WO2023065086A1

WO2023065086A1 - Positioning method and apparatus, communication device, and storage medium

Info

Publication number: WO2023065086A1
Application number: PCT/CN2021/124500
Authority: WO
Inventors: 沈洋
Original assignee: 北京小米移动软件有限公司
Priority date: 2021-10-18
Filing date: 2021-10-18
Publication date: 2023-04-27
Also published as: CN116324467A

Abstract

A positioning method and apparatus, a communication device, and a storage medium. The positioning method is performed by a requester, and comprises: sending a positioning service request to a network side device, the positioning service request comprising: UE information of an observer UE, which is used for positioning a target UE outside a network coverage. The method enables the network side device to accurately know which UEs can be used as observer UEs to position the target UE, and to accurately position, on the basis of the observer UE, the target UE located outside the network coverage.

Description

Positioning method, device, communication device and storage medium

technical field

The present disclosure relates to but not limited to the technical field of communication, and in particular relates to a positioning method, device, communication device and storage medium.

Background technique

In a wireless communication system, for example, in a 5th generation mobile communication technology (5G) system, some user equipment (User Equipment, UE) is within the coverage of the 5G network, and some UEs are outside the coverage of the 5G network. For those UEs outside the coverage of the network, network side devices (such as base stations or core network devices, etc.) cannot accurately determine the locations of those UEs.

Contents of the invention

Embodiments of the present disclosure disclose a positioning method, a device, a communication device, and a storage medium.

According to the first aspect of the present disclosure, a positioning method is provided, executed by a requester, including:

Sending a location service request to the network side device, where the location service request includes: UE information of an observer UE, wherein the observer UE is used to locate a target UE outside the coverage of the network.

According to a second aspect of the present disclosure, a positioning method is provided, executed by a network side device, including:

Receive the positioning service request sent by the requester, the positioning service request includes: UE information of the observer UE;

A ranging service request is sent to the observer UE; wherein, the ranging service request is used to request the observer UE to measure a target UE located outside the coverage of the network.

According to a third aspect of the present disclosure, a positioning method is provided, performed by a watcher UE, including:

Receiving the ranging service request sent by the network side device; the ranging service request is sent by the network side device after receiving the positioning service request sent by the requester;

Based on the ranging service request, the ranging is performed on the target UE located outside the coverage of the network.

According to a fourth aspect of the present disclosure, there is provided a positioning device applied to a requester, including:

The first sending module is configured to send a positioning service request to a network side device, the positioning service request includes: UE information of an observer UE; wherein the observer UE is used to locate a target UE outside the coverage of the network.

According to a fifth aspect of the present disclosure, a positioning device is provided, which is applied to a network side device, including:

The second receiving module is configured to receive a positioning service request sent by the requester, where the positioning service request includes: UE information of the observer UE;

The second sending module is configured to send a ranging service request to the observer UE; wherein the ranging service request is used to request the observer UE to measure a target UE outside the network coverage.

According to a sixth aspect of the present disclosure, a positioning device is provided, which is applied to an observer UE, including:

The third receiving module is configured to receive the ranging service request sent by the network side device; the ranging service request is sent by the network side device after receiving the ranging service request sent by the requester;

The positioning module is configured to perform ranging on a target UE located outside the coverage of the network based on the ranging service request.

According to a seventh aspect of the present disclosure, a communication device is provided, including:

processor;

memory for storing processor-executable instructions;

Wherein, the processor is configured to implement the positioning method in any embodiment of the present disclosure when running the executable instruction.

According to an eighth aspect of the present disclosure, a computer storage medium is provided. The computer storage medium stores a computer executable program, and when the executable program is executed by a processor, the positioning method of any embodiment of the present disclosure is implemented.

The technical solutions provided by the embodiments of the present disclosure may include the following beneficial effects:

In the embodiment of the present disclosure, the requester may send a positioning service request to the network side device, where the positioning service request includes: UE information of the observer UE; where the observer UE is used to locate a target UE outside the coverage of the network. In this way, the network side equipment can accurately know which UEs can be used as observer UEs to locate the target UEs outside the network coverage; and the position of the target UEs outside the network coverage can be accurately located based on the observer UEs , to realize the positioning of the target UE.

It should be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary and explanatory only, and are not intended to limit the embodiments of the present disclosure.

Description of drawings

FIG. 1 is a schematic structural diagram of a wireless communication system.

Fig. 2 is a schematic diagram showing location determination according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 3 is a schematic diagram of network coverage according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 4 is a schematic diagram of network coverage according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 5 is a schematic diagram of network coverage according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 6 is a flowchart showing a positioning method according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 7 is a flowchart showing a positioning method according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 8 is a flowchart showing a positioning method according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 9 is a flowchart showing a positioning method according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 10 is a flowchart showing a positioning method according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 11 is a flowchart showing a positioning method according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 12 is a flowchart showing a positioning method according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 13 is a block diagram of a positioning device according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 14 is a block diagram of a positioning device according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 15 is a block diagram of a positioning device according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 16 is a block diagram of a UE according to an exemplary embodiment.

Fig. 17 is a block diagram of a base station according to an exemplary embodiment.

Detailed ways

Reference will now be made in detail to the exemplary embodiments, examples of which are illustrated in the accompanying drawings. When the following description refers to the accompanying drawings, the same numerals in different drawings refer to the same or similar elements unless otherwise indicated. The implementations described in the following exemplary embodiments do not represent all implementations consistent with the embodiments of the present disclosure. Rather, they are merely examples of apparatuses and methods consistent with aspects of the disclosed embodiments as recited in the appended claims.

Terms used in the embodiments of the present disclosure are for the purpose of describing specific embodiments only, and are not intended to limit the embodiments of the present disclosure. As used in the examples of this disclosure and the appended claims, the singular forms "a" and "the" are also intended to include the plural unless the context clearly dictates otherwise. It should also be understood that the term "and/or" as used herein refers to and includes any and all possible combinations of one or more of the associated listed items.

It should be understood that although the embodiments of the present disclosure may use the terms first, second, third, etc. to describe various information, the information should not be limited to these terms. These terms are only used to distinguish information of the same type from one another. For example, without departing from the scope of the embodiments of the present disclosure, first information may also be called second information, and similarly, second information may also be called first information. Depending on the context, the word "if" as used herein may be interpreted as "at" or "when" or "in response to a determination."

Please refer to FIG. 1 , which shows a schematic structural diagram of a wireless communication system provided by an embodiment of the present disclosure. As shown in FIG. 1 , the wireless communication system is a communication system based on cellular mobile communication technology, and the wireless communication system may include: several user equipments 110 and several base stations 120 .

Wherein, the user equipment 110 may be a device that provides voice and/or data connectivity to the user. The user equipment 110 can communicate with one or more core networks via a radio access network (Radio Access Network, RAN), and the user equipment 110 can be an Internet of Things user equipment, such as a sensor device, a mobile phone (or called a "cellular" phone) ) and computers with IoT user equipment, for example, can be fixed, portable, pocket, hand-held, built-in computer or vehicle-mounted devices. For example, Station (Station, STA), subscriber unit (subscriber unit), subscriber station (subscriber station), mobile station (mobile station), mobile station (mobile), remote station (remote station), access point, remote user equipment (remote terminal), access user equipment (access terminal), user device (user terminal), user agent (user agent), user equipment (user device), or user equipment (user equipment). Alternatively, the user equipment 110 may also be equipment of an unmanned aerial vehicle. Alternatively, the user equipment 110 may also be a vehicle-mounted device, for example, a trip computer with a wireless communication function, or a wireless user device connected externally to the trip computer. Alternatively, the user equipment 110 may also be a roadside device, for example, may be a street lamp, a signal lamp, or other roadside devices with a wireless communication function.

The base station 120 may be a network side device in a wireless communication system. Wherein, the wireless communication system may be a fourth generation mobile communication technology (the 4th generation mobile communication, 4G) system, also known as a Long Term Evolution (LTE) system; or, the wireless communication system may also be a 5G system, Also known as new air interface system or 5G NR system. Alternatively, the wireless communication system may also be a next-generation system of the 5G system. Among them, the access network in the 5G system can be called the New Generation-Radio Access Network (NG-RAN).

Wherein, the base station 120 may be an evolved base station (eNB) adopted in a 4G system. Alternatively, the base station 120 may also be a base station (gNB) adopting a centralized distributed architecture in the 5G system. When the base station 120 adopts a centralized distributed architecture, it generally includes a centralized unit (central unit, CU) and at least two distributed units (distributed unit, DU). The centralized unit is provided with a packet data convergence protocol (Packet Data Convergence Protocol, PDCP) layer, radio link layer control protocol (Radio Link Control, RLC) layer, media access control (Medium Access Control, MAC) layer protocol stack; A physical (Physical, PHY) layer protocol stack is set in the distribution unit, and the embodiment of the present disclosure does not limit the specific implementation manner of the base station 120 .

A wireless connection may be established between the base station 120 and the user equipment 110 through a wireless air interface. In different embodiments, the wireless air interface is a wireless air interface based on the fourth-generation mobile communication network technology (4G) standard; or, the wireless air interface is a wireless air interface based on the fifth-generation mobile communication network technology (5G) standard, such as The wireless air interface is a new air interface; alternatively, the wireless air interface may also be a wireless air interface based on a technical standard of a next-generation mobile communication network based on 5G.

In some embodiments, an E2E (End to End, end-to-end) connection may also be established between user equipment 110. For example, vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication, vehicle-to-roadside equipment (vehicle to Infrastructure, V2I) communication and vehicle-to-pedestrian (V2P) communication in vehicle to everything (V2X) communication Wait for the scene.

Here, the above user equipment may be regarded as the terminal equipment in the following embodiments.

In some embodiments, the foregoing wireless communication system may further include a network management device 130 .

Several base stations 120 are connected to the network management device 130 respectively. Wherein, the network management device 130 may be a core network device in a wireless communication system, for example, the network management device 130 may be a Mobility Management Entity (Mobility Management Entity) in an evolved packet core network (Evolved Packet Core, EPC), MME). Alternatively, the network management device can also be other core network devices, such as Serving GateWay (SGW), Public Data Network Gateway (Public Data Network GateWay, PGW), policy and charging rule functional unit (Policy and Charging Rules Function, PCRF) or Home Subscriber Server (Home Subscriber Server, HSS), etc. The implementation form of the network management device 130 is not limited in this embodiment of the present disclosure.

In order to facilitate the understanding of those skilled in the art, the embodiments of the present disclosure list a plurality of implementation manners to clearly illustrate the technical solutions of the embodiments of the present disclosure. Of course, those skilled in the art can understand that the multiple embodiments provided by the embodiments of the present disclosure can be executed independently, or combined with the methods of other embodiments in the embodiments of the present disclosure, and can also be executed alone or in combination It is then executed together with some methods in other related technologies; this is not limited in the embodiment of the present disclosure.

In order to better understand the technical solution described in any embodiment of the present disclosure, first, the positioning in the related technology is explained:

In one embodiment, the ranging service refers to determining the distance between two UEs and/or determining the direction from one UE to another UE through a direct communication connection.

In one embodiment, as shown in FIG. 2, the observer UE has a reference plane and a reference direction. The direction from the target UE to the observer UE is: the angle between the line connecting the observer UE and the target UE and the reference direction. The included angle is represented by an azimuth direction and/or an elevation direction. The azimuth direction of the target UE is: the angular direction formed by the reference direction and the straight line projection from the observer UE to the target UE on the same plane as the reference direction perpendicular to the zenith. The elevation angle direction of the target UE is the angle direction between the two in the vertical direction (above the horizontal plane).

In one embodiment, the ranging service can be supported regardless of whether it is within the coverage of 5G. As shown in Figure 3, an illustration of 5G coverage is provided; both UE1 and UE2 are within 5G coverage. Figure 4 provides an illustration of partial 5G coverage; UE1 is within 5G coverage and UE2 is outside 5G coverage. Figure 5 provides an illustration without 5G coverage; neither UE1 nor UE2 is within 5G coverage. In one embodiment, if a licensed band is used for ranging, then full operator control is possible.

In one embodiment, ranging is used for relative positioning between two UEs. In one embodiment, positioning depends on measurement information between the target UE and multiple gNBs; here it is assumed that the target UE must have network connectivity. For example, in the case of partial 5G coverage as shown in FIG. 3 , the location of UE2 can be derived based on the absolute location of UE1 and the ranging information of UE2.

Here are some examples:

Exemplarily, for vehicle wireless communication technology (V2X); if the Road Side Unit (Road Side Unit, RSU) is in a fixed position, the position of the vehicle can be determined based on the relative position between the vehicle and the RSU.

Exemplarily, for an indoor area; if the UE is deployed at a fixed location with good network coverage, the location of the mobile UE may be determined based on the relative position between the mobile UE and the UE deployed at the fixed location.

Exemplarily, for the use of the wearable device and the mobile phone, the position of the wearable device can be determined based on the relative position between the wearable device and the mobile phone.

Exemplarily, for a drone with a network connection to search for a lost target, the position of the lost target can be obtained based on the relative position between the lost target and the drone.

Exemplarily, for the location of a group of UEs working in the same area, the location of any UE in the group may be determined based on the location of another UE.

As shown in FIG. 6, an embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by the requester, including:

Step S61: Send a positioning service request to the network side device, the positioning service request includes: UE information of the observer UE; wherein the observer UE is used to locate the target UE outside the coverage of the network.

The location method provided by the embodiments of the present disclosure may be executed by a requester; the requester may be, but not limited to, a location service (LoCation Service, LCS) requester or an application layer function (Application Function, AF). Here, the LCS requester may be an LCS client (Client). In the positioning method provided by the embodiments of the present disclosure, the requester may send a positioning service request to a network side device, for example, may send the positioning service request to a network function (Network Function, NF). It should be noted that: a network function (Network Function, NF) is a physical device or a function performed by a physical device, which is not limited here. Wherein, NF may be, but not limited to, various network-side devices, entities or network elements of an access network or a core network. For example, the NF may be a base station in the access network; another example, the NF may be a gateway mobile location center (Gateway Mobile Location Centre, GMLC), a location management function (Location Management Function, LMF) etc. in the core network.

In one embodiment, the requester may be, but not limited to, one of the following: a server, a network function, or a UE. Here, the application server may be various types of servers, such as an application server. Here, the network function may be various network devices or network entities, network elements, and so on. Here, the UE may be various mobile terminals or fixed terminals; for example, the UE may be, but not limited to, a mobile phone, a computer, a server, a wearable device, a game control platform, or a multimedia device.

In an embodiment, network coverage may refer to coverage of various networks; for example, network coverage may be, but not limited to, 4G coverage, 5G coverage, or other evolved network coverage. In short, the target UE located outside the coverage of the network here is: the UE to be located located outside the coverage of the network.

In one embodiment, the observer UE is within network coverage; the target UE is out of network coverage. Exemplarily, the observer UE is within the 5G coverage, and the target UE is outside the 5G coverage.

In one embodiment, the observer UE may be a UE located within the network coverage of the mobile communication network and in the vicinity of the target UE.

In one embodiment, the observer UE locates the target UE outside the network coverage, including but limited to: the observer UE discovers the target UE outside the network coverage, and/or, the observer UE locates the target UE outside the network coverage The UE performs ranging.

In one embodiment, the UE information is identification information of the UE. Here, the UE identification information may be used to uniquely identify the UE. Exemplarily, the requester sends a location service request to the NF, wherein the location service request includes: list information of observer UEs; the list includes identification information of one or more UEs. In this way, after receiving the location service request, the NF can determine which UEs can be used as observer UEs to perform ranging on the target UE.

In the embodiment of the present disclosure, the requester can send a positioning service request to the network side device (such as NF), where the positioning service request includes: UE information of the observer UE; where the observer UE is used to locate Target UE. In this way, the network side equipment can accurately know which UEs can be used as observer UEs to locate the target UEs outside the network coverage; and the position of the target UEs outside the network coverage can be accurately located based on the observer UEs , to realize the positioning of the target UE.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is applied to a requester, including: receiving positioning information of a target UE sent by a network-side device; wherein, the positioning information of the target UE is the measurement of the target UE returned by the network-side device determined from the result.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is applied to the requester, including: receiving the positioning information of the target UE sent by the NF; wherein, the positioning information of the target UE is determined by the NF based on the ranging result of the target UE returned by the observer UE .

In one embodiment, the location information of the target is determined by a network side device (such as NF) in the following manner: the observer UE determines based on the ranging result of the target UE and the location information of the observer UE.

In one embodiment, the ranging result may be, but not limited to, one of the following: the distance between the observer UE and the target UE, the direction between the observer UE and the target UE, and the discovery notification. Here, the discovery notification is a notification instructing the watcher UE to discover the target UE. Of course, the ranging result may also include other parameters, which are not limited in this embodiment of the present disclosure.

The discovery notification may be: notification information sent to the network side when the observer UE measures the target UE. For example, the observer UE discovers the target UE located outside the coverage of the network through functions such as direct communication (such as wifi or Proximity Service (ProSe)) discovery.

In one embodiment, the direction between the observer UE and the target UE may be represented by an azimuth direction and/or an elevation direction as shown in FIG. 2 .

In the embodiment of the present disclosure, the location information of the target UE may be sent by the requester UE receiving NF, so that the requester can accurately know the location of the target UE outside the coverage of the network.

It should be noted that those skilled in the art can understand that the methods provided in the embodiments of the present disclosure may be executed independently, or together with some methods in the embodiments of the present disclosure or some methods in related technologies.

In some embodiments, the positioning service request includes: the allowed positioning delay; wherein, the positioning delay is used for the observer UE to measure the distance or to discover the delay of the target UE, or for the observer UE to report the delay of the target UE. The delay of the ranging result of the UE.

In some embodiments, the positioning service request includes: the allowed positioning delay; wherein, the positioning delay is used for the observer UE to measure the distance or find the maximum delay of the target UE, or for the observer UE to report the maximum delay of the target UE. The maximum delay of the ranging result of the target UE.

In some embodiments, the allowable positioning delay may include: the sum of the delays of the observer UE's discovery and ranging of the target UE; or, the delay of the observer UE's ranging of the target and reporting the ranging result of the target UE The sum of the delays; or, the sum of the delays of the observer UE discovering the target UE and reporting the ranging result of the target UE.

In some embodiments, the allowable positioning delay may include: the sum of the delay for the observer UE to discover and measure the target UE, and the delay for reporting the ranging result of the target UE.

In some embodiments of the present disclosure, the positioning service request is the positioning service request in step S61.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, executed by a requester, including: sending a positioning service request to a network side device, wherein the positioning service request includes: a permitted positioning delay.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, executed by a requester, including: sending a positioning service request to an NF, where the positioning service request includes: a permitted positioning delay.

Exemplarily, the requester sends a positioning service request to a network side device (such as NF), and the positioning service request includes a permitted positioning delay; the positioning delay is used for the watcher UE to determine the delay in finding the target UE. In this way, when the observer UE receives the request including the positioning delay, it can know the latest time allowed to find the target UE outside the coverage of the network; and stop searching for the target UE when the latest time is reached.

Exemplarily, the requester sends a positioning service request to a network side device (such as NF), and the positioning service request includes a permitted positioning delay; the positioning delay is used for the observer UE to measure the delay of the target UE. In this way, when the observer UE receives the request including the positioning delay, it can know the latest time allowed for the target UE located outside the coverage of the network, and terminate the ranging for the target UE after the latest time is reached.

Exemplarily, the requester sends a positioning service request to a network side device (such as NF), and the positioning service request includes a permitted positioning delay; the positioning delay is used for the observer UE to report the delay of the ranging result to the target UE . In this way, when the observer UE receives the request including the positioning delay, it may know the latest time allowed to report the ranging result of the target UE; and not report the ranging result of the target UE beyond the latest time.

In one embodiment, the timing delay is greater than or equal to the first duration.

In another embodiment, the timing delay is less than the second duration.

In yet another embodiment, the timing delay is greater than or equal to the first duration, and the timing delay is less than or equal to the second duration. Here, the first duration is shorter than the second duration.

In this way, in the embodiments of the present disclosure, on the one hand, there may be a tolerable delay for any of the target UE discovery, ranging, or ranging results for the target UE, so that the observer UE can discover the target UE, The target UE performs ranging or can report any of the ranging results for the target UE; The ranging or the reporting of any of the ranging results of the target UE, so that the finally obtained positioning result of the target UE is inaccurate.

For example, when it is difficult for the observer UE to find the target UE temporarily, or there is a certain delay in transmitting signals between the observer UE and the target UE, the allowable timing delay may be used to allow the observer UE to have a chance to find the target UE.

For another example, when there is a certain period of time for transmitting signals between the observer UE and the target UE, or other network events occur and the ranging is interrupted; the allowable timing delay can be used to allow the observer UE to have a chance to complete successfully. Ranging to the target UE.

For another example, when the target UE is a mobile UE or a relatively fast moving UE, the allowed timing delay can be set so that the network side equipment (such as NF) will no longer receive messages to the target UE that exceed the timing delay. Ranging results; in this way, the network side equipment (such as NF) reduces the probability of obtaining a ranging result that is far from the ranging result, thereby improving the positioning information of the target UE obtained by the NF with high accuracy.

The following positioning method is performed by a network-side device (such as NF), which is similar to the above description of the positioning method performed by the requester; and for the positioning method performed by the network-side device (such as NF), there is no For the disclosed technical details, please refer to the description of an example positioning method performed by the requester, and no detailed description is given here.

As shown in FIG. 7 , an embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by a network side device, including:

Step S71: Receive the positioning service request sent by the requester, the positioning service request includes: UE information of the observer UE;

Step S72: Send a ranging service request to the observer UE; wherein, the ranging service request is used to request the observer UE to measure a target UE located outside the coverage of the network.

In all embodiments of the present disclosure, the network side device may be exemplarily a network function (NF); the NF may be but not limited to various network devices, entities or network elements of an access network or a core network. For example, the NF may be a base station in the access network; another example, the NF may be a gateway mobile location center (Gateway Mobile Location Centre, GMLC), a location management function (Location Management Function, LMF) etc. in the core network.

In some embodiments of the present disclosure, the network side device (such as NF) may interact with the observer UE through an access and mobility management function (Access and Mobility Management Function, AMF). For example, a network side device (such as NF) sends a ranging service request to the AMF, and the AMF forwards the ranging service request to the observer UE.

In the embodiment of the present disclosure, the positioning service request is the positioning service request in step S61; the positioning delay is the positioning delay in the above-mentioned embodiments.

In some embodiments, the positioning service request includes: the allowed positioning delay; wherein, the positioning delay is used for the observer UE to measure the distance or find the maximum delay of the target UE, or for the observer UE to report the maximum delay of the target UE. The maximum delay of the ranging result of the UE.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by a network side device (such as NF), including: receiving a positioning service request sent by a requester, where the positioning service request includes: a permitted positioning delay.

In some embodiments, the ranging service request includes: the allowed positioning delay; wherein, the positioning delay is used for the observer UE to measure distance or find the maximum delay of the target UE, or for the observer UE to report The maximum delay for the ranging result of the UE.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by a network side device (such as NF), including: sending a ranging service request to a watcher UE, where the ranging service request includes: a permitted positioning delay.

For the above implementation manner, for details, reference may be made to the expression on the requester side, and details are not repeated here.

As shown in FIG. 8, an embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by a network side device, including:

Step S81: receiving the ranging result of the target UE sent by the observer UE;

Step S82: Based on the ranging result, determine the positioning information of the target UE; or, based on the ranging result, terminate the ranging of the target UE by the observer UE.

In one embodiment, the ranging result includes: ranging information between the observer UE and the target UE; and/or, a discovery notification.

In one embodiment, the ranging information includes: distance and angle.

In one embodiment, the discovery notification is used to instruct the watcher UE to discover the target UE. For example, the discovery notification is used to instruct the watcher UE1 to discover the target UE.

In some embodiments, determining the positioning information of the target UE based on the ranging result includes: determining the positioning of the target UE based on the positioning information of the observer UE and the ranging information between the observer UE and the target UE in the ranging result information.

The network side device may be, for example, a network function (NF). For details, reference may be made to the foregoing embodiments, and details are not repeated here.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by a network side device, including: determining the positioning information of the target UE based on the positioning information of the observer UE and the ranging information between the observer UE and the target UE in the ranging result; Wherein, the ranging information includes: distance and angle. Here, since the observer UE is located within the coverage of the network, the network side device may obtain the location information of the observer UE by means of ranging or directly reporting location information of the observer UE.

In this way, in the embodiments of the present disclosure, the network side device can accurately determine the positioning information of the target UE based on the ranging result and the positioning information of the observer UE.

In some embodiments, based on the ranging result, determining the positioning information of the target UE includes one of the following:

Determine the positioning information of the target UE based on the first ranging result returned by the observer UE;

Based on the ranging result returned by the at least one observer UE, the positioning information of the target UE is determined.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, executed by a network side device, which may include: determining positioning information of a target UE based on the first ranging result returned by the observer UE.

Exemplarily, the network side device receives the first returned ranging result, where the first returned ranging result is the ranging result returned by the observer UE1; then the network side device receives the first returned ranging result based on the first returned ranging result Based on the distance result and the positioning information of the observer UE1, the positioning information of the target UE is determined. In this way, the embodiments of the present disclosure can determine the positioning information of the target UE based on the earliest returned ranging result, so that the positioning information of the target UE can be quickly determined. The network side device may be, for example, a network function (NF). For details, reference may be made to the foregoing embodiments, and details are not repeated here.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, executed by a network side device, which may include: determining positioning information of a target UE based on a ranging result returned by at least one observer UE.

Exemplarily, the network-side device receives the ranging result returned by any observer UE among multiple observer UEs; then the network-side device returns based on the ranging result returned by any observer UE and the positioning information of the observer UE , to determine the positioning information of the target UE. In this way, the embodiments of the present disclosure can determine the positioning information of the target UE based on the ranging result of any observer UE ranging the target UE; thus, more scenarios of positioning the target UE can be applied.

Exemplarily, the network-side device receives ranging results returned by multiple observer UEs; then the network-side device determines a candidate location of the target UE based on the ranging results returned by the observer UE and the location information of the observer UE. information; the network side device determines the positioning information of the target UE based on multiple candidate positioning information. In this way, the embodiments of the present disclosure can determine the positioning information of the target UE based on the ranging results of multiple observer UEs measuring the target UE, thereby improving the accuracy of obtaining the positioning information of the target UE.

In one embodiment, the positioning service request includes: Quality of Service (Quality of Service, QoS) information.

In some embodiments, determining the positioning information of the target UE based on the ranging result includes: determining the positioning information of the target UE according to the ranging result and QoS information.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by a network side device, and may include: determining positioning information of a target UE according to a ranging result and QoS information.

Exemplarily, if the QoS indicated by the QoS information is to obtain the location information of the target UE or estimate the location information of the target as soon as possible, when the network side device receives the first returned ranging result; then it can be based on the ranging result and The positioning information of the observer UE is returned from the ranging result, and the positioning information of the target UE is determined. If the QoS indicated by the QoS information is: the positioning information of the target UE is relatively accurate; the network side device receives the ranging results returned by N observer UEs, and obtains the positioning information of the target UE based on the N ranging results; where N is An integer greater than 1. In this way, the embodiments of the present disclosure may also select one or more observer UEs to determine the positioning information of the target UE based on the ranging result and the QoS information.

In some embodiments, terminating the ranging from the observer UE to the target UE based on the ranging result includes: determining to terminate the ranging from the observer UE to the target UE based on the QoS information and the ranging result.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by a network side device, and may include: determining to terminate ranging from an observer UE to a target UE based on QoS information and a ranging result.

In some embodiments, based on the QoS information and the ranging result, determining to terminate the ranging from the observer UE to the target UE includes: determining to terminate the ranging from the observer UE to the target UE in response to the ranging result meeting the QoS requirements indicated by the QoS information. ranging.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by a network side device, and may include: determining to terminate the ranging of the target UE by the observer UE in response to the ranging result meeting the QoS requirement indicated by the QoS information.

Exemplarily, if the QoS requirement indicated by the QoS information is to determine the positioning information of the target UE according to a ranging result; when the network side device receives the first returned ranging result, the network side device terminates the observation of the observer UE from the target UE. ranging. If the QoS requirement indicated by the QoS information is to determine the positioning information of the target UE based on the ranging results of N observer UEs; when the network side device receives a ranging result returned by an observer UE, the network side device does not terminate the observer UE's tracking Ranging of the target UE: until the network side device receives the ranging results returned by N observer UEs, the network side device terminates the ranging of the observer UE to the target UE. N can be a preset value or determined by a communication protocol; or it can be determined not based on the value of N but based on a preset duration.

In some embodiments, terminating the ranging from the observer UE to the target UE based on the ranging result includes: terminating the ranging from the observer UE to the target UE based on a discovery notification in the ranging result.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by a network side device, and may include: terminating the ranging from the observer UE to the target UE based on the discovery notification in the ranging result.

Exemplarily, the network side device receives the ranging result; if it is determined that the ranging result includes an indication that the first observer UE finds the target UE, terminate the ranging of the target UE by the second observer UE. Here, the positioning service request includes: UE information of a plurality of observer UEs; wherein, the first observer UE is any one of the plurality of observer UEs, and the second observer UE is any one of the plurality of observer UEs except the first observer UE. Part or all of other observer UEs other than the observer UE. Here, if the ranging result does not include the discovery notification, the ranging from the observer UE to the target UE is not terminated.

In this way, the network side device in this embodiment of the present disclosure may also determine whether to terminate the ranging from the observer UE to the target UE based on whether the ranging result includes a discovery notification. If the ranging result includes the discovery notification, it is determined that the target UE has been discovered by the observer UE; then the ranging of the target UE can be performed based on the observer UE, without consuming other observer UEs to perform ranging on the target UE. In this way, the loss and the like of the UE can be reduced.

In some embodiments, sending the ranging service request to the observer UE includes: sending the ranging service request to the observer UE in response to determining that the target UE is located outside the network coverage.

As shown in FIG. 9, an embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by a network side device, and may include:

Step S91: In response to determining that the target UE is outside the coverage of the network, send a ranging service request to the observer UE.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by a network side device, and may include: sending a ranging service request to an observer UE in response to determining that the target UE is located outside the network coverage. Here, the network side device may be a GMLC.

The implementation of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, executed by a network side device, which may include: determining that the target UE is located outside the network coverage in response to not receiving the AMF address of the target UE. Here, the network side device may be a GMLC.

Here, the network side device sends the ranging service request to the observer UE, or the network side device sends the ranging service request to the AMF corresponding to the observer UE.

Here, the network side device may interact with the target UE through unified data management (Unified Data Management, UDM). For example, the GMLC sends an AMF address request to the UDM of the target UE; if the network side device does not receive the AMF address of the target UE returned by the UDM, it determines that the target UE is located outside the network coverage.

In this way, in the embodiment of the present disclosure, when the network side device determines that the target UE is outside the network coverage, it sends a ranging service request to the observer UE within the network coverage; Positioning information of the target UE.

In some embodiments, sending the ranging service request to the observer UE includes: sending the ranging service request to the observer UE in response to receiving the AMF address of the observer UE.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, executed by a network side device, which may include: sending a ranging service request to the observer UE in response to receiving the AMF address of the observer UE. Here, the network side device may be a GMLC.

Here, the network side device may interact with the observer UE through UDM. For example, the GMLC sends an AMF address request to UDM1 of the observer UE; if the network side device receives the AMF address of the target UE returned by UDM1, it determines that the target UE is within the network coverage.

In this way, the network side device in this embodiment of the present disclosure can accurately determine that the observer UE is actually within the network coverage by receiving the AMF address of the observer UE.

The following positioning method is performed by the observer UE, which is similar to the above description of the positioning method performed by the requester or the network device (NF); and the embodiment of the positioning method performed by the observer UE does not include For the disclosed technical details, please refer to the description of an example positioning method performed by the requester or the network side (NF), and no detailed description will be given here.

As shown in FIG. 10 , an embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is performed by an observer UE, including:

Step S101: The receiving NF sends a ranging service request; the ranging service request is sent by the network side device after receiving the positioning service request sent by the requester;

Step S102: Based on the ranging service request, perform ranging on the target UE located outside the coverage of the network.

The method provided by the embodiments of the present disclosure may be executed by the observer UE, or may also be executed by the AMF corresponding to the observer UE.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by an observer UE, and may include: based on a ranging service request, positioning a target UE located outside a network coverage for ranging.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by an observer UE, and may include: sending a ranging result of a target UE to a network side device.

In some embodiments, the ranging service request includes: allowed ranging delay;

Sending the ranging result of the target UE to the network side device includes: sending the ranging result of the target UE to the network side device before the ranging delay is reached.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, which is executed by an observer UE, and may include: sending a ranging result of a target UE to a network side device before the ranging delay is reached.

In some embodiments of the present disclosure, the observer UE may interact with the network side device through the AMF. For example, the observer UE sends the ranging result to the AMF corresponding to the UE, and the AMF forwards the ranging result to the GMLC in the network side device.

In one embodiment, the positioning delay is the maximum delay for the observer UE to measure distance or discover the target UE, or the maximum delay for the observer UE to report the ranging result of the UE.

For the above implementation manner, for details, refer to the expression on the requester side or the network side device side, and will not repeat them here.

It should be noted that those skilled in the art can understand that any method provided in the embodiments of the present disclosure may be executed alone, or together with some methods in the embodiments of the present disclosure or some methods in related technologies.

In order to further explain any embodiment of the present disclosure, several specific embodiments are provided below.

example one

As shown in FIG. 11 , an embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, including:

Step S111: the requester sends a positioning service request to the NF, and the positioning service request includes the list information of the observer UE and the allowed timing delay;

Here, the list information of the observer UE includes: information of UE1, UE2, . . . , and UEn; wherein, n is an integer greater than 1.

Here, the NF includes: AMF, LMF, GMLC and/or a network-initiated location request (Network Initiated Location Request, NEF). In one embodiment, the NF is a network element of the 5G core network.

Step S112: NF determines that the target UE is out of network coverage;

Here, the step S112 may also occur before the step S111.

Step S1131: NF sends a ranging service request to UE1; the ranging service request includes: allowed timing delay;

Step S1132: NF sends a ranging service request to UE2; the ranging service request includes: allowed timing delay;

Step S1133: NF sends a ranging service request to UEn; the ranging service request includes: allowed timing delay;

Here, the NF sends the ranging service request to UE1, UE2, ... and UEn. Send a ranging service request. Here, NF1 includes: AMF1, LMF1, GMLC1 and/or NEF1; NF2 includes: AMF2, LMF2, GMLC2 and/or NEF2; NFn includes: AMFn, LMFn, GMLC1 and/or NEFn.

Step S1141: UE1 initiates a ranging process to the target UE;

Step S1142: UE2 initiates a ranging procedure to the target UE;

Step S1143: UEn initiates a ranging procedure to the target UE;

Step S115: UE1 sends the ranging result including the discovery notification to the NF;

Here, the discovery notification is used to indicate the discovery of the target UE.

Step S116: NF starts the network initiated location request (Network Initiated Location Request, NI-LR) process;

Here, the NF starting the NI-LR process includes but is not limited to at least one of the following: the NF receives the ranging information returned by UE1; the NF determines the positioning information of the target UE based on the ranging information and the UE1 positioning information. In one embodiment, the LMF determines the location of the target UE based on the location of UE1 and the relative position between UE1 and the target UE.

Step S117: the NF sends the positioning information of the target UE to the requester;

Step S1181: NF terminates the ranging process of UE2;

Step S1182: The NF terminates the ranging process of the UEn.

Here, the NF may determine the ranging procedure of other observer UEs except UE1 based on the QoS sent by the requester.

Example two

As shown in FIG. 12 , an embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning method, including:

Step S1201a: The LCS client sends a positioning service request to the GMLC, and the positioning service request includes the list information of the observer UE and the allowed timing delay;

In an optional embodiment, step S1201a may also be replaced by step S1201b1 and step S1201b2.

Step S1201b1: The AF sends a positioning service request to the NEF, and the positioning service request includes the list information of the observer UE and the allowed timing delay;

Step S1201b2: The NEF sends a positioning service request to the GMLC, and the positioning service request includes the list information of the observer UE and the allowed timing delay;

Step S1202: GMLC and UDM perform a privacy inspection process;

Here, GMLC and UDM perform a privacy check process, including: GMLC invokes a unified data management (Unified Data Management, UDM) service operation for the target UE to obtain the privacy configuration of the target UE; UDM returns the privacy configuration file of the target UE and the contracted user Subscriber Permanent Identifier (SUPI): GMLC detects the privacy profile of the target UE, and if the target UE is not allowed to be located, steps S1201a, S1201b1, S1201b2, S1202, and S1203 are skipped.

Step S1203: GMLC acquires the AMF address of the target UE;

Here, the GMLC acquires the AMF address of the target UE, including: the GMLC uses the SUPI of the target UE to call a service operation to the UDM of the target UE; the UDM returns the current service AMF address of the target UE or does not return the service AMF address of the target UE.

Step S1204: GMLC determines that the target UE is out of network coverage;

Here, if the AMF address of the target UE is not returned in step S1203, the GMLC determines that the target UE is not registered in the network, and the target UE is out of network coverage.

Step S1205: GMLC obtains the AMF address of UE1;

Here, the GMLC obtains the AMF address of UE1, including: the GMLC uses the SUPI of the UE1 to call the service operation to the UDM; the UDM returns the current service AMF address of the UE1.

Step S1206: CMLC sends a ranging service request to AMF1;

Here, AMF1 is the AMF corresponding to UE1; sending the ranging service request to AMF1 by the CMLC may be sending the ranging service request to UE1. In one embodiment, the ranging service request includes: allowed timing delay.

Step S1207: AMF1 invokes the ranging procedure;

Step S1208: AMF1 sends the ranging result including the discovery notification to the GMLC;

Here, the discovery notification indicates discovery of the target UE.

Step S1209: GMLC starts the NI-LR process;

Here, the GMLC starting the NI-LR process at least includes: obtaining the positioning information of the target UE.

Here, the LMF provides the UE information of the target UE in the NI-LR request; the LMF determines the location of the target UE based on the location of UE1 and the relative position between UE1 and the target UE.

Step S1210a: GMLC sends the positioning information of the target UE to the LCS client;

Step S1210b1: GMLC sends the positioning information of the target UE to the NEF;

Step S1210b2: The NEF sends the positioning information of the target UE to the AF.

As shown in Figure 13, the embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to the requester, including:

The first sending module 41 is configured to send a positioning service request to a network side device, the positioning service request includes: UE information of an observer UE, wherein the observer UE is used to locate a target UE outside the network coverage.

In an embodiment, the network side device includes: NF.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to a requester, and may include: a first sending module 41 configured to send a positioning service request to a network side device, wherein the positioning service request includes: a permitted positioning delay.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to a requester, and may include: a first receiving module configured to receive the positioning information of the target UE sent by the network side device; wherein, the positioning information of the target UE is based on the network side device It is determined by the ranging result of the target UE returned by the observer UE.

It should be noted that those skilled in the art can understand that the devices provided in the embodiments of the present disclosure may be implemented independently, or together with some devices in the embodiments of the present disclosure or devices in related technologies.

Regarding the apparatus in the foregoing embodiments, the specific manner in which each module executes operations has been described in detail in the embodiments related to the method, and will not be described in detail here.

As shown in FIG. 14, an embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to a network side device, including:

The second receiving module 51 is configured to receive the positioning service request sent by the requester, and the positioning service request includes: UE information of the observer UE;

The second sending module 52 is configured to send a ranging service request to the observer UE; wherein, the ranging service request is used to request the observer UE to measure a target UE located outside the coverage of the network.

In an embodiment, the network side device includes: NF.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to network-side equipment, and may include: a second receiving module 51 configured to receive a positioning service request sent by a requester; wherein, the positioning service request includes: an allowed positioning delay .

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to a network side device, and may include:

The second receiving module 51 is configured to receive the ranging result of the target UE sent by the observer UE;

The processing module is configured to determine the positioning information of the target UE based on the ranging result.

The processing module is configured to terminate the ranging of the target UE by the observer UE based on the ranging result.

The processing module is configured to determine the positioning information of the target UE based on the positioning information of the observer UE and the ranging information between the observer UE and the target UE in the ranging result; wherein the ranging information includes: distance and angle.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to a network side device, and the ranging service request includes: QoS information;

The apparatus may include: a processing module configured to determine to terminate ranging of the target UE by the observer UE based on the QoS information and the ranging result.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to a network side device, and may include: a processing module configured to determine to terminate the ranging of the observer UE to the target UE in response to the ranging result meeting the QoS requirements indicated by the QoS information .

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to a network side device, and may include: a processing module configured to determine positioning information of a target UE based on a first ranging result returned by an observer UE.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to a network side device, and may include: a processing module configured to determine positioning information of a target UE based on a ranging result returned by at least one observer UE.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to a network side device, and may include: a second sending module 52 configured to send a ranging service request to an observer UE in response to determining that the target UE is outside the network coverage.

In one embodiment, the network side device includes a GMLC.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to a GMLC, and may include: a processing module configured to, in response to not receiving the AMF address of the target UE, determine that the target UE is located outside the network coverage.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to GMLC, and may include: a second sending module configured to send a ranging service request to the observer UE in response to receiving the AMF address of the observer UE.

As shown in FIG. 15 , an embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to an observer UE, including:

The third receiving module 61 is configured to receive the ranging service request sent by the network function network side device; the ranging service request is sent by the network side device after receiving the ranging service request sent by the requester;

The positioning module 62 is configured to perform ranging on a target UE located outside the coverage of the network based on the ranging service request.

In an embodiment, the network side device includes: NF.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to an observer UE, and may include: a third sending module configured to send a ranging result of a target UE to a network side device.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a positioning device, which is applied to an observer UE, and a ranging service request includes: an allowed ranging delay;

The device includes: a third sending module 61 configured to send the ranging result of the positioning target UE to the network side device before the ranging delay is reached.

An embodiment of the present disclosure provides a communication device, including:

processor;

memory for storing processor-executable instructions;

In an embodiment, the communication device may include but not limited to at least one of: a core network device, an access network device, and a UE. Here, the access network equipment includes: a base station. The core network equipment includes entities such as the network function (NF) in the above embodiments; here, the NF may include but not limited to: AMF, GMLC, and LMF.

Wherein, the processor may include various types of storage media, which are non-transitory computer storage media, and can continue to memorize and store information thereon after the user equipment is powered off.

The processor may be connected to the memory through a bus or the like, and used to read the executable program stored on the memory, for example, at least one of the methods shown in FIGS. 6 to 12 .

An embodiment of the present disclosure further provides a computer storage medium, where a computer executable program is stored in the computer storage medium, and when the executable program is executed by a processor, the positioning method of any embodiment of the present disclosure is implemented. For example, at least one of the methods shown in FIGS. 6 to 12 .

With regard to the apparatus or storage medium in the above embodiments, the specific manner in which each module executes operations has been described in detail in the embodiments related to the method, and will not be described in detail here.

Fig. 16 is a block diagram showing a user equipment 800 according to an exemplary embodiment. For example, user equipment 800 may be a mobile phone, computer, digital broadcast user equipment, messaging device, game console, tablet device, medical device, fitness device, personal digital assistant, and the like.

Referring to FIG. 16, user equipment 800 may include one or more of the following components: processing component 802, memory 804, power supply component 806, multimedia component 808, audio component 810, input/output (I/O) interface 812, sensor component 814 , and the communication component 816.

The processing component 802 generally controls the overall operations of the user device 800, such as operations associated with display, telephone calls, data communications, camera operations, and recording operations. The processing component 802 may include one or more processors 820 to execute instructions to complete all or part of the steps of the above method. Additionally, processing component 802 may include one or more modules that facilitate interaction between processing component 802 and other components. For example, processing component 802 may include a multimedia module to facilitate interaction between multimedia component 808 and processing component 802 .

The memory 804 is configured to store various types of data to support operations at the user equipment 800 . Examples of such data include instructions for any application or method operating on user device 800, contact data, phonebook data, messages, pictures, videos, and the like. The memory 804 can be implemented by any type of volatile or non-volatile storage device or their combination, such as static random access memory (SRAM), electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM), erasable Programmable Read Only Memory (EPROM), Programmable Read Only Memory (PROM), Read Only Memory (ROM), Magnetic Memory, Flash Memory, Magnetic or Optical Disk.

The power supply component 806 provides power to various components of the user equipment 800 . Power components 806 may include a power management system, one or more power supplies, and other components associated with generating, managing, and distributing power for user device 800 .

The multimedia component 808 includes a screen providing an output interface between the user device 800 and the user. In some embodiments, the screen may include a liquid crystal display (LCD) and a touch panel (TP). If the screen includes a touch panel, the screen may be implemented as a touch screen to receive input signals from a user. The touch panel includes one or more touch sensors to sense touches, swipes, and gestures on the touch panel. The touch sensor may not only sense a boundary of a touch or swipe action, but also detect duration and pressure associated with the touch or swipe action. In some embodiments, the multimedia component 808 includes a front camera and/or a rear camera. When the user equipment 800 is in an operation mode, such as a shooting mode or a video mode, the front camera and/or the rear camera can receive external multimedia data. Each front camera and rear camera can be a fixed optical lens system or have focal length and optical zoom capability.

The audio component 810 is configured to output and/or input audio signals. For example, the audio component 810 includes a microphone (MIC), which is configured to receive external audio signals when the user equipment 800 is in operation modes, such as call mode, recording mode and voice recognition mode. Received audio signals may be further stored in memory 804 or sent via communication component 816 . In some embodiments, the audio component 810 also includes a speaker for outputting audio signals.

The I/O interface 812 provides an interface between the processing component 802 and a peripheral interface module, which may be a keyboard, a click wheel, a button, and the like. These buttons may include, but are not limited to: a home button, volume buttons, start button, and lock button.

Sensor component 814 includes one or more sensors for providing user equipment 800 with status assessments of various aspects. For example, the sensor component 814 can detect the open/closed state of the device 800, the relative positioning of components, such as the display and keypad of the user device 800, the sensor component 814 can also detect the user device 800 or a component of the user device 800 The position change of the user device 800, the presence or absence of contact of the user with the user device 800, the orientation or acceleration/deceleration of the user device 800 and the temperature change of the user device 800. The sensor assembly 814 may include a proximity sensor configured to detect the presence of nearby objects in the absence of any physical contact. Sensor assembly 814 may also include an optical sensor, such as a CMOS or CCD image sensor, for use in imaging applications. In some embodiments, the sensor component 814 may also include an acceleration sensor, a gyroscope sensor, a magnetic sensor, a pressure sensor or a temperature sensor.

The communication component 816 is configured to facilitate wired or wireless communication between the user equipment 800 and other devices. The user equipment 800 can access a wireless network based on a communication standard, such as WiFi, 4G or 5G, or a combination thereof. In an exemplary embodiment, the communication component 816 receives broadcast signals or broadcast related information from an external broadcast management system via a broadcast channel. In an exemplary embodiment, the communication component 816 also includes a near field communication (NFC) module to facilitate short-range communication. For example, the NFC module may be implemented based on Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology, Infrared Data Association (IrDA) technology, Ultra Wide Band (UWB) technology, Bluetooth (BT) technology and other technologies.

In an exemplary embodiment, user equipment 800 may be powered by one or more application specific integrated circuits (ASICs), digital signal processors (DSPs), digital signal processing devices (DSPDs), programmable logic devices (PLDs), field programmable A programmable gate array (FPGA), controller, microcontroller, microprocessor or other electronic component implementation for performing the methods described above.

In an exemplary embodiment, there is also provided a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium including instructions, such as the memory 804 including instructions, which can be executed by the processor 820 of the user equipment 800 to complete the above method. For example, the non-transitory computer readable storage medium may be ROM, random access memory (RAM), CD-ROM, magnetic tape, floppy disk, optical data storage device, and the like.

As shown in FIG. 17 , an embodiment of the present disclosure shows a structure of a base station. For example, the base station 900 may be provided as a network side device. Referring to FIG. 17 , base station 900 includes processing component 922 , which further includes one or more processors, and a memory resource represented by memory 932 for storing instructions executable by processing component 922 , such as application programs. The application program stored in memory 932 may include one or more modules each corresponding to a set of instructions. In addition, the processing component 922 is configured to execute instructions, so as to execute any of the aforementioned methods applied to the base station, for example, the methods shown in FIG. 4 to FIG. 10 .

Base station 900 may also include a power component 926 configured to perform power management of base station 900, a wired or wireless network interface 950 configured to connect base station 900 to a network, and an input-output (I/O) interface 958. The base station 900 can operate based on an operating system stored in the memory 932, such as Windows Server™, Mac OS X™, Unix™, Linux™, FreeBSD™ or similar.

Other embodiments of the invention will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art from consideration of the specification and practice of the invention disclosed herein. This disclosure is intended to cover any modification, use or adaptation of the present invention, these modifications, uses or adaptations follow the general principles of the present invention and include common knowledge or conventional technical means in the technical field not disclosed in this disclosure . The specification and examples are to be considered exemplary only, with a true scope and spirit of the invention being indicated by the following claims.

It should be understood that the present invention is not limited to the precise constructions which have been described above and shown in the accompanying drawings, and various modifications and changes may be made without departing from the scope thereof. The scope of the invention is limited only by the appended claims.

Claims

A method of locating, wherein, performed by a requester, comprising:

Sending a positioning service request to the network side device, where the positioning service request includes: UE information of an observer user equipment UE; wherein the observer UE is used to locate a target UE outside the coverage of the network.
The method according to claim 1, wherein the positioning service request includes: a permitted positioning delay; wherein the positioning delay is used for the observer UE to measure distance or discover the target UE The maximum delay, or the maximum delay used for the observer UE to report the ranging result to the target UE.
The method according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the method further comprises:

receiving the positioning information of the target UE sent by the network side device; wherein the positioning information of the target UE is determined by the network side device based on the ranging result of the target UE returned by the observer UE.
A positioning method, wherein, performed by a network side device, includes:

Receive a location service request sent by the requester, where the location service request includes: UE information of the observer user equipment UE;

Sending a ranging service request to the observer UE; wherein the ranging service request is used to request the observer UE to measure a target UE located outside the network coverage.
The method according to claim 4, the positioning service request includes: a permitted positioning delay; wherein, the positioning delay is used for the observer UE to measure distance or discover the maximum delay of the target UE time, or the maximum delay for the observer UE to report the ranging result to the UE.
The method according to claim 4 or 5, wherein the method comprises:

receiving the ranging result of the target UE sent by the observer UE;

Based on the ranging result, determine the positioning information of the target UE; or, based on the ranging result, terminate the ranging of the target UE by the observer UE.
The method according to claim 6, wherein the ranging result includes at least one of the following:

ranging information between the observer UE and the target UE;

Notifications found.
The method according to claim 6, wherein said determining the positioning information of the target UE based on the ranging result comprises:

Determine the positioning information of the target UE based on the positioning information of the observer UE and the ranging information between the observer UE and the target UE in the ranging result; wherein the ranging information includes : distance and angle.
The method according to claim 6, wherein the positioning service request includes: Quality of Service (QoS) information;

The terminating the ranging of the target UE by the observer UE based on the ranging result includes:

Based on the QoS information and the ranging result, determine to terminate ranging of the target UE by the observer UE.
The method according to claim 9, wherein the determining to terminate the ranging of the target UE by the observer UE based on the QoS information and the ranging result comprises:

In response to the ranging result meeting the QoS requirement indicated by the QoS information, determine to terminate the ranging of the target UE by the observer UE.
The method according to claim 6, wherein, based on the ranging result, determining the positioning information of the target UE includes one of the following:

determining the positioning information of the target UE based on the first ranging result returned by the observer UE;

Determine the positioning information of the target UE based on the ranging result returned by at least one observer UE.
The method according to claim 4 or 5, wherein the sending the ranging service request to the observer UE comprises:

In response to determining that the target UE is located outside of network coverage, sending the ranging service request to the observer UE.
The method according to claim 12, wherein the network side device comprises: a mobile positioning center gateway GMLC;

The methods include:

In response to not receiving the Access and Mobility Management Function AMF address of the target UE, it is determined that the target UE is located out of network coverage.
The method according to claim 13, wherein the sending the ranging service request to the observer UE comprises:

In response to receiving the AMF address of the observer UE, sending the ranging service request to the observer UE.
A positioning method, wherein, performed by a watcher user equipment UE, includes:

Receiving the ranging service request sent by the network side device; the ranging service request is sent by the network side device after receiving the positioning service request sent by the requester;

Based on the ranging service request, ranging is performed on a target UE located outside the coverage of the network.
The method of claim 15, wherein the method comprises:

Send the ranging result of the target UE to the network side device.
The method according to claim 18, wherein the ranging service request includes: allowed ranging delay;

The sending the ranging result of the target UE to the network side device includes:

Before the ranging delay is reached, send the ranging result of the target UE to the network side device.
A locating device, wherein, applied to a requester, comprising:

The first sending module is configured to send a positioning service request to a network side device, where the positioning service request includes: UE information of an observer user equipment UE, wherein the observer UE is used to locate a user outside the network coverage Target UE.
A positioning device, which is applied to network side equipment, includes:

The second receiving module is configured to receive a positioning service request sent by a requester, where the positioning service request includes: UE information of an observer user equipment UE;

The second sending module is configured to send a ranging service request to the observer UE; wherein the ranging service request is used to request the observer UE to measure a target UE outside the network coverage.
A positioning device, which is applied to an observer user equipment UE, includes:

The third receiving module is configured to receive a ranging service request sent by a network side device; the ranging service request is sent by the network side device after receiving the ranging service request sent by the requester;

The positioning module is configured to perform ranging on a target UE located outside the network coverage based on the ranging service request.
A communication device, wherein the communication device includes:

processor;

memory for storing said processor-executable instructions;

Wherein, the processor is configured to implement the positioning method according to any one of claims 1 to 3, or claims 4 to 14, or any one of claims 15 to 17 when running the executable instructions.
A computer storage medium, wherein the computer storage medium stores a computer executable program, and when the executable program is executed by a processor, claims 1 to 3, or claims 4 to 14, or claims 15 to 17 are realized Any one of the positioning methods.