A multiple access communication protocol includes an uplink channel and a downlink channel is disclosed. The uplink channel has a plurality of frames, such that each frame has a first selectable number of minislots and a second selectable number of slots. A reservation request of a first type is sent into a first selected minislot of a selected frame of the uplink channel when information of a first type is to be sent. The reservation request of the first type requests an assignment for at least one slot for transmitting information of the first type in at least one frame that is subsequent to the selected frame. A reservation request of the second type is sent into a second selected minislot of the selected frame when the second selected minislot is available in the selected frame and when information of a second type is to be sent. The reservation request of the second type requests an assignment of at least one slot for transmitting information of the second type in at least one frame that is subsequent to the selected frame, and contends for the second selected minislot based on a blocked binary tree algorithm. The downlink channel contains a feedback message that occurs prior to the end of the selected frame of the uplink channel. The feedback message includes minislot assignment information for sending reservation requests of the first and the second type and slot assignment information for transmitting information of the first and the second type, minislot contention information for the reservation requests of the second type sent in the selected frame, and allocation time information for the reservation requests of the second type to be initiated in a frame after the selected frame on behalf of the information of the second type.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present application is related to application Serial No. 09/597,392, entitled Voice-Data Integrated Multiaccess By Self-Reservation and Stabilized Aloha Contention, invented by J. -M. Ho, and filed concurrently with the present application; and is a continuation-in-part patent application of patent application Ser. No.09/222,879, entitled Multimedia Packet Multiple Access To High-Speed Local-Loop Broadcast Channels: Algorithm Design, invented by J. -M. Ho, and filed Dec. 30, 1998; a continuation-in-part patent application of patent application Ser. No. 09/222,878, entitled "Multimedia Packet Multiple Access To High-Speed Local-Loop Broadcast Channels: Protocol Architecture, invented by J. -M. Ho, and filed Dec. 30, 1998, each of which is related to Provisional patent application 60/103,370, filed Oct. 7, 1998, now expired; each of which is incorporated by reference herein.
A system and method for satellite based controlled ALOHA is provided. The system and method configure VSATs so that they accept guidance from a centralized and/or distributed system controller to determine when, where, and/or on what portion of a satellite resource to attempt to access a channel. The system and method take advantage of traffic patterns to maximize efficiency by utilizing a centralized and/or distributed control to determine which VSATs are and are not currently active, and to allocate to a portion of the inbound channel to the active VSATs and a portion of the inbound channel to the inactive VSATs. In a distributed approach, each VSAT decides for itself whether it captures a certain part of the inbound resource or not. This decision can be made based on previous transmissions that went through the part of the inbound intended to be captured.
The present invention relates to a radio transmission method and apparatus for a radio network using a plurality of communication stations. More specifically, the apparatus defines a radio transmission frame based on a signal sent from a control station. A management information transmission region and an information transmission region are set in the defined frame period. A station synchronous section for transmitting a signal for every communication station constituting the radio network is set in the management information transmission region. The length of the station synchronous section is variable in accordance with the number of communication stations in the network. Using this frame format, it is possible to efficiently conduct radio transmission.
A high speed wireless network for the access market where a polling mode, a contention mode, a seamless transition between the two modes and an efficient contention resolution algorithm are utilized to coordinate user transmission while utilizing a splitting tree algorithm to avoid collision of a number of users.
A control method of synchronizing communications between or among a plurality of devices in a communication system includes detecting beacons from the plurality of devices in the communication system, and establishing a reservation for at least a portion of the plurality of devices in the communication system. Each reservation is a frame interval in which to transmit symbols from one device to one or more of the other devices in the communications system. Each frame interval and intra-frame interval is set according to the established reservation. Each frame interval and intra-frame interval is a plural, integral number of symbol periods in duration.
