JP6059622B2 - Wireless relay device, terminal device, wireless relay method, and control method - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to a wireless communication technique using a relay device.

  Conventionally, a wireless relay device that relays wireless communication between a base station device and a terminal device has been proposed (see, for example, Patent Document 1). A specific example of the wireless relay device is a portable wireless router (PWR). For example, the PWR is connected to the mobile communication network by wirelessly communicating with a base station device of the mobile communication network, and relays communication between the terminal device connected to the PWR and the mobile communication network. The terminal device performs wireless communication with the PWR by means such as Wi-Fi (registered trademark) (Wireless Fidelity).

JP 2005-217994 A

  The connection between the base station device and the radio relay device and the connection between the radio relay device and the terminal device are independent of each other. Therefore, there has been a problem in the terminal device that it cannot be determined whether or not the connection between the base station device and the wireless relay device is maintained. For example, even if the connection between the base station device and the wireless relay device is broken, the terminal device performs communication via the wireless relay device as long as the connection is maintained with the wireless relay device. End up.

  In view of the above circumstances, an object of the present invention is to provide a technique that enables a terminal device to determine whether or not a connection between a base station device and a wireless relay device is maintained.

  One aspect of the present invention relays communication between a base station apparatus and a communication state monitoring unit that determines whether or not the own apparatus is out of the service area of the base station apparatus. A beacon generation unit that generates a beacon that includes information indicating whether or not out of service according to a determination result of the relay unit and the communication state monitoring unit, and the beacon generated by the beacon generation unit And a communication unit that transmits to the wireless relay device.

  One aspect of the present invention is a communication for receiving a beacon including information indicating whether or not the wireless relay device is out of the range of the base station device from a wireless relay device that relays communication between the device itself and the base station device. And a control unit that determines whether or not the wireless relay device is out of range of the base station device based on information included in the beacon received by the communication unit.

  One aspect of the present invention is the terminal device described above, wherein the control unit includes a case where the wireless relay device is out of range of the base station device and a case where the wireless relay device is within range of the base station device. And different processing.

  According to one aspect of the present invention, a communication state monitoring step for determining whether or not the own device is out of the range of the base station device and relaying communication between the terminal device connected to the own device and the base station device In response to the determination result of the relay step and the communication state monitoring step, a beacon generation step for generating a beacon including information indicating whether or not the terminal is out of service, and the beacon generated by the beacon generation step And a communication step of transmitting to the wireless relay method.

  One aspect of the present invention is a communication for receiving a beacon including information indicating whether or not the wireless relay device is out of the range of the base station device from a wireless relay device that relays communication between the device itself and the base station device. And a control step of determining whether or not the wireless relay device is out of range of the base station device based on information included in the beacon received by the communication step.

  According to the present invention, in a terminal device, it is possible to determine whether or not the connection between the base station device and the radio relay device is maintained.

It is the schematic showing the outline of the process of the radio relay apparatus 20 and the terminal device 30 of this invention. 3 is a schematic block diagram illustrating a functional configuration of a wireless relay device 20. FIG. It is a figure which shows the format of the beacon produced | generated by the beacon production | generation part 205. FIG. 5 is a flowchart illustrating a specific example of the operation of the wireless relay device 20. 3 is a schematic block diagram illustrating a functional configuration of a terminal device 30. FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing a specific example of the operation of the terminal device 30. FIG. 10 is a sequence diagram showing specific examples of operations of the base station device 10, the radio relay device 20, and the terminal device 30.

[Outline]
FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram showing an outline of processing of the wireless relay device 20 and the terminal device 30 of the present invention. FIG. 1 shows a base station device 10, a radio relay device 20, and a terminal device 30.
The base station apparatus 10 functions as a base station connected to the mobile communication network.

The wireless relay device 20 is, for example, a communication device such as a PWR, a tethered mobile phone or a smartphone. The wireless relay device 20 performs a relay process between the base station device 10 and the terminal device 30.
The terminal device 30 is an information processing device such as a smartphone, a tablet, a personal computer, or a laptop computer. The terminal device 30 communicates with the base station device 10 via the wireless relay device 20.

  Specific examples of wireless communication performed by the wireless relay device 20 with the base station device 10 include 3G (third generation mobile communication system), LTE (Long Term Evolution), WiMAX (WiMAX: Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access), and the like. There is a mobile communication using the standard.

  Communication performed by the wireless relay device 20 with the terminal device 30 may be wireless communication or wired communication. Specific examples of communication performed by the wireless relay device 20 with the terminal device 30 include a wireless LAN (Local Area Network; for example, Wi-Fi (registered trademark)), Bluetooth (registered trademark), USB (Universal Serial Bus), and the like. There is communication using standards.

  The radio relay apparatus 20-1 is located within the base station apparatus 10. Therefore, the wireless relay device 20-1 can perform wireless communication with the base station device 10. Therefore, the terminal device 30-1 can communicate with the base station device 10 via the wireless relay device 20-1.

  In such a case, the wireless relay device 20-1 indicates to the terminal device 30-1 information indicating that wireless communication is possible with the base station device 10 (hereinafter referred to as “in-range notification information”). .) Is sent to the beacon. The terminal device 30-1 can determine that the connection between the base station device 10 and the wireless relay device 20-1 is maintained by receiving the beacon to which the in-zone notification information is added.

  On the other hand, the radio relay apparatus 20-2 is located outside the service area of the base station apparatus 10. Therefore, the radio relay apparatus 20-2 cannot perform radio communication with the base station apparatus 10. Therefore, the terminal device 30-2 cannot communicate with the base station device 10 via the radio relay device 20-2.

  In such a case, the wireless relay device 20-2 provides information indicating that the terminal device 30-2 cannot perform wireless communication with the base station device 10 (hereinafter referred to as “out-of-service notification information”). ) Is sent to the beacon. The terminal device 30-2 can determine that the connection between the base station device 10 and the wireless relay device 20-2 is not maintained by receiving the beacon to which the out-of-service notification information is added.

[Details]
FIG. 2 is a schematic block diagram illustrating a functional configuration of the wireless relay device 20. The wireless relay device 20 includes a CPU (Central Processing Unit), a memory, an auxiliary storage device, and the like connected by a bus, and executes a wireless relay program. The wireless relay device 20 functions as a device including a first communication unit 201, a second communication unit 202, a relay unit 203, a communication state monitoring unit 204, and a beacon generation unit 205 by executing a wireless relay program. Note that all or part of each function of the wireless relay device 20 may be realized by using hardware such as an application specific integrated circuit (ASIC), a programmable logic device (PLD), or a field programmable gate array (FPGA). .

  The first communication unit 201 performs wireless communication with the base station device 10. Specific examples of wireless communication performed by the first communication unit 201 with the base station apparatus 10 include mobile communication using standards such as 3G, LTE, and WiMAX.

  The second communication unit 202 performs communication with the terminal device 30. Specific examples of communication performed by the second communication unit 202 with the terminal device 30 include communication using a standard such as a wireless LAN, Bluetooth (registered trademark), or USB.

  The relay unit 203 relays communication performed between the base station device 10 and the terminal device 30. For example, the relay unit 203 relays data transmitted from the mobile communication network to the terminal device 30 and data transmitted from the terminal device 30 to the mobile communication network.

  The communication state monitoring unit 204 monitors the communication state between the first communication unit 201 and the base station device 10, and the own device (wireless relay device 20) is located within or outside the base station device 10. Determine whether. For example, the communication state monitoring unit 204 acquires the received power of a signal (hereinafter referred to as “received signal”) received from the base station apparatus 10 in the first communication unit 201, and the received power is equal to or less than a predetermined threshold. In some cases, it may be determined that it is located outside the service area. For example, the communication status monitoring unit 204 may determine that the first communication unit 201 is out of service when the communication delay time with the mobile communication network side is equal to or greater than a predetermined threshold. The communication state monitoring unit 204 may determine whether or not the communication state monitoring unit 204 is located outside the service area based on other criteria.

  The beacon generation unit 205 generates a beacon to which information indicating the determination result of the communication state monitoring unit 204 is given. For example, when it is determined that the communication state monitoring unit 204 is out of service area, the beacon generation unit 205 gives out-of-service notification information to the beacon. For example, when it is determined that the communication state monitoring unit 204 is not out of the service area (when it is determined that the user is within the service area), the beacon generation unit 205 gives the service area notification information to the beacon. The beacon generation unit 205 broadcasts the generated beacon via the second communication unit 202.

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating a format of a beacon generated by the beacon generation unit 205.
FIG. 3A is a diagram illustrating a format of a beacon to which out-of-service notification information is assigned. Out-of-service notification information is given as a character string “out of radar range” to Vendor-Specific-content in IE (Information Element) defined in the beacon.
FIG. 3B is a diagram showing the format of a beacon to which in-zone notification information is attached. The area notification information is given as a character string “within the range” to Vendor-Specific-content among IEs defined in the beacon.

  FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing a specific example of the operation of the wireless relay device 20. The communication state monitoring unit 204 determines the communication state of the first communication unit 201 at a predetermined timing (step S101). The predetermined timing may be a timing at which a signal is received from the base station apparatus 10, a timing at which a predetermined time has elapsed, or another timing. The communication state monitoring unit 204 determines whether or not the own device (wireless relay device 20) is located outside the service area of the base station device 10 by determining the communication state.

  The communication state monitoring unit 204 determines whether or not the new determination result is different from the previous determination result (step S102). If the new determination result and the previous determination result are the same (step S102—NO), the communication state monitoring unit 204 does not output the determination result to the beacon generation unit 205, and the process ends. On the other hand, when the new determination result and the previous determination result are different (step S102—YES), the communication state monitoring unit 204 outputs the determination result to the beacon generation unit 205.

  When receiving the determination result from the communication state monitoring unit 204, the beacon generation unit 205 generates a beacon according to the determination result. When it determines with it being located out of service area (step S103-YES), the beacon production | generation part 205 provides out-of-service notification information to a beacon (step S104). On the other hand, when it determines with not being located out of service area (step S103-NO), the beacon production | generation part 205 provides service area notification information to a beacon (step S105). And the 2nd communication part 202 carries out the broadcast transmission of the beacon produced | generated by the beacon production | generation part 205 (step S106).

  FIG. 5 is a schematic block diagram illustrating a functional configuration of the terminal device 30. The terminal device 30 includes a CPU, a memory, an auxiliary storage device, and the like connected by a bus, and executes a control program. The terminal device 30 functions as a device including a communication unit 301, a control unit 302, an input unit 303, and an output unit 304 by executing a control program. All or some of the functions of the terminal device 30 may be realized using hardware such as an ASIC, PLD, or FPGA.

  The communication unit 301 communicates with the wireless relay device 20. Specific examples of communication performed by the communication unit 301 with the wireless relay device 20 include communication using a standard such as a wireless LAN, Bluetooth (registered trademark), or USB.

  The control unit 302 performs control of the terminal device 30 and data processing. For example, the control unit 302 controls the operation of the own device (terminal device 30) based on the beacon received via the communication unit 301.

  The input unit 303 is configured using an existing input device such as a keyboard, a pointing device (such as a mouse or a tablet), a button, or a touch panel. The input unit 303 is operated by the user when inputting a user instruction to the terminal device 30. The input unit 303 may be an interface for connecting the input device to the terminal device 30. In this case, the input unit 303 inputs an input signal generated in response to a user input in the input device to the terminal device 30.

  The output unit 304 outputs data and signals to the user of the terminal device 30 via the output device of the terminal device 30. The output device may be configured using, for example, a device that outputs images and characters on a screen. For example, the output device can be configured using a CRT (Cathode Ray Tube), a liquid crystal display, an organic EL (Electro-Luminescent) display, or the like. The output device may be configured using devices such as one or a plurality of lights (light emitting unit), a speaker, and a vibrator (vibration generating unit).

  FIG. 6 is a flowchart illustrating a specific example of the operation of the terminal device 30. When the communication unit 301 receives a beacon from the wireless relay device 20 (step S201), the control unit 302 determines whether the wireless relay device 20 is out of range based on the beacon. If it is out of range (step S202—YES), the control unit 302 executes out-of-range processing (step S203). On the other hand, when it is not out of the service area (step S202—NO), the control unit 302 executes the service area process (step S204).

<Out-of-service processing>
Out-of-service processing is processing executed when the wireless relay device 20 moves out of the service area. Hereinafter, specific examples of out-of-service processing will be listed. When the control unit 302 includes a communication unit (hereinafter referred to as “other communication unit”) that can be connected to the mobile communication network without going through the wireless relay device 20, the control unit 302 includes: The communication means may be switched so as to connect to the mobile communication network by other communication means. The control unit 302 may change its own device (terminal device 30) to a mode with less power consumption (hereinafter referred to as “power save mode”). For example, the power save mode may be a mode in which communication with the wireless relay device 20 is not performed.

  The control unit 302 may cause the output unit 304 to execute an output indicating that the wireless relay device 20 is out of range. At this time, the control unit 302 may control the output unit 304 to display a setting screen for changing the communication unit to another communication unit. The control unit 302 may control the output unit 304 to display a setting screen for transitioning the own apparatus to the power save mode. In these cases, the user can easily change the communication means and mode by operating the input unit 303 according to the setting screen displayed by the output unit 304.

  As the out-of-service processing, the control unit 302 may operate as follows. First, the control unit 302 determines the presence or absence of other communication means. When there is no other communication means, the control unit 302 shifts its own device to the power save mode. When there is another communication means, the control unit 302 confirms the radio wave state of the other communication means and determines whether the other communication means is out of range. When the other communication means is out of range, the control unit 302 causes the own apparatus to transition to the power save mode. On the other hand, when the other communication means is not out of the service area (within the service area), the control unit 302 switches the communication means so as to connect to the mobile communication network using the other communication means.

  There may be a plurality of other communication means. A plurality of other communication means may be given priorities. In this case, the control unit 302 stores the priority order for each other communication means. The control unit 302 determines whether another communication unit is out of service area from the higher priority. Then, the control unit 302 switches the communication means so as to connect to the mobile communication network using another communication means determined to be within the range. On the other hand, when it is determined that all other communication means are out of service, the control unit 302 causes the own apparatus to transition to the power save mode.

<Range processing>
The area processing is processing executed when the wireless relay device 20 moves from outside the area to within the area. Hereinafter, specific examples of the area processing will be listed. When the control unit 302 is connected to the mobile communication network by other communication means, the control unit 302 may switch the communication means so as to connect to the mobile communication network by communication via the wireless relay device 20. When the own device (terminal device 30) is in the power save mode, the control unit 302 may cause the own device to transition from the power save mode to the normal mode.

  The control unit 302 may cause the output unit 304 to execute an output indicating that the wireless relay device 20 is within range. At this time, the control unit 302 may control the output unit 304 to display a setting screen for changing the communication unit to communication via the wireless relay device 20. The control unit 302 may control the output unit 304 to display a setting screen for transitioning the own device from the power save mode to the normal mode. In these cases, the user can easily change the communication means and mode by operating the input unit 303 according to the setting screen displayed by the output unit 304.

  As the area processing, the control unit 302 may operate as follows. First, the control unit 302 determines whether another communication unit is used. When other communication means are used, the control unit 302 switches the communication means so as to connect to the mobile communication network by communication via the wireless relay device 20. On the other hand, when other communication means are not used, the control unit 302 causes the own apparatus to transition from the power save mode to the normal mode. This is the end of the explanation of the range processing.

  FIG. 7 is a sequence diagram illustrating a specific example of the operation of each device of the base station device 10, the radio relay device 20, and the terminal device 30. The base station device 10 and the wireless relay device 20 perform data communication while wireless communication is possible (step S301). The wireless relay device 20 determines a communication state with the base station device 10 at a predetermined timing (step S302). The wireless relay device 20 generates a beacon according to the determination result and transmits the beacon (step S303). When receiving the beacon, the terminal device 30 determines the communication state of the wireless relay device 20 based on the received beacon (step S304). And the terminal device 30 performs an out-of-service process or an in-service process according to the determination result regarding a communication state (step S305).

  According to the radio relay device 20 and the terminal device 30 configured as described above, the terminal device 30 easily determines whether or not the connection between the base station device 10 and the radio relay device 20 is maintained. It becomes possible.

  Further, the control unit 302 of the terminal device 30 performs out-of-service processing or in-service processing according to the determination result of whether or not communication between the base station device 10 and the wireless relay device 20 is maintained (whether or not out of service). Execute. Therefore, in the terminal device 30, it becomes possible to maintain communication with a mobile communication network and to reduce useless power consumption. For example, by shifting to a mode in which communication is not performed in communication with the wireless relay device 20, it is possible to suppress power required for useless communication with the wireless relay device 20 that is out of service.

  The embodiment of the present invention has been described in detail with reference to the drawings. However, the specific configuration is not limited to this embodiment, and includes designs and the like that do not depart from the gist of the present invention.

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 10 ... Base station apparatus, 20 ... Wireless relay apparatus, 30 ... Terminal apparatus, 201 ... First communication part, 202 ... Second communication part, 203 ... Relay part, 204 ... Communication state monitoring part, 205 ... Beacon generation part, 301 ... Communication part 302 ... Control part 303 ... Input part 304 ... Output part

Claims (5)

A communication state monitoring unit that determines whether or not its own device is out of range of the base station device;
A relay unit that relays communication between the terminal device connected to the own device and the base station device;
According to the determination result of the communication state monitoring unit, a beacon generating unit that generates a beacon including information indicating whether or not out of service area in an IE (Information Element) area ;
A communication unit that broadcasts the beacon generated by the beacon generation unit to a terminal device;
A wireless relay device comprising: A communication unit that receives a beacon including information indicating whether or not the wireless relay device is out of range of the base station device, from a wireless relay device that relays communication between the own device and the base station device;
Based on information included in the beacon received by the communication unit, it is determined whether or not the wireless relay device is out of range of the base station device, and when the wireless relay device is out of range of the base station device A control unit that shifts the device to a mode with less power consumption ;
A terminal device comprising:   The terminal according to claim 2, wherein the control unit performs different processing depending on whether the wireless relay device is out of a range of the base station device or when the wireless relay device is within a range of the base station device. apparatus. A communication state monitoring step for determining whether or not the own device is out of range of the base station device;
A relay step of relaying communication between a terminal device connected to the own device and the base station device;
According to the determination result of the communication state monitoring step, a beacon generating step for generating a beacon including information indicating whether or not out of service area in an IE (Information Element) area ;
A communication step of broadcasting the beacon generated by the beacon generation step to a terminal device;
A wireless relay method. A communication step of receiving a beacon including information indicating whether or not the wireless relay device is out of range of the base station device from a wireless relay device that relays communication between the own device and the base station device;
Based on information included in the beacon received by the communication step, it is determined whether or not the wireless relay device is out of range of the base station device, and when the wireless relay device is out of range of the base station device A control step for transitioning the device to a mode with less power consumption ;
A control method.

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