Gateway apparatus and resource allocating method

Abstract

According to one embodiment, a gateway apparatus includes a pool which retains the plurality of media gateway channel resources in each of a plurality of resource groups constituted by dividing the plurality of media gateway channel resources in accordance with necessity levels thereof, a memory which stores a group table indicating the correspondence/relation between the plurality of resource groups and the communication terminals belonging to these resource groups, and a controller which refers to the group table when an arbitrary communication terminal among the plurality of communication terminals requests to use the media gateway channel resource and which reads from the pool an idle media gateway channel resource in the corresponding resource group for the arbitrary communication terminal based on the result of the reference to allocate the idle media gateway channel resource to the arbitrary communication terminal.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS

A general architecture that implements the various feature of the invention will now be described with reference to the drawings. The drawings and the associated descriptions are provided to illustrate embodiments of the invention and not to limit the scope of the invention.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of an IP terminal gateway system according to a first embodiment of this invention;

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing one example of storage contents of a storage unit for interface attributes corresponding to numbers shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing one example of storage contents of a table for channel resource necessity levels shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing one example of storage contents of a table for share group numbers corresponding to channel resource necessity levels shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing one example of storage contents of a table for a channel resource share group to be acquired shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing one example of storage contents of a storage unit for managing the number of resources shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 7 is a flowchart showing a control processing procedure of a call control unit when the MG channel resource is acquired in the first embodiment;

FIG. 8 is a flowchart showing a control processing procedure of the call control unit when the MG channel resource is returned in the first embodiment;

FIG. 9 is a block diagram showing the configuration of an IP terminal gateway system according to a second embodiment of this invention;

FIG. 10 is a diagram showing one example of storage contents of a storage unit for managing the number of resources shown in FIG. 9;

FIG. 11 is a flowchart showing a control processing procedure of a call control unit when an MG channel resource is returned in the second embodiment;

FIG. 12 is a block diagram showing the configuration of an IP terminal gateway system according to a third embodiment of this invention; and

FIG. 13 is a diagram showing one example of storage contents of a table used by a call control unit in the third embodiment.

Claims

1. A gateway apparatus which accommodates a plurality of communication terminals via a packet communication network and which permits the connection of a communication network different from the packet communication network, and which connect the plurality of communication terminals and the communication network via a plurality of media gateway channel resources to permit a communication, the gateway apparatus comprising: a pool which retains the plurality of media gateway channel resources in each of a plurality of resource groups constituted by dividing the plurality of media gateway channel resources in accordance with necessity levels thereof;a memory which stores a group table indicating the relationship between the plurality of resource groups and the communication terminals belonging to these resource groups; anda controller which refers to the group table when an arbitrary communication terminal among the plurality of communication terminals requests to use the media gateway channel resource and which reads from the pool an idle media gateway channel resource in the corresponding resource group for the arbitrary communication terminal based on the result of the reference to allocate the idle media gateway channel resource to the arbitrary communication terminal.

2. The gateway apparatus according to claim 1, when the packet communication network is divided into a plurality of segments, wherein the pool retains the plurality of channel resources belonging to the respective resource groups for each of the segments, andthe memory stores the group table for each of the segments.

3. The gateway apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the memory stores a plurality of group tables belongs to the resource group which the necessity level of this communication terminal is same in between a first segment and a second segment among the plurality of segments, in which at least one of the plurality of communication terminals.

4. The gateway apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising a change controller which changes the number of media gateway channel resources for each of the resource groups retained in the pool in accordance with a preset condition.

5. The gateway apparatus according to claim 4, wherein the change controller includes:a first mode which fixes the number of media gateway channel resources for each of the resource groups retained in the pool;a second mode which changes the number of media gateway channel resources for each of the resource groups retained in the pool; anda mode selecting controller which selectively executes the first and second modes in accordance with the condition.

6. The gateway apparatus according to claim 4, wherein the change controller uses, to judge the condition, one of a time zone, the frequency of use of the media gateway channel resources, and the idleness of the media gateway channel resource in the resource group from which the used media gateway channel resource has been acquired in returning the used media gateway channel resource to this resource group, or uses a combination of the time zone and the frequency of use.

7. A resource allocating method for use in a gateway apparatus which accommodates a plurality of communication terminals via a packet communication network, and which permits the connection of a communication network different from the packet communication network, and which connects the plurality of communication terminals and the communication network via a plurality of media gateway channel resources to permit a communication, the resource allocating method comprising: retaining the plurality of media gateway channel resources in each of a plurality of resource groups constituted by dividing the plurality of media gateway channel resources in accordance with necessity levels thereof, in a pool;storing a group table indicating the relationship between the plurality of resource groups and the communication terminals belonging to these resource groups, in a memory;referring to the group table when an arbitrary communication terminal among the plurality of communication terminals requests to use the media gateway channel resource, andreading from the pool an idle media gateway channel resource in the corresponding resource group for the arbitrary communication terminal based on the result of the reference to allocate the idle media gateway channel resource to the arbitrary communication terminal.