Related subject matter is disclosed in the following application filed concurrently herewith and assigned to the same assignee hereof: U.S. patent application entitled “Code Space Sharing Among Multiple Modes of Operation,” Ser. No. 09/660,093.
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to communications; more specifically, wireless communications.
2. Description of the Related Art
In some wireless communication systems, channels are distinguished using orthogonal codes such as Walsh codes that are assigned from a collection of codes that constitute a code space. Typically each user is given full time access to a subspace of the code space such as one or more Walsh codes until the communication session is ended by, for example, a handoff, a dropped call or an end of call. This type of use of the code space is inefficient in multiple mode operations such as in systems supporting both voice and data users.
The present invention divides the code space associated with the communication system into two subspaces where each subspace is assigned to a different mode of operation. In one mode, such as a voice mode, each user is given full time access to a portion of the subspace associated with that mode of operation. In a second mode, such as a data mode, each user uses the entire subspace associated with that mode on a time shared basis. Additionally, in-sector handoffs from one Walsh code to another are used to more efficiently distribute the code space.
Walsh codes have the distinctive property that higher Walsh space codes can be derived from the lower Walsh space codes.
Orthogonality across codes from different spaces is possible as long as two codes that are in the same derivation path are not selected simultaneously. Consider
When assigning code space to mode one users, such as voice users, and assigning other code space to mode two users, such as data users, it is desirable to divide the codes in large blocks that originate from a lower order Walsh code such as a 16 symbol code. By assigning the subspaces in groups originating from lower order Walsh codes, a receiver's design is simplified by requiring fewer decoding paths to receive transmissions. For example, in a system using 128 symbol Walsh codes, it is desirable to assign the codes to the subspaces in groups of 8 consecutive codes so that a receiver would only need 16 decoding paths to receive transmissions.
In reference to
It is also possible to distribute the codes among the mode 1 and mode 2 subspaces on a dynamic basis. For example, if one code in the mode 1 subspace is not being used, it may be assigned to the mode 2 subspace; however, this is subject to the code from the mode 1 subspace being orthogonal to all of the other codes in the mode 2 subspace. If more codes in the mode 1 subspace are unused, they may be assigned to the mode 2 subspace as well, but once again subject to the codes from the mode 1 subspace being orthogonal to all of the other codes presently in use in the mode 2 subspace. Similarly, unused codes in the mode 2 subspace may be assigned to the mode 1 subspace subject to the codes from the mode 2 subspace being orthogonal to all of the codes presently in use in the mode 1 subspace. Information regarding the current set of code assignments may be transmitted by a base station to users as well as other base stations using communication channels such as control channels or paging channels.
The utilization of the code space is dynamically changing because user traffic streams (calls or data sessions of either mode-1 or mode-2 type) arrive and depart. This can cause fragmentation of the code space thus unnecessarily blocking user traffic from fully utilizing all available code space. For example and in reference to
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