Claims
- 1. A communications method, for use with a first mobile node, the method comprising:
operating a mobility management node to receive mobility management signals relating to said first mobile node; storing, in response to the received mobility management signals, tunnel information defining first and second incoming tunnels and an outgoing tunnel, said tunnels being associated with said first mobile node, said incoming and outgoing being relative to said mobility agent node; said stored tunnel information including an IP address of said first mobile node which is associated with said first and second incoming tunnels and said first outgoing tunnel; said stored tunnel information, defining said first incoming tunnel and said first outgoing tunnel, including first and second tunnel end node addresses corresponding to first and second tunnel end nodes, respectively, the end nodes of said first incoming tunnel and said first outgoing tunnel being the same, the first tunnel end node address being an address corresponding to said mobility management node, the second tunnel end node address being a destination address of the first outgoing tunnel and a source address of said first incoming tunnel; and said stored tunnel information, defining said second incoming tunnel, including third and forth tunnel end node addresses corresponding to third and forth tunnel end nodes, respectively, the third tunnel end node address being the destination address of the second incoming tunnel and corresponding to said mobility management node, said forth tunnel end node address being different from said first, second and third tunnel end node addresses and being the source address of the second incoming tunnel.
- 2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:
operating the mobility management node to receive another mobility management signal; and in response to said another mobility management signal, updating the stored tunnel information to change the destination address of the first outgoing tunnel from said second tunnel end node address to another tunnel end node address.
- 3. The method of claim 2, wherein updating the stored tunnel information to change the designation address of the first outgoing tunnel does not affect the stored first incoming tunnel address information.
- 4. The method of claim 3, wherein said another tunnel end node address is said forth tunnel end node address.
- 5. The method of claim 2, further comprising:
removing said first incoming tunnel, said step of removing the first incoming tunnel including deleting at least some of the address information corresponding to the first incoming tunnel.
- 6. The method of claim 5 wherein said deletion is in response to yet another mobility management signal received by said mobility management node.
- 7. The method of claim 5, wherein said deletion is performed without affecting the information corresponding to said first outgoing tunnel.
- 8. The method of claim 2, further comprising:
in response to receiving an additional mobility management signal, deleting from the stored tunnel information the information defining said second incoming tunnel without altering information defining said first incoming tunnel and said first outgoing tunnel.
- 9. The method of claim 2, further comprising:
storing independent tunnel life time information for each of the first and second incoming tunnels and said first outgoing tunnel.
- 10. The method of claim 1, wherein the source addresses of the first and second incoming tunnels correspond to different access nodes.
- 11. The method of claim 1, wherein the source addresses of the first and second incoming tunnels are different IP addresses corresponding to said mobile node.
- 12. The method of claim 1, further comprising:
operating said mobility management node to perform mobility management tunnel operations corresponding to a plurality of mobile nodes, said mobility management operations including storing information used to maintain multiple incoming tunnels and at least one outgoing tunnel for each of a plurality of mobile nodes at the same time, the incoming tunnels corresponding to individual ones of said mobile nodes having different tunnel source node addresses.
- 13. The method of claim 1, wherein said stored tunnel information defining said first incoming tunnel and said first outgoing tunnel include a tunnel type indicator flag associated with said first and second tunnel end node addresses, said indicator flag indicating that said first and second tunnel end node addresses correspond to a bi-directional tunnel, said first outing tunnel and said first incoming tunnel being included in said bi-directional tunnel.
- 14. The method of claim 13, further comprising:
operating the mobility management node to receive another mobility management signal; and in response to said another mobility management signal, updating the stored tunnel information to remove said outgoing tunnel by changing said bi-direction tunnel flag to an incoming tunnel flag.
- 15. The method of claim 14, further comprising:
establishing a new outgoing tunnel between said mobility management node and the tunnel end node which servers as the source tunnel end node of said second incoming tunnel.
- 16. The method of claim 15, wherein establishing said new outgoing tunnel includes changing a tunnel type identifier flag associated with said second incoming tunnel to indicate that said second incoming tunnel is a bidirectional tunnel.
- 17. A communications system, for use with a first mobile node, the system comprising:
a mobility management node including:
means for receiving mobility management signals relating to said first mobile node; means for storing, in response to the received mobility management signals, tunnel information defining first and second incoming tunnels and an outgoing tunnel, said tunnels being associated with said first mobile node, said incoming and outgoing being relative to said mobility agent node; said stored tunnel information including an IP address of said first mobile node which is associated with said first and second incoming tunnels and said first outgoing tunnel; said stored tunnel information, defining said first incoming tunnel and said first outgoing tunnel, including first and second tunnel end node addresses corresponding to first and second tunnel end nodes, respectively, the end nodes of said first incoming tunnel and said first outgoing tunnel being the same, the first tunnel end node address being an address corresponding to said mobility management node, the second tunnel end node address being a destination address of the first outgoing tunnel and a source address of said first incoming tunnel; and said stored tunnel information, defining said second incoming tunnel, including third and forth tunnel end node addresses corresponding to third and forth tunnel end nodes, respectively, the third tunnel end node address being the destination address of the second incoming tunnel and corresponding to said mobility management node, said forth tunnel end node address being different from said first, second and third tunnel end node addresses and being the source address of the second incoming tunnel.
- 18. The system of claim 16, wherein said mobility management node further includes:
means for updating the stored tunnel information to change the destination address of the first outgoing tunnel from said second tunnel end node address to another tunnel end node address, in response to said another mobility management signal.
- 19. The system of claim 18, wherein updating the stored tunnel information to change the designation address of the first outgoing tunnel does not affect the stored first incoming tunnel address information.
- 20. The system of claim 19, wherein said another tunnel end node address is said forth tunnel end node address.
- 21. A mobile communications method for use with a mobile node having a mobile node IP address, comprising:
a mobility agent node receiving mobility management signals; in response to said received signals independently establishing first and second incoming tunnels and at most one outgoing tunnel, said first and second incoming tunnels and said at most one outgoing tunnel corresponding to said mobile node and being associated with said mobile node IP address, said incoming and outgoing being relative to said mobility agent node; said first and second incoming tunnels having a mobility agent node address as a destination tunnel end node address and said at most one outgoing tunnel having said mobility agent node address as a source tunnel end node address; and said first and second incoming tunnels having different source tunnel end node addresses.
- 22. The mobile communications method of claim 21, wherein the source tunnel end node address of one of said first and second incoming tunnels is the same as the destination tunnel end node address of said at most one outgoing tunnel.
- 23. The method of claim 22,
wherein said first incoming tunnel and said at most one outgoing tunnel exist between said mobility agent node and a first network node; and wherein said second incoming tunnel and said second outgoing tunnel exist between said mobility agent node and a second network node, said second network node being different from said first network node.
- 24. The mobile communications method of claim 23, further comprising:
moving the at most one outgoing tunnel without moving said incoming tunnel.
- 25. The mobile communications method of claim 24, where moving the at most one outgoing tunnel includes:
changing the destination address of said at most one outgoing tunnel by modifying stored tunnel destination address information.
- 26. The mobile communications method of claim 23, further comprising:
removing one of the established incoming tunnels in response to receiving another mobility management signal.
- 27. The mobile communications method of claim 26, wherein the removed incoming tunnel is the first incoming tunnel, the method further comprising:
generating, prior to said removing step, said another mobility management signal in response to a first handoff operation involving a handoff of said mobile node from said first network node to said second network node.
- 28. The method of claim 27, further comprising:
receiving an additional mobility management signal as part of a handoff of said mobile node from said second network node to a third network node; and in response to receiving said additional mobility management signal adding an additional incoming tunnel corresponding to said mobile node, said additional incoming tunnel being between said third network node and said mobility agent node.
- 29. The method of claim 28, further comprising:
prior to establishing said additional incoming tunnel, establishing a forwarding tunnel between said third network node and said second network node.
- 30. The method of claim 29, further comprising:
operating the third network node to receive IP packets from said mobile node; and operating the third network node to forward the received IP packets to said second network node through said forwarding tunnel.
- 31. The method of claim 30, further comprising:
operating the second network node to transmit IP packets received from said forwarding tunnel to said mobility agent node through said second incoming tunnel.
- 32. The method of claim 31, further comprising:
terminating said forwarding tunnel following establishment of said additional incoming tunnel; and using said additional incoming tunnel to transmit packets received by said third network node from said mobile node to said mobility agent node.
- 33. The method of claim 32, further comprising:
moving said at most one outgoing tunnel so that said at most one outgoing tunnel is between said mobility agent node and said third node; and terminating said second incoming tunnel.
- 34. A communications method, for use with a first mobile node and a mobility management node, the method comprising;
operating the mobility management node to encapsulate and forward inner packets that arrive at the mobility management node with a destination address equal to the home address of the mobile node, into a first tunnel that at least supports outgoing tunneling; operating the mobility management node to additionally decapsulate and forward inner packets, that have a source address equal to the home address of the first mobile node, and that arrive at the mobility management node in a second incoming only tunnel; said incoming and outgoing being relative to said mobility management node; said first and second tunnels being described by stored tunnel state in the mobility management node; said stored tunnel information including the home address of said first mobile node which is associated with said second incoming only tunnel and said first tunnel; said stored tunnel information, defining said first tunnel including first and second tunnel end node addresses corresponding to first and second tunnel end nodes, respectively, the first tunnel end node address being an address corresponding to said mobility management node, the second tunnel end node address being at least the destination address of the first tunnel for outgoing packets; and said stored tunnel information defining said second incoming only tunnel, including third and forth tunnel end node addresses corresponding to third and forth tunnel end nodes, respectively, the third tunnel end node address being only the destination address of the second incoming tunnel and corresponding to said mobility management node, said forth tunnel end node address being different from said first, second and third tunnel end node addresses, and being the source address of the second incoming only tunnel.
- 35. The method of claim 34 further comprising:
said first tunnel state that at least supports outgoing inner packets from the mobility management node to the home address of the mobile node being separated into a first part that defines the outgoing tunnel state from the first tunnel end node to the second tunnel end node and a second part that defines the incoming tunnel state from the second tunnel end node to the first tunnel end node; said first and second parts being selectively enabled to create an outgoing only tunnel capability, an incoming only tunnel capability a bidirectional tunnel capability or a cancelled tunnel; said incoming only tunnel capability creating a first incoming only tunnel; said first and second incoming only tunnels being available only if at least one other tunnel at the mobility management node provides an outgoing tunnel capability towards the home address of the mobile node; and said second incoming only tunnel being additionally stored as a first outgoing part and a second incoming part with only the incoming capability enabled.
- 36. The method of claim 35 further comprising:
operating the mobility management node to receive mobility management signals relating to said first mobile node; said mobility management signals defining the status of the first or second tunnel as to whether it is now outgoing only, incoming only, bidirectional or cancelled; updating in response to the said received mobility management signals, the outgoing and incoming state of the first or second tunnel; and modifying the tunnel state associated with the second or first tunnel respectively as a result of the signaled changes to the first or second tunnel.
- 37. The method of claim 36, further comprising:
the first tunnel supporting the bidirectional tunnel capability; operating the mobility management node to receive another mobility management signal; and in response to said another mobility management signal, updating the stored tunnel information to activate the outgoing tunnel capability of the second tunnel and cancel the outgoing tunnel capability of the first tunnel.
- 38. The method of claim 37, further comprising:
in response to receiving an additional mobility management signal, deleting from the stored tunnel information the information defining said second incoming tunnel without altering information defining said first incoming tunnel and said first outgoing tunnel.
- 39. The method of claim 35, further comprising:
storing independent tunnel life time information for each of the first and second incoming tunnels and said first outgoing tunnel.
- 40. The method of claim 34, wherein the second and forth tunnel end node addresses correspond to different access nodes or to different IP addresses corresponding to said mobile node.
- 41. The method of claim 36 further comprising;
operating the mobility management node to receive another mobility management signal; said signal defining a third incoming only tunnel which is added to the tunnel state in the management mode; and said signal not affecting the tunnel state for the first tunnel but deleting the state for the second incoming only tunnel.
- 42. The method of claim 34, further comprising:
operating said mobility management node to perform mobility management tunnel operations corresponding to a plurality of mobile nodes, said mobility management operations including storing information used to maintain multiple incoming tunnels and at least one outgoing tunnel for each of a plurality of mobile nodes at the same time, the incoming tunnels corresponding to individual ones of said mobile nodes having different tunnel source node addresses.
RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] The present application claims the benefit of the filing date of U.S. Provisional Patent Application S. No. 60/377,450 filed May 2, 2002 titled “Methods and Apparatus For the Utilization of Multiple Uplinks in Reverse Tunneling Method of Mobile IP Based Mobility Management Systems” and of U.S. Provisional Patent Application S. No. 60/372,655 filed Apr. 15, 2002 titled “Communications Methods and Apparatus”.
Provisional Applications (2)
|
Number |
Date |
Country |
|
60377450 |
May 2002 |
US |
|
60372655 |
Apr 2002 |
US |