage media. Storage media may be any available media that can be accessed by a computer.
• such computer- readable media can comprise a random-access memory (RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), an electrically erasable programmable ROM (EEPROM), optical disk storage, magnetic disk storage, other magnetic storage devices, combinations of the aforementioned types of computer-readable media, or any other medium that can be used to store computer executable code in the form of instructions or data structures that can be accessed by a computer.
• RAM random-access memory
• ROM read-only memory
• EEPROM electrically erasable programmable ROM
• optical disk storage magnetic disk storage
• magnetic disk storage other magnetic storage devices
• combinations of the aforementioned types of computer-readable media or any other medium that can be used to store computer executable code in the form of instructions or data structures that can be accessed by a computer.
• FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating an example of a wireless communications system and an access network 100.
• the wireless communications system (also referred to as a wireless wide area network (WW AN)) includes base stations 102, UEs 104, and an Evolved Packet Core (EPC) 160.
• the base stations 102 may include macro cells (high power cellular base station) and/or small cells (low power cellular base station).
• the macro cells include eNBs.
• the small cells include femtocells, picocells, and microcells.
• the base stations 102 (collectively referred to as Evolved Universal Mobile
• the base stations 102 may perform one or more of the following functions: transfer of user data, radio channel ciphering and deciphering, integrity protection, header compression, mobility control functions (e.g., handover, dual connectivity), inter-cell interference coordination, connection setup and release, load balancing, distribution for non-access stratum (NAS) messages, NAS node selection, synchronization, radio access network (RAN) sharing, multimedia broadcast multicast service (MBMS), subscriber and equipment trace, RAN information management (RIM), paging, positioning, and delivery of warning messages.
• the base stations 102 may communicate directly or indirectly (e.g., through the EPC 160) with each other over backhaul links 134 (e.g., X2 interface).
• the backhaul links 134 may be wired or wireless.
• the base stations 102 may wirelessly communicate with the UEs 104. Each of the base stations 102 may provide communication coverage for a respective geographic coverage area 110. There may be overlapping geographic coverage areas 110. For example, the small cell 102' may have a coverage area 110' that overlaps the coverage area 110 of one or more macro base stations 102.
• a network that includes both small cell and macro cells may be known as a heterogeneous network.
• a heterogeneous network may also include Home Evolved Node Bs (eNBs) (HeNBs), which may provide service to a restricted group known as a closed subscriber group (CSG).
• eNBs Home Evolved Node Bs
• CSG closed subscriber group
• the carriers may or may not be adjacent to each other. Allocation of carriers may be asymmetric with respect to DL and UL (e.g., more or less carriers may be allocated for DL than for UL).
• the component carriers may include a primary component carrier and one or more secondary component carriers.
• a primary component carrier may be referred to as a primary cell (PCell) and a secondary component carrier may be referred to as a secondary cell (SCell).
• PCell primary cell
• SCell secondary cell
• the wireless communications system may further include a Wi-Fi access point
• AP 150 in communication with Wi-Fi stations (STAs) 152 via communication links 154 in a 5 GHz unlicensed frequency spectrum.
• STAs Wi-Fi stations
• communication links 154 in a 5 GHz unlicensed frequency spectrum.
• the STAs 152 / AP 150 may perform a clear channel assessment (CCA) prior to communicating in order to determine whether the channel is available.
• CCA clear channel assessment
• the EPC 160 may include a Mobility Management Entity (MME) 162, other MME 162, other MME 162, other MME 162, other MME 162, other MME
• the MMEs 164 may be in communication with a Home Subscriber Server (HSS) 174.
• HSS Home Subscriber Server
• the MME 162 is the control node that processes the signaling between the UEs 104 and the EPC 160.
• the MME 162 provides bearer and connection management. All user Internet protocol (IP) packets are transferred through the Serving Gateway 166, which itself is connected to the PDN Gateway 172.
• the PDN Gateway 172 provides UE IP address allocation as well as other functions.
• the PDN Gateway 172 and the BM-SC 170 are connected to the IP Services 176.
• the IP Services 176 may include the Internet, an intranet, an IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS), a PS Streaming Service (PSS), and/or other IP services.
• the BM-SC 170 may provide functions for MBMS user service provisioning and delivery.
• the BM-SC 170 may serve as an entry point for content provider MBMS transmission, may be used to authorize and initiate MBMS Bearer Services within a public land mobile network (PLMN), and may be used to schedule MBMS transmissions.
• PLMN public land mobile network
• the MBMS Gateway 168 may be used to distribute MBMS traffic to the base stations 102 belonging to a Multicast Broadcast Single Frequency Network (MBSFN) area broadcasting a particular service, and may be responsible for session management (start stop) and for collecting eMBMS related charging information.
• MMSFN Multicast Broadcast Single Frequency Network
• the base station may also be referred to as a Node B, evolved Node B (eNB), an access point, a base transceiver station, a radio base station, a radio transceiver, a transceiver function, a basic service set (BSS), an extended service set (ESS), or some other suitable terminology.
• the base station 102 provides an access point to the EPC 160 for a UE 104.
• Examples of UEs 104 include a cellular phone, a smart phone, a session initiation protocol (SIP) phone, a laptop, a personal digital assistant (PDA), a satellite radio, a global positioning system, a multimedia device, a video device, a digital audio player (e.g., MP3 player), a camera, a game console, a tablet, a smart device, a wearable device, or any other similar functioning device.
• SIP session initiation protocol
• PDA personal digital assistant
• satellite radio a global positioning system
• multimedia device e.g., a digital audio player (e.g., MP3 player), a camera, a game console, a tablet, a smart device, a wearable device, or any other similar functioning device.
• the UE 104 may also be referred to as a station, a mobile station, a subscriber station, a mobile unit, a subscriber unit, a wireless unit, a remote unit, a mobile device, a wireless device, a wireless communications device, a remote device, a mobile subscriber station, an access terminal, a mobile terminal, a wireless terminal, a remote terminal, a handset, a user agent, a mobile client, a client, or some other suitable terminology.
• the UE 104 may be configured to receive device-to-device signals from proximate UEs, measure signal strength of the proximate UEs based on the device-to-device signals, and select one of the proximate UEs as a relay UE based on the signal strength measurements, in order to communicate with the network via the relay UE (198).
• FIG. 2A is a diagram 200 illustrating an example of a DL frame structure in
• an RB contains 12 consecutive subcarriers in the frequency domain and 7 consecutive symbols (for DL, OFDM symbols; for UL, SC-FDMA symbols) in the time domain, for a total of 84 REs.
• an RB contains 12 consecutive subcarriers in the frequency domain and 6 consecutive symbols in the time domain, for a total of 72 REs.
• the number of bits carried by each RE depends on the modulation scheme.
• some of the REs carry DL reference (pilot) signals
• the DL-RS may include cell-specific reference signals (CRS) (also sometimes called common RS), UE-specific reference signals (UE-RS), and channel state information reference signals (CSI-RS).
• CRS cell-specific reference signals
• UE-RS UE-specific reference signals
• CSI-RS channel state information reference signals
• FIG. 2A illustrates CRS for antenna ports 0, 1, 2, and 3 (indicated as Ro, Ri, R2, and R3, respectively), UE-RS for antenna port 5 (indicated as R5), and CSI-RS for antenna port 15 (indicated as R).
• FIG. 2B illustrates an example of various channels within a DL subframe of a frame.
• the physical control format indicator channel (PCFICH) is within symbol 0 of slot 0, and carries a control format indicator (CFI) that indicates whether the physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) occupies 1, 2, or 3 symbols (FIG. 2B illustrates a PDCCH that occupies 3 symbols).
• the PDCCH carries downlink control information (DCI) within one or more control channel elements (CCEs), each CCE including nine RE groups (REGs), each REG including four consecutive REs in an OFDM symbol.
• DCI downlink control information
• CCEs control channel elements
• Each CCE including nine RE groups (REGs), each REG including four consecutive REs in an OFDM symbol.
• a UE may be configured with a UE- specific enhanced PDCCH (ePDCCH) that also carries DCI.
• the ePDCCH may have 2, 4, or 8 RB pairs (FIG. 2B shows two RB pairs, each subset including one RB pair).
• the physical hybrid automatic repeat request (ARQ) (HARQ) indicator channel (PHICH) is also within symbol 0 of slot 0 and carries the HARQ indicator (HI) that indicates HARQ acknowledgement (ACK) / negative ACK (NACK) feedback based on the physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH).
• the primary synchronization channel (PSCH) is within symbol 6 of slot 0 within subframes 0 and 5 of a frame, and carries a primary synchronization signal (PSS) that is used by a UE to determine subframe timing and a physical layer identity.
• the secondary synchronization channel is within symbol 5 of slot 0 within subframes 0 and 5 of a frame, and carries a secondary synchronization signal (SSS) that is used by a UE to determine a physical layer cell identity group number. Based on the physical layer identity and the physical layer cell identity group number, the UE can determine a physical cell identifier (PCI). Based on the PCI, the UE can determine the locations of the aforementioned DL-RS.
• the physical broadcast channel (PBCH) is within symbols 0, 1, 2, 3 of slot 1 of subframe 0 of a frame, and carries a master information block (MIB).
• the MIB provides a number of RBs in the DL system bandwidth, a PHICH configuration, and a system frame number (SFN).
• the physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) carries user data, broadcast system information not transmitted through the PBCH such as system information blocks (SIBs), and paging messages.
• SIBs system information blocks
• some of the REs carry demodulation reference signals
• DM-RS channel estimation at the eNB.
• the UE may additionally transmit sounding reference signals (SRS) in the last symbol of a subframe.
• SRS sounding reference signals
• the SRS may have a comb structure, and a UE may transmit SRS on one of the combs.
• the SRS may be used by an eNB for channel quality estimation to enable frequency- dependent scheduling on the UL.
• FIG. 2D illustrates an example of various channels within an UL subframe of a frame.
• a physical random access channel (PRACH) may be within one or more subframes within a frame based on the PRACH configuration.
• the PRACH may include six consecutive RB pairs within a subframe.
• the PRACH allows the UE to perform initial system access and achieve UL synchronization.
• PRACH physical random access channel
• FIG. 3 is a block diagram of an eNB 310 in communication with a UE 350 in an access network.
• IP packets from the EPC 160 may be provided to a controller/processor 375.
• the controller/processor 375 implements layer 3 and layer 2 functionality.
• Layer 3 includes a radio resource control (RRC) layer
• layer 2 includes a packet data convergence protocol (PDCP) layer, a radio link control (RLC) layer, and a medium access control (MAC) layer.
• RRC radio resource control
• PDCP packet data convergence protocol
• RLC radio link control
• MAC medium access control
• the controller/processor 375 provides RRC layer functionality associated with broadcasting of system information (e.g., MIB, SIBs), RRC connection control (e.g., RRC connection paging, RRC connection establishment, RRC connection modification, and RRC connection release), inter radio access technology (RAT) mobility, and measurement configuration for UE measurement reporting; PDCP layer functionality associated with header compression / decompression, security (ciphering, deciphering, integrity protection, integrity verification), and handover support functions; RLC layer functionality associated with the transfer of upper layer packet data units (PDUs), error correction through ARQ, concatenation, segmentation, and reassembly of RLC service data units (SDUs), re-segmentation of RLC data PDUs, and reordering of RLC data PDUs; and MAC layer functionality associated with mapping between logical channels and transport channels, multiplexing of MAC SDUs onto transport blocks (TBs), demuliplexing of MAC SDUs from TBs, scheduling information reporting, error
• Each stream may then be mapped to an OFDM subcarrier, multiplexed with a reference signal (e.g., pilot) in the time and/or frequency domain, and then combined together using an Inverse Fast Fourier Transform (IFFT) to produce a physical channel carrying a time domain OFDM symbol stream.
• the OFDM stream is spatially precoded to produce multiple spatial streams.
• Channel estimates from a channel estimator 374 may be used to determine the coding and modulation scheme, as well as for spatial processing.
• the channel estimate may be derived from a reference signal and/or channel condition feedback transmitted by the UE 350.
• Each spatial stream may then be provided to a different antenna 320 via a separate transmitter 318TX.
• Each transmitter 318TX may modulate an RF carrier with a respective spatial stream for transmission.
• each receiver 354RX receives a signal through its respective antenna 352.
• Each receiver 354RX recovers information modulated onto an RF carrier and provides the information to the receive (RX) processor 356.
• the TX processor 368 and the RX processor 356 implement layer 1 functionality associated with various signal processing functions.
• the RX processor 356 may perform spatial processing on the information to recover any spatial streams destined for the UE 350. If multiple spatial streams are destined for the UE 350, they may be combined by the RX processor 356 into a single OFDM symbol stream.
• the RX processor 356 then converts the OFDM symbol stream from the time-domain to the frequency domain using a Fast Fourier Transform (FFT).
• FFT Fast Fourier Transform
• the frequency domain signal comprises a separate OFDM symbol stream for each subcarrier of the OFDM signal.
• the symbols on each subcarrier, and the reference signal, are recovered and demodulated by determining the most likely signal constellation points transmitted by the eNB 310. These soft decisions may be based on channel estimates computed by the channel estimator 358.
• the soft decisions are then decoded and deinterleaved to recover the data and control signals that were originally transmitted by the eNB 310 on the physical channel.
• the data and control signals are then provided to the controller/processor 359, which implements layer 3 and layer 2 functionality.
• the controller/processor 359 can be associated with a memory 360 that stores program codes and data.
• the memory 360 may be referred to as a computer- readable medium.
• the controller/processor 359 provides demultiplexing between transport and logical channels, packet reassembly, deciphering, header decompression, and control signal processing to recover IP packets from the EPC 160.
• the controller/processor 359 is also responsible for error detection using an ACK and/or NACK protocol to support HARQ operations.
• the controller/processor 359 provides RRC layer functionality associated with system information (e.g., MIB, SIBs) acquisition, RRC connections, and measurement reporting; PDCP layer functionality associated with header compression / decompression, and security (ciphering, deciphering, integrity protection, integrity verification); RLC layer functionality associated with the transfer of upper layer PDUs, error correction through ARQ, concatenation, segmentation, and reassembly of RLC SDUs, re-segmentation of RLC data PDUs, and reordering of RLC data PDUs; and MAC layer functionality associated with mapping between logical channels and transport channels, multiplexing of MAC SDUs onto TBs, demuliplexing of MAC SDUs from TBs, scheduling information reporting, error correction through HARQ, priority handling, and logical channel prioritization.
• RRC layer functionality associated with system information (e.g., MIB, SIBs) acquisition, RRC connections, and measurement reporting
• PDCP layer functionality associated with header
• Channel estimates derived by a channel estimator 358 from a reference signal or feedback transmitted by the eNB 310 may be used by the TX processor 368 to select the appropriate coding and modulation schemes, and to facilitate spatial processing.
• the spatial streams generated by the TX processor 368 may be provided to different antenna 352 via separate transmitters 354TX. Each transmitter 354TX may modulate an RF carrier with a respective spatial stream for transmission.
• the UL transmission is processed at the eNB 310 in a manner similar to that described in connection with the receiver function at the UE 350.
• Each receiver 318RX receives a signal through its respective antenna 320.
• Each receiver 318RX recovers information modulated onto an RF carrier and provides the information to a RX processor 370.
• the controller/processor 375 can be associated with a memory 376 that stores program codes and data.
• the memory 376 may be referred to as a computer- readable medium.
• the controller/processor 375 provides demultiplexing between transport and logical channels, packet reassembly, deciphering, header decompression, control signal processing to recover IP packets from the UE 350. IP packets from the controller/processor 375 may be provided to the EPC 160.
• the controller/processor 375 is also responsible for error detection using an ACK and/or NACK protocol to support HARQ operations.
• FIG. 4 is a diagram of a device-to-device (D2D) communications system 460.
• the D2D communications system 460 includes a plurality of UEs 464, 466, 468, 470.
• the D2D communications system 460 may overlap with a cellular communications system, such as for example, a WW AN.
• Some of the UEs 464, 466, 468, 470 may communicate together in D2D communication using the DL/UL WW AN spectrum, some may communicate with the base station 462, and some may do both.
• the UEs 468, 470 are in D2D communication and the UEs 464, 466 are in D2D communication.
• the UEs 464, 466 are also communicating with the base station 462.
• the D2D communication may be through one or more sidelink channels, such as a physical sidelink broadcast channel (PSBCH), a physical sidelink discovery channel (PSDCH), a physical sidelink shared channel (PSSCH), and a physical sidelink control channel (PSCCH).
• sidelink channels such as a physical sidelink broadcast channel (PSBCH), a physical sidelink discovery channel (PSDCH), a physical sidelink shared channel (PSSCH), and a physical sidelink control channel (PSCCH).
• PSBCH physical sidelink broadcast channel
• PSDCH physical sidelink discovery channel
• PSSCH physical sidelink shared channel
• PSCCH physical sidelink control channel
• the exemplary methods and apparatuses discussed infra are applicable to any of a variety of wireless D2D communications systems, such as for example, a wireless device-to-device communication system based on FlashLinQ, WiMedia, Bluetooth, ZigBee, or Wi-Fi based on the IEEE 802.11 standard.
• a wireless device-to-device communication system based on FlashLinQ, WiMedia, Bluetooth, ZigBee, or Wi-Fi based on the IEEE 802.11 standard.
• the exemplary methods and apparatus are discussed within the context of LTE.
• one of ordinary skill in the art would understand that the exemplary methods and apparatuses are applicable more generally to a variety of other wireless device-to-device communication systems.
• one UE may perform D2D communication with another UE via a D2D link between the UEs.
• the D2D link may be a PC5 link. It may be beneficial to measure a quality of the D2D link (e.g., D2D link strength) between the UEs for various situations.
• a UE may measure qualities of the D2D links of proximate UEs that are near the UE to find a proximate UE having the best D2D link quality with the UE.
• the D2D link quality between UEs may be based on signal strength of communication between the UEs.
• the UE may connect to a proximate UE that provides the best D2D link quality with the UE, among the proximate UEs. Therefore, an effective approach to measure the D2D link quality between UEs is desired.
• a UE may be selected as a relay UE based on the D2D link quality.
• a UE that is out of coverage of a network or has a very weak connection to the network may be able to communicate with one or more UEs that are within the coverage of the network.
• the UE that is out of network coverage or has a very weak connection to the network may be referred to as a remote UE, hereinafter.
• the remote UE may be able to use another UE (e.g., a proximate UE) that is within the network coverage as a relay to communicate with the network.
• the remote UE that is out of the network coverage may be able to communicate with a proximate UE that is within the network coverage, where the proximate UE within the network coverage performs a relay function for the remote UE such that the remote UE may communicate with the network via the proximate UE within the network.
• the communication between the remote UE and the proximate UE within the network coverage may be performed via D2D communication.
• the remote UE may select one of the proximate UEs within the network coverage as a relay to communicate with the network.
• the UE may select a proximate UE that provides the best D2D link quality with the UE, based on measurements of the D2D link qualities between the remote UE outside the network coverage and the proximate UEs within the network coverage.
• FIG. 5 is an example diagram 500 illustrating communication between various components
• a base station 502 provides network coverage 504.
• a remote UE 506 is outside the network coverage 504, and thus cannot communicate with the base station 502.
• a proximate UE 508 and a proximate UE 510 are within the network coverage 504, and thus are capable of communicating with the base station 502.
• the remote UE 506 may communicate with the proximate UE 508 via a communication link LI A, and may communicate with the proximate UE 510 via a communication link L2A.
• LI A may be a D2D link between the remote UE 506 and the proximate UE 508, and L2A may be a D2D link between the remote UE 506 and the proximate UE 510.
• the proximate UE 508 may communicate with the base station 502 via a communication link LIB.
• the proximate UE 510 may communicate with the base station 502 via a communication link L2B.
• the remote UE 506 may communicate with the base station 502 via the proximate UE 508 performing as a relay for the remote UE 506, via the communication link L1A and the communication link LIB.
• the remote UE 506 may communicate with the base station 502 via the proximate 510 performing as a relay for the remote UE 506, via the communication link L2A and the communication link L2B.
• the remote UE 506 may measure D2D link qualities of the link LI A and L2A, and select one of the proximate UEs 508 and 510 as a relay UE based on the measurement of the D2D link qualities. For example, if the D2D link quality of the link LI A is better than the D2D link quality of the link L2A, the remote UE 506 may select the proximate UE 508 as a relay to communicate with the base station 502, via the link L1A and the link LIB.
• a UE may measure a quality of a
• the apparatus may include additional components that perform each of the blocks of the algorithm in the aforementioned flowcharts of FIGs. 6 and 7. As such, each block in the aforementioned flowcharts of FIGs. 6 and 7 may be performed by a component and the apparatus may include one or more of those components.
• the components may be one or more hardware components specifically configured to carry out the stated processes/algorithm, implemented by a processor configured to perform the stated processes/algorithm, stored within a computer-readable medium for implementation by a processor, or some combination thereof.

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