WO2020150871A1

WO2020150871A1 - Discontinuous reception configuration of terminal device

Info

Publication number: WO2020150871A1
Application number: PCT/CN2019/072575
Authority: WO
Inventors: Nitin MANGALVEDHE; Rapeepat Ratasuk; Srinivasan Selvaganapathy; Jussi-Pekka Koskinen; Haitao Li
Original assignee: Nokia Shanghai Bell Co., Ltd.; Nokia Solutions And Networks Oy; Nokia Technologies Oy
Priority date: 2019-01-21
Filing date: 2019-01-21
Publication date: 2020-07-30
Also published as: CN113632585A

Abstract

Embodiments of the present disclosure relate to discontinuous reception configuration. A method comprises determining, at a terminal device, a first configuration associated with discontinuous reception based on parameters related to the configuration receiving from a network device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval of the discontinuous reception for the terminal device; determining, based on the first configuration, a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception of a further terminal device, the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval of the discontinuous reception for the further terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval; and transmitting the second configuration associated with discontinuous reception to the further terminal device. In this way, the power consumption of in-coverage terminal device is reduced by optimizing the paging time for the out-of-coverage terminal device.

Description

DISCONTINUOUS RECEPTION CONFIGURATION OF TERMINAL DEVICE

FIELD

Embodiments of the present disclosure generally relate to the field of telecommunication and in particular, to a discontinuous reception configuration of the terminal device.

BACKGROUND

Narrowband Internet of Things (NB-IoT) and Enhanced Machine-Type Communication (eMTC) technology were specified in Release 13 and enhanced in Release 14 and Release 15. NB-IoT and eMTC are a low-power technology intended for delay-tolerant, low-data-rate applications and for very long battery life. The technology supports coverage enhancement to support devices that may experience a high path loss. Further enhancements of the technology are planned in Release 16. One of the enhancements includes the use of User Equipment (UE) relays to further extend coverage. Discontinuous Reception (DRX) and Extended Discontinuous Reception (eDRX) are supported for Narrowband Internet of the Thing (NB-IoT) and eMTC UEs and are important to reduce UE power consumption. Wake-up signal (WUS) operation is also introduced in Release 15 to enable UEs to save power by monitoring paging only when they receive indication through the WUS, the monitoring and detection of which is a low-power operation.

NB-IoT and eMTC devices used for metering services may be deployed in locations experiencing a large penetration loss from the best serving base station, such as in basements or in closets deep inside a building. Alternatively, devices may be used in areas with network deployment. In such cases, the devices may be out of network coverage. A potential solution is to employ relaying through other NB-IoT and eMTC UEs that are within network coverage. Both the in-coverage and out-of-coverage UEs may use DRX to reduce power consumption. The DRX configurations, however, should enable the network to reach the out-of-coverage UE for paging and subsequent connection establishment.

SUMMARY

In general, example embodiments of the present disclosure provide a solution for the DRX configuration of the terminal device.

In a first aspect, there is provided a method for discontinuous reception. The method comprises determining, at a terminal device, a first configuration associated with discontinuous reception based on parameters related to the configuration receiving from a network device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval of the discontinuous reception for the terminal device; determining, based on the first configuration, a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception of a further terminal device, the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval of the discontinuous reception for the further terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval; and transmitting the second configuration associated with discontinuous reception to the further terminal device.

In a second aspect, there is provided a method for discontinuous reception. The method comprises receiving, at a terminal device out of a coverage of a network device, a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception from a further terminal device in the coverage of the network device, the second configuration being determined based on a first configuration associated with the discontinuous reception of the further terminal device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval for the further terminal device and the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval for the terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval; and determining a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message based on the second configuration associated with the discontinuous reception.

In a third aspect, there is provided a device for discontinuous reception. The device comprises at least one processor; and at least one memory including computer program codes; the at least one memory and the computer program codes are configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the device at least to determine, at a terminal device, a first configuration associated with discontinuous reception based on parameters related to the configuration receiving from a network device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval of the discontinuous reception for the terminal device; determine, based on the first configuration, a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception of a further terminal device, the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval of the discontinuous reception for the further terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval; and transmit the second configuration associated with discontinuous reception to the further terminal device.

In a fourth aspect, there is provided a device for discontinuous reception. The device comprises at least one processor; and at least one memory including computer program codes; the at least one memory and the computer program codes are configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the device at least to receive, at a terminal device out of a coverage of a network device, a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception from a further terminal device in the coverage of the network device, the second configuration being determined based on a first configuration associated with the discontinuous reception of the further terminal device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval for the further terminal device and the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval for the terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval; and determine a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message based on the second configuration associated with the discontinuous reception.

In a fifth aspect, there is provided an apparatus comprising means to perform the steps of the method according to the first aspect. The apparatus comprises means for determining, at a terminal device, a first configuration associated with discontinuous reception based on parameters related to the configuration receiving from a network device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval of the discontinuous reception for the terminal device; means for determining, based on the first configuration, a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception of a further terminal device, the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval of the discontinuous reception for the further terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval; and means for transmitting the second configuration associated with discontinuous reception to the further terminal device.

In a sixth aspect, there is provided an apparatus comprising means to perform the steps of the method according to the second aspect. The apparatus comprises means for receiving, at a terminal device out of a coverage of a network device, a second configuration associated with the discontinuous reception from a further terminal device in the coverage of the network device, the second configuration being determined based on a first configuration associated with the discontinuous reception of the further terminal device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval for the further terminal device and the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval for the terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval; and means for determining a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message based on the second configuration associated with the discontinuous reception.

In a seventh aspect, there is provided a computer readable medium having a computer program stored thereon which, when executed by at least one processor of a device, causes the device to carry out the method according to the first aspect.

In an eighth aspect, there is provided a computer readable medium having a computer program stored thereon which, when executed by at least one processor of a device, causes the device to carry out the method according to the second aspect.

It is to be understood that the summary section is not intended to identify key or essential features of embodiments of the present disclosure, nor is it intended to be used to limit the scope of the present disclosure. Other features of the present disclosure will become easily comprehensible through the following description.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Some example embodiments will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings, where:

FIG. 1 shows an example network 100 in which example embodiments of the present disclosure can be implemented;

FIG. 2 shows a diagram of an example process 200 of the discontinuous reception for the terminal device according to some example embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 3 shows a diagram of a time interval for discontinuous reception according to some example embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 4 shows a diagram of a time interval for discontinuous reception according to some example embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 5 shows a diagram of a time interval for discontinuous reception according to some example embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 6 shows a flowchart of an example method 600 of the discontinuous reception for the terminal device according to some example embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 7 shows a flowchart of an example method 700 of the discontinuous reception for the terminal device according to some example embodiments of the present disclosure;

FIG. 8 is a simplified block diagram of a device that is suitable for implementing example embodiments of the present disclosure; and

Fig. 9 illustrates a block diagram of an example computer readable medium in accordance with some embodiments of the present disclosure.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Principle of the present disclosure will now be described with reference to some example embodiments. It is to be understood that these embodiments are described only for the purpose of illustration and help those skilled in the art to understand and implement the present disclosure, without suggesting any limitation as to the scope of the disclosure. The disclosure described herein can be implemented in various manners other than the ones described below.

In the following description and claims, unless defined otherwise, all technical and scientific terms used herein have the same meaning as commonly understood by one of ordinary skills in the art to which this disclosure belongs.

As used herein, the term “communication network” refers to a network that follows any suitable communication standards or protocols such as long term evolution (LTE) , LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) and 5G NR, and employs any suitable communication technologies, including, for example, Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) , OFDM, time division multiplexing (TDM) , frequency division multiplexing (FDM) , code division multiplexing (CDM) , Bluetooth, ZigBee, machine type communication (MTC) , eMBB, mMTC and uRLLC technologies. For the purpose of discussion, in some embodiments, the LTE network, the LTE-Anetwork, the 5G NR network or any combination thereof is taken as an example of the communication network.

As used herein, the term “network device” refers to any suitable device at a network side of a communication network. The network device may include any suitable device in an access network of the communication network, for example, including a base station (BS) , a relay, an access point (AP) , a node B (NodeB or NB) , an evolved NodeB (eNodeB or eNB) , a 5G or next generation NodeB (gNB) , a Remote Radio Module (RRU) , a radio header (RH) , a remote radio head (RRH) , a low power node such as a femto, a pico, and the like. For the purpose of discussion, in some embodiments, the eNB is taken as an example of the network device.

The network device may also include any suitable device in a core network, for example, including multi-standard radio (MSR) radio equipment such as MSR BSs, network controllers such as radio network controllers (RNCs) or base station controllers (BSCs) , Multi-cell/multicast Coordination Entities (MCEs) , Mobile Switching Centers (MSCs) and MMEs, Operation and Management (O&M) nodes, Operation Support System (OSS) nodes, Self-Organization Network (SON) nodes, positioning nodes, such as Enhanced Serving Mobile Position Centers (E-SMLCs) , and/or Mobile Data Terminals (MDTs) .

As used herein, the term “terminal device” refers to a device capable of, configured for, arranged for, and/or operable for communications with a network device or a further terminal device in a communication network. The communications may involve transmitting and/or receiving wireless signals using electromagnetic signals, radio waves, infrared signals, and/or other types of signals suitable for conveying information over air. In some embodiments, the terminal device may be configured to transmit and/or receive information without direct human interaction. For example, the terminal device may transmit information to the network device on predetermined schedules, when triggered by an internal or external event, or in response to requests from the network side.

Examples of the terminal device include, but are not limited to, user equipment (UE) such as smart phones, wireless-enabled tablet computers, laptop-embedded equipment (LEE) , laptop-mounted equipment (LME) , and/or wireless customer-premises equipment (CPE) . For the purpose of discussion, in the following, some embodiments will be described with reference to UEs as examples of the terminal devices, and the terms “terminal device” and “user equipment” (UE) may be used interchangeably in the context of the present disclosure.

As used herein, the term “cell” refers to an area covered by radio signals transmitted by a network device. The terminal device within the cell may be served by the network device and access the communication network via the network device.

As used herein, the term “circuitry” may refer to one or more or all of the following:

(a) hardware-only circuit implementations (such as implementations in only analog and/or digital circuitry) and

(b) combinations of hardware circuits and software, such as (as applicable) : (i) a combination of analog and/or digital hardware circuit (s) with software/firmware and (ii) any portions of hardware processor (s) with software (including digital signal processor (s) ) , software, and memory (ies) that work together to cause an apparatus, such as a mobile phone or server, to perform various functions) and

(c) hardware circuit (s) and or processor (s) , such as a microprocessor (s) or a portion of a microprocessor (s) , that requires software (e.g., firmware) for operation, but the software may not be present when it is not needed for operation.

This definition of circuitry applies to all uses of this term in this application, including in any claims. As a further example, as used in this application, the term circuitry also covers an implementation of merely a hardware circuit or processor (or multiple processors) or portion of a hardware circuit or processor and its (or their) accompanying software and/or firmware. The term circuitry also covers, for example and if applicable to the particular claim element, a baseband integrated circuit or processor integrated circuit for a mobile device or a similar integrated circuit in server, a cellular network device, or other computing or network device.

As used herein, the singular forms “a” , “an” , and “the” are intended to include the plural forms as well, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise. The term “includes” and its variants are to be read as open terms that mean “includes, but is not limited to” . The term “based on” is to be read as “based at least in part on” . The term “one embodiment” and “an embodiment” are to be read as “at least one embodiment” . The term “another embodiment” is to be read as “at least one other embodiment” . Other definitions, explicit and implicit, may be included below.

FIG. 1 illustrates a communication environment 100 in which embodiments of the present disclosure can be implemented. The communication environment 100 may comply with any suitable protocol or standard that already exists or will be developed in the future. In some embodiments, the communication environment 100 may be the LTE (or LTE-A) network, the NR network or combination thereof.

The communication environment 100 may comprise a network device 110 and terminal devices 120-1 and 120-2. The network device 110 may provide wireless connections for a terminal device 120-1 (hereafter also referred to as UE 120-1) within the coverage 125 of the network device 110 and a terminal device 120-2 (hereafter also referred to as UE 120-2) out of the coverage 125 of the network device 110. The terminal device 120-1 may communicate with the network device 110 via a wireless transmission channel 105. In addition, the terminal device 120-1 may communicate with the terminal device 120-2 via another wireless transmission channel 115.

It is to be understood that the number of network devices and the number of terminal devices as shown in FIG. 1 are only for the purpose of illustration without suggesting any limitations. The communication environment 100 may include any suitable number of network devices and any suitable number of terminal devices adapted for implementing embodiments of the present disclosure. In addition, it would be appreciated that there may be various wireless communications as well as wireline communications (if needed) among these additional network devices and additional terminal devices.

The communications in the communication environment 100 may conform to any suitable standards including, but not limited to, Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) , Extended Coverage Global System for Mobile Internet of Things (EC-GSM-IoT) , Long Term Evolution (LTE) , LTE-Evolution, LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) , Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (WCDMA) , Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) , GSM EDGE Radio Access Network (GERAN) , and the like.

Furthermore, the communications in the communication environment 100 may be performed according to any generation communication protocols either currently known or to be developed in the future. Examples of the communication protocols include, but not limited to, the first generation (1G) , the second generation (2G) , 2.5G, 2.75G, the third generation (3G) , the fourth generation (4G) , 4.5G, the fifth generation (5G) communication protocols.

By way of illustrative example, the various example implementations or techniques described herein may be applied to various terminal devices, such as machine type communication (MTC) terminal devices, enhanced machine type communication (eMTC) terminal devices, Internet of Things (IoT) terminal devices, and/or narrowband IoT terminal devices.

IoT may refer to an ever-growing group of objects that may have Internet or network connectivity, so that these objects may send information to and receive information from other network devices. For example, many sensor type applications or devices may monitor a physical condition or a status, and may send a report to a server or other network device, for example, when an event occurs. Machine Type Communications (MTC, or Machine to Machine communications) may, for example, be characterized by fully automatic data generation, exchange, processing and actuation among intelligent machines, with or without intervention of humans.

Also, in an example implementation, a terminal device or UE may be a UE/terminal device with URLLC applications. A cell (or cells) may include a number of terminal devices connected to the cell, including terminal devices of different types or different categories, for example, including the categories of MTC, NB-IoT, URLLC, or other UE category.

The various example implementations may be applied to a wide variety of wireless technologies or wireless networks, such as LTE, LTE-A, 5G, cmWave, and/or mmWave band networks, IoT, MTC, eMTC, URLLC, and the like, or any other wireless network or wireless technology. These example networks or technologies are provided only as illustrative examples, and the various example implementations may be applied to any wireless technology/wireless network.

Discontinuous Reception (DRX) and Extended Discontinuous Reception (eDRX) are supported for Narrowband Internet of the Thing (NB-IoT) UEs and are important to reduce UE power consumption. Wake-up signal (WUS) operation is also introduced in Release 15 to enable UEs to save power by monitoring paging only when they receive indication through the WUS, the monitoring and detection of which is a low-power operation.

NB-IoT devices used for metering services may be deployed in locations experiencing a large penetration loss from the best serving base station, such as in basements or in closets deep inside a building. Alternatively, devices may be used in areas with network deployment. In such cases, the devices may be out of network coverage or in poor network coverage. A potential solution is to employ relaying through other NB-IoT UEs or relay nodes (for example, relay eNBs) that are within network coverage or with better network coverage. For example, a UE with poor network coverage may be better off connecting to another UE in good network coverage and relaying its data through the other UE rather than connecting to the network directly. Both the in-coverage and out-of-coverage UEs may use DRX to reduce power consumption. The DRX configurations, however, should enable the network to reach the out-of-coverage UE for paging and subsequent connection establishment.

Conventionally, the cell-specific and UE-specific DRX configurations may be specified for the terminal device in the coverage of a cell. As shown in FIG. 1, the terminal device 120-1 may obtain its DRX configuration directly from the network device 110. For an out-of-coverage terminal device, for example, the terminal device 120-2, the paging procedure initiated by the network device 110 may be performed through an in-coverage terminal device, i.e. the terminal device 120-1. For example, the terminal device 120-1 may monitor the paging at its paging occasion. The network device 110 may also performs DRX configuration for the terminal device 120-2 through the terminal device 120-1.

Furthermore, the network device 110 may configure the Wake-Up signal (WUS) for all terminal devices in its coverage 125.

As mentioned above, the DRX configuration for the out-of-coverage terminal device is configured by the network device. However, the network device 110 does not communicate with the out-of-coverage terminal device 120-2 directly and thus the paging from the network device to the out-of-coverage terminal device has to be forwarded by a suitable in-coverage terminal or relay device. In a case that the in-coverage terminal device acts as a relay for the out-of-coverage terminal device and the communication between the in-coverage terminal device and the out-of-coverage terminal device may be based on D2D sidelink, the in-coverage terminal device may transmit synchronization and broadcast signals to the out-of-coverage terminal device. The in-coverage terminal device may assist the out-of-coverage terminal device in registration, tracking area update, etc. Currently, the DRX configuration for the in-coverage terminal device is not taken into consideration when the conventional DRX configuration for the out-of-coverage terminal device is configured.

The present disclosure proposes an approach for configuring DRX for the out-of-coverage terminal device when both the in-coverage terminal device and the out-of-coverage terminal device are operated in an NB-IoT system. The in-coverage terminal device may determine the DRX configuration of the out-of-coverage terminal device based on its own DRX configuration. The offset between the time period, in which the in-coverage terminal device and the out-of-coverage terminal device may monitor the paging message, may be taken into consideration to determine the DRX configuration of the out-of-coverage terminal device. In this way, the power consumption of in-coverage terminal device is reduced by optimizing the paging time for the out-of-coverage terminal device.

Furthermore, this approach can also be used to coordinate data transmission between the network and out-of-coverage terminal when paging is not needed on the sidelink. In this case, the DRX or WUS configuration of the relay and out-of-coverage terminal devices can be coordinated such that the out-of-coverage terminal is active based on the relay terminal DRX or WUS configuration.

Principle and implementations of the present disclosure will be described in detail below with reference to FIG. 2, which shows a process 200 according to example embodiments of the present disclosure. For the purpose of discussion, the process 200 will be described with reference to FIG. 1. The process 200 may involve DRX configurations for the terminal device.

As shown in FIG. 2, the terminal device 120-1 determines 205 the configuration associated with the discontinuous reception for itself based on one of more parameters related to the configuration receiving from the network device 110.

In some embodiments, the terminal device 120-1 may receive one or more parameters for determining the following: the length of the DRX cycle, a start position of the paging frame and a start position of the paging occasion. For example, in LTE, the paging occasion (PO) and paging frame (PF) are determined using the DRX parameters defaultPagingCycle and nB provided by the network. The PF is determined using the following equation: SFN mod T = (T div N) * (UE_ID mod N) where T is the DRX cycle of the UE derived from the parameter defaultPagingCycle, N = min (T, nB) where nB is parameter provided by the network, and UE_ID is the device identifier. The PO is determined using a table whose index is given by i_s= floor (UE_ID/N) mode Ns where Ns = max (1, nB/T) . In another example, in NR, the the paging occasion (PO) and paging frame (PF) are determined using the parameters defaultPagingCycle, nAndPagingFrameOffset and ns provided by the network.

In some embodiments, the DRX configuration may at least indicate a time interval for discontinuous reception of the terminal device 120-1. In some embodiments, the term “configuration associated with the discontinuous reception” may refer to the configuration of Discontinuous Reception (DRX) or configuration of Extended Discontinuous Reception (eDRX) . A terminal device may support both of DRX and eDRX or one of them.

In some embodiments, the DRX configuration may be referred to as RRC_IDLE DRX configuration, which may indicate the time period for the terminal device 120-1 to monitor a paging message from the network device 110.

In some embodiments, in a case of the configuration is the DRX configuration, the time interval of the terminal device 120-1 may be referred to as a DRX cycle. The DRX cycle may comprise a paging frame with a paging occasion. The paging frame indicates a time period (radio frame) for the terminal device 120-1, in which the terminal device 120-1 may start monitoring an incoming paging message. The paging occasion indicates a time period (subframe) within the paging frame for the terminal device 120-1 in which the terminal device 120-1 may start receiving a paging message.

In this case, the terminal device 120-1 may determine at least one of the following: the length of the DRX cycle, a start position of the paging frame and a start position of the paging occasion.

Based on the received DRX configuration of the terminal device 120-1, the terminal device 120-1 determines 210 the DRX configuration of the terminal device 120-2, which is located out of the coverage 125 of the network device 110. The DRX configuration of the terminal device 120-2 may at least indicate a time interval of DRX for the terminal device 120-2. The DRX time interval for the terminal device 120-2 may have offset from the DRX time interval for the terminal device 120-1.

In some embodiments, the terminal device 120-1 may determine the offset based on the time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the terminal device 120-2. The terminal device 120-1 may determine the start position of the paging frame in the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-2 based on the determined offset and the start position of the paging frame in the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-1.

FIG. 3 shows an example of the offset between the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-1 and the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-2.

As shown in FIG. 3, the DRX cycle 311 of the terminal device 120-1 may comprising a paging frame 310-1. In general, a DRX cycle may refer to a time period starting from the start position of a paging frame 310-1 to the start position ora next paging frame 310-2. The DRX cycle 321 of the terminal device 120-2 may comprise a paging frame 320-1.

As described above, the terminal device 120-1 may determine the offset 330 based on the time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the terminal device 120-2.

In some embodiments, for determining the offset, the terminal device 120-1 may determine a first time length for processing the paging message from the network device 110 to the terminal device 120-2 by the terminal device 120-1. The terminal device may also determine a second time length for generating a paging message for the terminal device 120-2. The terminal device 120-1 may determine the offset based on at least one of the first time length and the second time length.

Furthermore, in order to provide multiple paging opportunities to the terminal device 120-1 for paging the terminal device 120-2. The terminal device 120-1 may determine the relationship between the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-1 and the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-2. For example, the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-1 and the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-2 may have a certain relationship, for example, the relationship is N: 1, which means during one DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-1, there are N DRX cycles of the terminal device 120-2 for monitoring the paging message.

In some embodiments, the terminal device 120-1 may also determine the length of the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-2 based on the length of the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-1. For example, the length of the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-2 may equal to the length of the length of the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-1.

In some embodiments, if a WUS operation is enabled in the cell and both the terminal device 120-1 and the terminal device 120-2 support the WUS, the time interval for DRX of the terminal device 120-1 may be referred to as a DRX cycle. The DRX cycle may comprise a paging occasion. Meanwhile, the terminal device 120-1 may also receive the WUS configuration from the network device. The WUS configuration may comprise a wake-up occasion indicating a time period (subframe) for the terminal device 120-1, in which the terminal device 120-1 may start receiving wake up signal. The wake up signal may wake up the terminal device 120-1 from an idle state. The paging occasion may indicate a time period for the terminal device 120-1, in which the terminal device 120-1 may start receiving a paging message.

Furthermore, if the both the terminal device 120-1 and the terminal device 120-2 support the WUS, there is a gap between the wake-up occasion and the paging occasion. The requirement for the minimum gap may be preconfigured based on the WUS configuration of the terminal device 120-1.

In this case, the terminal device 120-1 may determine at least one of the following: the length of the DRX cycle and a start position of the paging occasion.

In this case, the terminal device 120-1 may also receive a starting position of a paging frame. The paging occasion may be included in the paging frame.

Similarly, based on the received DRX configuration of the terminal device 120-1, the terminal device 120-1 determines the DRX configuration of the terminal device 120-2, which is located out of the coverage 125 of the network device 110. The DRX configuration of the terminal device 120-2 may at least indicate a DRX cycle for the terminal device 120-2 comprising a paging occasion.

In some embodiments, based on the minimum gap requirement of the terminal device 120-2, the terminal device 120-1 determines the WUS configuration of the terminal device 120-2. The WUS configuration of the terminal device 120-2 may at least indicate a wake-up occasion.

In general, the DRX configuration for the terminal device 120-2 may depend on the DRX configuration for the terminal device 120-1, the WUS configuration and the capabilities of the terminal device 120-2.

In some embodiments, the WUS configuration of the terminal device 120-2 may be configured by the network device 110 and forwarded from the terminal device 120-1 to the terminal device 120-2.

In some embodiments, the terminal device 120-1 may transmit the WUS for the the terminal device 120-2 on a sidelink between the terminal device 120-1 and the terminal device 120-2. Correspondingly, the terminal device 120-2 may monitor the WUS at the wake-up occasion on the sidelink.

In some embodiments, the terminal device 120-1 may determine the offset based on the time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the terminal device 120-2. The terminal device 120-1 may determine the start position of the paging occasion in the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-2 based on the determined offset and the start position of the paging occasion in the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-1.

FIG. 4 shows an example of the offset between the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-1 and the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-2.

As shown in FIG. 4, the terminal device 120-1 may be configured with a wake-up occasion 410 and the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-1 may comprise a gap 411 and a paging occasion 412, while the DRX cycle of the terminal device 120-2 may comprise a wake-up occasion 420, a gap 421 and a paging occasion 422. The terminal device 120-1 may determine the offset 430 and determine the start position of the paging occasion 422 based on the offset 430 and the start position of the paging occasion 412.

In some embodiments, the length of the gap 421 of the terminal device 120-2 may be different from the length of the gap 411 of the terminal device 411.

In some embodiments, in a case that the WUS is supported, the offset 430 may be larger than the offset in the case that the WUS is not supported, such as the offset 330.

In some embodiments, the offset 430 may be configured depending on whether the WUS operation is used and the WUS configuration of the terminal device 120-2.

In some embodiments, the offset 430 may be implicitly obtained from the value configured without WUS taking into account the WUS configuration details such as WUS transmission time and gap of the terminal device 120-2. As mentioned above, the configuration associated with the discontinuous reception may be a eDRX configuration. In a case of the configuration is the eDRX configuration, the eDRX cycle includes a paging time window (PTW) comprising one or more DRX cycles. It should be understood that the device configured with eDRX configuration may be the terminal device 120-1 or other in-coverage terminal device (not shown in FIG. 1) . Assuming that the terminal device 120-1 may also support eDRX, the terminal device 120-1 may determine the paging message in one of the DRX cycles within the PTW.

In some embodiments, the terminal device 120-1 may determine the start time point and the end time point of the PTW of the terminal device 120-1 as part of the eDRX configuration.

In some embodiments, with the same eDRX cycle, the terminal device 120-1 may determine the eDRX configuration of the terminal device 120-2 based on the eDRX configuration of the terminal device 120-1. The eDRX configuration of the terminal device 120-2 may at least indicate the PTW of the terminal device 120-2.

In some embodiments, the terminal device 120-1 may determine the offset based on a time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the terminal device 120-2. The terminal device 120-1 may determine the start time point of the PTW of the terminal device 120-2 based on the offset and the start time point of the PTW of the terminal device 120-1.

FIG. 5 shows an example of the offset between the eDRX of the terminal device 120-1 and the eDRX of the terminal device 120-2.

As shown in FIG. 5, the eDRX 510 of the terminal device 120-1 may comprise a PTW 540 while the eDRX 520 of the terminal device 120-2 may comprise a PTW 550. The terminal device 120-1 may determine the offset 530 as described above and determine the start time point of the PTW 550 based on the start time point of the PTW 540 and the offset 530.

In some embodiments, the

PTWs

540 and 550 may be overlapping to allow the terminal device 120-2 to be paged directly by the network device 110 when it is paging the terminal device 120-1 and to allow the terminal device 120-1 to page the terminal device 120-2 during the PTW of the terminal device 120-1.

Then, the terminal device 120-1 transmits 215 the DRX and eDRX configurations for the terminal device 120-2 to the terminal device 120-2.

The terminal device 120-2 may determine the time period for receiving the paging message based on the received eDRX and DRX configurations.

Once the DRX and eDRX configuration is completed at the terminal device 120-2, the terminal device 120-2 may transmit 220 a message to the terminal device 120-1 to indicate that the DRX and eDRX configuration is successful. The terminal device 120-1 may forward 225 the message to the network device 110. Thus, the DRX and eDRX configuration of the terminal device 120-2 may be transparent to the network device 110.

In some embodiments, the network device 110 may determine which in-coverage terminal devices are allowed to transmit paging for out-of-coverage terminal device based on a radio quality threshold when the paging transmission is allowed. For example, the terminal devices having a value of Reference Signal Received Power (RSRP) less than the radio quality threshold, which means that the terminal devices may be located at the edge of the cell, may be selected as the in-coverage terminal device allowed to transmit paging for out-of-coverage terminal device.

In some embodiments, the network device 110 may also configure the resources for transmitting the paging message from the specified resource pool. The out-of-coverage terminal device may monitor the configured resources all the time. Alternatively, the out-of-coverage terminal device may also monitor the configured resources when other signals can be received, for example, discovery/broadcast/data from the in-coverage terminal device.

In this way, the power consumption of in-coverage terminal device is reduced by optimizing the paging time for the out-of-coverage terminal device. Meanwhile, the present disclosure also enables WUS operation to be used for the out-of-coverage terminal device with a WUS configuration that is optimized to save power for the in-coverage terminal device.

More details of the example embodiments in accordance with the present disclosure will be described with reference to FIGs. 6-7.

FIG. 6 shows a flowchart of an example method 600 for discontinuous reception configuration of a terminal device according to some example embodiments of the present disclosure. The method 600 can be implemented at the terminal device 120-1 as shown in FIGs. 1-2. For the purpose of discussion, the method 600 will be described with reference to FIGs. 1-2.

As shown in FIG. 6, at 610, the terminal device 120-1 determines a first configuration associated with discontinuous reception based on parameters related to the configuration receiving from a network device 110. The first configuration at least indicates a first time interval for the terminal device.

In some embodiments, the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging frame with a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device 120-1 to start receiving a paging message, the terminal device 120-1 may receive at least one of the following: a first length of the first DRX cycle; a first start position of the first paging frame in the first DRX cycle; and a first start position of the first paging occasion in the first paging frame.

In some embodiments, the terminal device 110-1 is configured with a first wake-up occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to receive wake up signal, the first configuration is a first Discontinuous Reception, DRX configuration and the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, the terminal device 120-1 may receive at least one of the following: a first length of the first DRX cycle and a first start position of the first paging occasion.

In some embodiments, the first configuration is a first Extended Discontinuous Reception, eDRX configuration, the first time interval comprises a first Paging Time Window (PTW) , the first PTW indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, the terminal device 120-1 may receive at least one of the following: a first start time point of the first PTW; and a first end time point of the first PTW.

At 620, the terminal device 120-1 determine a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception of a further terminal device 120-2 110 based on the first configuration. The second configuration at least indicates a second time interval for the further terminal device 120-2. The second time interval has an offset from the first time interval.

In some embodiments, the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging frame with a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device 120-1 to start receiving a paging message, the terminal device 120-1 may obtain a first start position of a first paging frame and a first start position of the first paging occasion in the first DRX cycle, determine the offset based on a time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the further terminal device 120-2 and determine, based on the first start position of the first paging frame, the first start position of the first paging occasion and the offset, a second start position of a second paging frame in a second DRX cycle and a second start position of a second paging occasion in the second DRX cycle.

In some embodiments, the terminal device 110-1 is configured with a first wake-up occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to receive wake up signal, the first configuration is a first Discontinuous Reception, DRX configuration and the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, the terminal device 120-1 may obtain a first start position of the first paging occasion in the first DRX cycle, determine the offset based on a time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the further terminal device and determine a second start position of a second paging occasion in a second DRX cycle based on the first start position of the first paging occasion and the offset.

In some embodiments, the first configuration is a first Extended Discontinuous Reception, eDRX configuration, the first time interval comprises a first Paging Time Window (PTW) , the first PTW indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, the terminal device 120-1 may obtain a first start time point of the first PTW; determine the offset based on a time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the further terminal device and determine, based on the first start time point and the offset value, a second start time point of the second PTW.

In some embodiments, the terminal device 120-1 may determine a first time length for processing the paging message from the network device to the further terminal device by the terminal device and a second time length for generating a paging message for the further terminal device. The terminal device 120-1 may also determine the offset based on at least one of the first time length and the second time length.

In some embodiments, the terminal device 120-1 may determine a first time length for processing the paging message from the network device to the further terminal device by the terminal device, a second time length for generating a paging message for the further terminal device and a third time length for transmitting the wake-up signal followed by a gap before the paging message. The terminal device 120-1 may also determine the offset based on at least one of the first time length, the second time length and the third length.

In some embodiments, the terminal device 120-1 may obtain a first length of the first DRX cycle and determine a second length of the second DRX cycle based on the first length.

At 630, the terminal device 120-1 transmits the second DRX configuration to the further terminal device 120-2.

FIG. 7 shows a flowchart of an example method 700 for configuration associated with discontinuous reception of a terminal device according to some example embodiments of the present disclosure. The method 700 can be implemented at the terminal device 120-2 as shown in FIGs. 1-2. For the purpose of discussion, the method 700 will be described with reference to FIGs. 1-2.

In some embodiments, the example method 700 can be used for DRX or eDRX configuration of an out-of-coverage terminal device according to some example embodiments of the present disclosure.

As shown in FIG. 7, at 710, the terminal device 120-2 receives a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception from a further terminal device 120-1. The second configuration is determined based on a first configuration associated with the discontinuous reception of the further terminal device 120-1. The first configuration at least indicates a first time interval for the further terminal device and the second configuration at least indicates a second time interval for the terminal device. The second time interval has an offset from the first time interval.

At 720, the terminal device 120-2 determines a time period for the terminal device to receive a paging message based on the second configuration.

In some example embodiments, an apparatus capable of performing the method 600 (for example, implemented at the terminal device 120-1) may comprise means for performing the respective steps of the method 600. The means may be implemented in any suitable form. For example, the means may be implemented in a circuitry or software module.

In some example embodiments, the apparatus comprises: means for determining, at a terminal device, a first configuration associated with discontinuous reception based on parameters related to the configuration receiving from a network device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval of the discontinuous reception for the terminal device; means for determining, based on the first configuration, a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception of a further terminal device, the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval of the discontinuous reception for the further terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval; and means for transmitting the second configuration associated with discontinuous reception to the further terminal device.

In some example embodiments, the first configuration is a first Discontinuous Reception, DRX configuration and the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging frame with a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, the means for determining the first configuration may comprises means for determining at least one of the following: a first length of the first DRX cycle; a first start position of the first paging frame in the first DRX cycle; and a first start position of the first paging occasion in the first paging frame.

In some example embodiments, the terminal device is configured with a first wake-up occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to receive wake up signal, the first configuration is a first Discontinuous Reception, DRX configuration and the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, the means for determining the first configuration may comprises means for determining at least one of the following: a first length of the first DRX cycle and a first start position of the first paging occasion.

In some example embodiments, the first configuration is a first Extended Discontinuous Reception, eDRX configuration, the first time interval comprises a first Paging Time Window (PTW) , the first PTW indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, the means for determining the first configuration may comprises means for determining at least one of the following: a first start time point of the first PTW; and a first end time point of the first PTW.

In some example embodiments, the first configuration is a first Discontinuous Reception, DRX configuration and the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging frame with a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, , the means for determining the second configuration comprises means for obtaining a first start position of a first paging frame and a first start position of the first paging occasion in the first DRX cycle; means for determining the offset based on a time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the further terminal device; and means for determining, based on the first start position of the first paging frame, the first start position of the first paging occasion and the offset, a second start position of a second paging frame in a second DRX cycle and a second start position of a second paging occasion in the second DRX cycle.

In some example embodiments, the first configuration is a first Discontinuous Reception, DRX configuration and the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging frame with a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, , the means for determining the second DRX configuration comprises means for obtaining a first start position of the first paging occasion in the first DRX cycle; means for determining the offset based on a time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the further terminal device; and means for determining a second start position of a second paging occasion in a second DRX cycle based on the first start position of the first paging occasion and the offset.

In some example embodiments, the first configuration is a first Extended Discontinuous Reception, eDRX configuration, the first time interval comprises a first Paging Time Window (PTW) , the first PTW indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, the means for determining the second DRX configuration comprises means for obtaining a first start time point of the first PTW; means for determining the offset based on a time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the further terminal device; and means for determining, based on the first start time point and the offset value, a second start time point of the second PTW.

In some example embodiments, the means for determining the offset based on the time requirement comprises means for determining a first time length for processing the paging message from the network device to the further terminal device by the terminal device; means for determining a second time length for generating a paging message for the further terminal device; and means for determining the offset based on at least one of the first time length and the second time length.

example embodiments, the means for determining the offset based on the time requirement comprises means for determining a first time length for processing the paging message from the network device to the further terminal device by the terminal device; means for determining a second time length for generating a paging message for the further terminal device; means for determining a third time length for transmitting the wake-up signal followed by a gap before the paging message; and means for determining the offset based on at least one of the first time length, the second time length and the third length.

In some example embodiments, the apparatus may further comprise means for obtaining a first length of the first DRX cycle and means for determining a second length of the second DRX cycle based on the first length.

In some example embodiments, an apparatus capable of performing the method 700 (for example, implemented at the terminal device 120-2) may comprise means for performing the respective steps of the method 700. The means may be implemented in any suitable form. For example, the means may be implemented in a circuitry or software module.

In some example embodiments, the apparatus comprises: means for determining, at a terminal device out of a coverage of a network device, a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception from a further terminal device in the coverage of the network device, the second configuration being determined based on a first configuration associated with the discontinuous reception of the further terminal device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval for the further terminal device and the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval for the terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval and means for determining a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message based on the second configuration associated with the discontinuous reception.

Fig. 8 is a simplified block diagram of a device 800 that is suitable for implementing embodiments of the present disclosure. The device 800 may be provided to implement the terminal device 120-1 and 120-2 as shown in FIG. 1. As shown, the device 800 includes one or more processors 810, one or more memories 820 coupled to the processor 810, and one or more transmitters and/or receivers (TX/RX) 840 coupled to the processor 810.

The TX/RX 840 is for bidirectional communications. The TX/RX 840 has at least one antenna to facilitate communication. The communication interface may represent any interface that is necessary for communication with other network elements.

The processor 810 may be of any type suitable to the local technical network and may include one or more of the following: general purpose computers, special purpose computers, microprocessors, digital signal processors (DSPs) and processors based on multicore processor architecture, as non-limiting examples. The device 800 may have multiple processors, such as an application specific integrated circuit chip that is slaved in time to a clock which synchronizes the main processor.

The memory 820 may include one or more non-volatile memories and one or more volatile memories. Examples of the non-volatile memories include, but are not limited to, a Read Only Memory (ROM) 824, an electrically programmable read only memory (EPROM) , a flash memory, a hard disk, a compact disc (CD) , a digital video disk (DVD) , and other magnetic storage and/or optical storage. Examples of the volatile memories include, but are not limited to, a random access memory (RAM) 822 and other volatile memories that will not last in the power-down duration.

A computer program 830 includes computer executable instructions that are executed by the associated processor 810. The program 830 may be stored in the ROM 824. The processor 810 may perform any suitable actions and processing by loading the program 830 into the RAM 822.

The embodiments of the present disclosure may be implemented by means of the program 830 so that the device 800 may perform any process of the disclosure as discussed with reference to Figs. 2 to 7. The embodiments of the present disclosure may also be implemented by hardware or by a combination of software and hardware.

In some embodiments, the program 830 may be tangibly contained in a computer readable medium which may be included in the device 800 (such as in the memory 820) or other storage devices that are accessible by the device 800. The device 800 may load the program 830 from the computer readable medium to the RAM 822 for execution. The computer readable medium may include any types of tangible non-volatile storage, such as ROM, EPROM, a flash memory, a hard disk, CD, DVD, and the like. Fig. 9 shows an example of the computer readable medium 900 in form of CD or DVD. The computer readable medium has the program 830 stored thereon.

Generally, various embodiments of the present disclosure may be implemented in hardware or special purpose circuits, software, logic or any combination thereof. Some aspects may be implemented in hardware, while other aspects may be implemented in firmware or software which may be executed by a controller, microprocessor or other computing device. For example, in some embodiments, various examples of the present disclosure (e.g., a method, apparatus or device) may be partly or fully implemented on the computer readable medium. While various aspects of embodiments of the present disclosure are illustrated and described as block diagrams, flowcharts, or using some other pictorial representation, it will be appreciated that the blocks, apparatus, systems, techniques or methods described herein may be implemented in, as non-limiting examples, hardware, software, firmware, special purpose circuits or logic, general purpose hardware or controller or other computing devices, or some combination thereof.

The units included in the apparatuses and/or devices of the present disclosure may be implemented in various manners, including software, hardware, firmware, or any combination thereof. In one embodiment, one or more units may be implemented using software and/or firmware, for example, machine-executable instructions stored on the storage medium. In addition to or instead of machine-executable instructions, parts or all of the units in the apparatuses and/or devices may be implemented, at least in part, by one or more hardware logic components. For example, and without limitation, illustrative types of hardware logic components that can be used include Field-programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) , Application-specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) , Application-specific Standard Products (ASSPs) , System-on-a-chip systems (SOCs) , Complex Programmable Logic Devices (CPLDs) , and the like.

As examples, embodiments of the present disclosure may be described in the context of the computer-executable instructions, such as those included in program modules, being executed in a device on a target real or virtual processor. Generally, program modules include routines, programs, libraries, objects, classes, components, data structures, or the like that perform particular tasks or implement particular abstract data types. The functionality of the program modules may be combined or split between program modules as desired in various embodiments. Machine-executable instructions for program modules may be executed within a local or distributed device. In a distributed device, program modules may be located in both local and remote storage media.

Program code for carrying out methods of the present disclosure may be written in any combination of one or more programming languages. These program codes may be provided to a processor of a general purpose computer, special purpose computer, or other programmable data processing apparatus, such that the program codes, when executed by the processor or controller, cause the functions/operations specified in the flowcharts and/or block diagrams to be implemented. The program code may execute entirely on a machine, partly on the machine, as a stand-alone software package, partly on the machine and partly on a remote machine or entirely on the remote machine or server.

In the context of the present disclosure, a computer readable medium may be any tangible medium that may contain, or store a program for use by or in connection with an instruction execution system, apparatus, or device. The computer readable medium may be a machine readable signal medium or a machine readable storage medium. The computer readable medium may include but not limited to an electronic, magnetic, optical, electromagnetic, infrared, or semiconductor system, apparatus, or device, or any suitable combination of the foregoing. More specific examples of the machine readable storage medium would include an electrical connection having one or more wires, a portable computer diskette, a hard disk, a random access memory (RAM) , a read-only memory (ROM) , an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM or Flash memory) , an optical fiber, a portable compact disc read-only memory (CD-ROM) , an optical storage device, a magnetic storage device, or any suitable combination of the foregoing.

Further, while operations are depicted in a particular order, this should not be understood as requiring that such operations be performed in the particular order shown or in sequential order, or that all illustrated operations be performed, to achieve desirable results. In certain cases, multitasking and parallel processing may be advantageous. Likewise, while several specific embodiment details are contained in the above discussions, these should not be construed as limitations on the scope of the present disclosure, but rather as descriptions of features that may be specific to particular embodiments. Certain features that are described in the context of separate embodiments may also be implemented in combination in a single embodiment. Conversely, various features that are described in the context of a single embodiment may also be implemented in multiple embodiments separately or in any suitable sub-combination.

Although the present disclosure has been described in language specific to structural features and/or methodological acts, it would be appreciated that the present disclosure defined in the appended claims is not necessarily limited to the specific features or acts described above. Rather, the specific features and acts described above are disclosed as example forms of implementing the claims.

Claims

A method, comprising:

determining, at a terminal device, a first configuration associated with discontinuous reception based on parameters related to the configuration receiving from a network device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval of the discontinuous reception for the terminal device;

determining, based on the first configuration, a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception of a further terminal device, the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval of the discontinuous reception for the further terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval; and

transmitting the second configuration associated with discontinuous reception to the further terminal device.
The method of Claim 1, wherein the first configuration is a first Discontinuous Reception, DRX configuration and the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging frame with a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, and wherein determining the first configuration comprises determining at least one of the following:

a first length of the first DRX cycle;

a first start position of the first paging frame in the first DRX cycle; and

a first start position of the first paging occasion in the first paging frame.
The method of Claim 1, wherein the terminal device is configured with a first wake-up occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to receive wake up signal, the first configuration is a first Discontinuous Reception, DRX configuration and the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, and wherein determining the first configuration comprises determining at least one of the following:

a first length of the first DRX cycle; and

a first start position of the first paging occasion.
The method of Claim 1, wherein the first configuration is a first Extended Discontinuous Reception, eDRX configuration, wherein the first time interval comprises a first Paging Time Window (PTW) , the first PTW indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, and wherein determining the first configuration comprises determining at least one of the following:

a first start time point of the first PTW; and

a first end time point of the first PTW.
The method of Claim 1, wherein the first configuration is a first Discontinuous Reception, DRX configuration and the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging frame with a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, and wherein determining the second configuration comprises:

obtaining a first start position of the first paging frame and a first start position of the first paging occasion in the first DRX cycle;

determining the offset based on a time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the further terminal device; and

determining, based on the first start position of the first paging frame, the first start position of the first paging occasion and the offset, a second start position of a second paging frame in a second DRX cycle and a second start position of a second paging occasion in the second DRX cycle.
The method of Claim 1, wherein the terminal device is configured with a first wake-up occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to receive wake-up signal, the first configuration is a first Discontinuous Reception, DRX configuration and the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, and wherein determining the second configuration comprises:

obtaining a first start position of the first paging occasion in the first DRX cycle;

determining the offset based on a time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the further terminal device; and

determining a second start position of a second paging occasion in a second DRX cycle based on the first start position of the first paging occasion and the offset.
The method of Claim 1, wherein the first configuration is a first Extended Discontinuous Reception, eDRX configuration, wherein the first time interval comprises a first Paging Time Window (PTW) , the first PTW indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, and wherein determining the second configuration comprises:

obtaining a first start time point of the first PTW;

determining the offset based on a time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the further terminal device; and

determining a second start time point of a second PTW based on the first start time point of the first PTW and the offset value.
The method of Claims 5 or 7, wherein determining the offset based on the time requirement comprises:

determining a first time length for processing the paging message from the network device to the further terminal device by the terminal device;

determining a second time length for generating a paging message for the further terminal device; and

determining the offset based on at least one of the first time length, the second time length.
The method of Claims 6, wherein determining the offset based on the time requirement comprises:

determining a first time length for processing the paging message from the network device to the further terminal device by the terminal device;

determining a second time length for generating a paging message for the further terminal device;

determining a third time length for transmitting the wake-up signal followed by a gap before the paging message; and

determining the offset based on at least one of the first time length, the second time length and the third time length.
The method of Claims 5 or 6, further comprising:

obtaining a first length of the first DRX cycle; and

determining a second length of the second DRX cycle based on the first length.
A method, comprising:

receiving, at a terminal device out of a coverage of a network device, a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception from a further terminal device in the coverage of the network device, the second configuration being determined based on a first configuration associated with the discontinuous reception of the further terminal device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval for the further terminal device and the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval for the terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval; and

determining a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message based on the second configuration associated with the discontinuous reception.
A device, comprising:

at least one processor; and

at least one memory including computer program codes;

the at least one memory and the computer program codes are configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the device at least to:

determine, at a terminal device, a first configuration associated with discontinuous reception based on parameters related to the configuration receiving from a network device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval of the discontinuous reception for the terminal device;

determine, based on the first configuration, a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception of a further terminal device, the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval of the discontinuous reception for the further terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval; and

transmit the second configuration associated with discontinuous reception to the further terminal device.
The device of Claim 12, wherein the first configuration is a first Discontinuous Reception, DRX configuration and the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging frame with a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, and wherein the device is caused to determine the first configuration by determining at least one of the following:

a first length of the first DRX cycle;

a first start position of the first paging frame in the first DRX cycle; and

a first start position of the first paging occasion in the first paging frame.
The device of Claim 12, wherein the terminal device is configured with a first wake-up occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to receive wake up signal, the first configuration is a first Discontinuous Reception, DRX configuration and the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, and wherein the device is caused to determine the first configuration by determining at least one of the following:

a first length of the first DRX cycle; and

first start position of the first paging occasion.
The device of Claim 12, wherein the first configuration is a first Extended Discontinuous Reception, eDRX configuration, wherein the first time interval comprises a first Paging Time Window (PTW) , the first PTW indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, and wherein the device is caused to determine the first configuration by determining at least one of the following:

a first start time point of the first PTW; and

a first end time point of the first PTW.
The device of Claim 12, wherein the first configuration is a first Discontinuous Reception, DRX configuration and the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging frame with a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, and wherein the device is caused to determine the second configuration by:

obtaining a first start position of the first paging frame and a first start position of the first paging occasion in the first DRX cycle;

determining the offset based on a time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the further terminal device; and

determining, based on the first start position of the first paging frame, the first start position of the first paging occasion and the offset, a second start position of a second paging frame in a second DRX cycle and a second start position of a second paging occasion in the second DRX cycle.
The device of Claim 12, wherein the terminal device is configured with a first wake-up occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to receive wake-up signal, the first configuration is a first Discontinuous Reception, DRX configuration and the first time interval is a first DRX cycle comprising a first paging occasion indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, and wherein the device is caused to determine the second configuration by:

obtaining a first start position of the first paging occasion in the first DRX cycle;

determining the offset based on a time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the further terminal device; and

determining a second start position of a second paging occasion in a second DRX cycle based on the first start position of the first paging occasion and the offset.
The device of Claim 12, wherein the first configuration is a first Extended Discontinuous Reception, eDRX configuration, wherein the first time interval comprises a first Paging Time Window (PTW) , the first PTW indicating a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message, and wherein the device is caused to determine the second configuration by:

obtaining a first start time point of the first PTW;

determining the offset based on a time requirement for forwarding the paging message to the further terminal device; and

determining, based on the first start time point and the offset value, a second start time point of the second PTW.
The device of Claims 16 or 18, wherein the device is caused to determine the offset based on the time requirement by:

determining a first time length for processing the paging from the network device to the further terminal device by the terminal device; and

determining a second time length for generating a paging message for the further terminal device; and

determining the offset based on at least one of the first time length and the second time length.
The device of Claim 19, wherein the device is caused to determine the offset based on the time requirement by:

determining a first time length for processing the paging message from the network device to the further terminal device by the terminal device;

determining a second time length for generating a paging message for the further terminal device;

determining a third time length for transmitting the wake-up signal followed by a gap before the paging message; and

determining the offset based on at least one of the first time length, the second time length and the third time length.
The device of Claims 16 or 17, wherein the device is further caused to:

obtain a first length of the first DRX cycle; and

determine a second length of the second DRX cycle based on the first length.
A device, comprising:

at least one processor; and

at least one memory including computer program codes;

the at least one memory and the computer program codes are configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the device at least to:

receive, at a terminal device out of a coverage of a network device, a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception from a further terminal device in the coverage of the network device, the second configuration being determined based on a first configuration associated with the discontinuous reception of the further terminal device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval for the further terminal device and the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval for the terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval; and

determine a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message based on the second configuration associated with the discontinuous reception.
An apparatus for discontinuous reception, comprising:

means for determining, at a terminal device, a first configuration associated with discontinuous reception based on parameters related to the configuration receiving from a network device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval of the discontinuous reception for the terminal device;

means for determining, based on the first configuration, a second configuration associated with discontinuous reception of a further terminal device, the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval of the discontinuous reception for the further terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval; and

means for transmitting the second configuration associated with discontinuous reception to the further terminal device.
An apparatus for discontinuous reception:

means for receiving, at a terminal device out of a coverage of a network device, a second configuration associated with the discontinuous reception from a further terminal device in the coverage of the network device, the second configuration being determined based on a first configuration associated with the discontinuous reception of the further terminal device, the first configuration at least indicating a first time interval for the further terminal device and the second configuration at least indicating a second time interval for the terminal device, the second time interval having an offset from the first time interval; and

means for determining a time period for the terminal device to start receiving a paging message based on the second configuration associated with the discontinuous reception.
A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising program instructions for causing an apparatus to perform at least the method of any of claims 1-10.
A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising program instructions for causing an apparatus to perform at least the method of any of claim 11.