Claims
- 1. In a system having at least a first slot, a method comprising the steps of:
providing at least one field in the first slot; and configuring the first slot into at least a first segment and a second segment based on values associated with at least a portion of the at least one field associated with the first slot, wherein the first segment is addressed to a first subscriber unit and the second segment is addressed to a second subscriber unit.
- 2. The method of claim 1 wherein the first segment and the second segment each comprises at least one symbol, and wherein the at least one symbol from the first segment and the at least one symbol from the second segment are interleaved.
- 3. The method of claim 1 wherein the first segment has a first segment header and the second segment has a second segment header.
- 4. The method of claim 1 wherein at least one field in the first slot is selected from a group consisting of: a coding scheme field, a logical channel multiplexing field, a block format field, and a combined field.
- 5. The method of claim 1 wherein at least a portion of the data within at least one of the first segment and the second segment is encrypted.
- 6. The method of claim 1 further comprising the steps of:
providing the at least one field in a second slot; and configuring the second slot based on values associated with at least a portion of the at least one field associated with the second slot.
- 7. The method of claim 6 wherein the step of configuring the second slot comprises the step of partitioning the second slot into at least one of a segment and a signaling message.
- 8. The method of claim 6 wherein the value of the field associated with the first slot is different than the value of the field associated with the second slot.
- 9. The method of claim 6 wherein the value of the field associated with the first slot and the value of the field associated with the second slot are the same.
- 10. The method of claim 1 wherein the first segment and the second segment comprise a modulation rate, and wherein the modulation rate of the first segment is different from the modulation rate of the second segment.
- 11. The method of claim 1 wherein the first segment and the second segment comprise a modulation rate, and wherein the modulation rate of the first segment and the modulation rate of the second segment are the same.
- 12. The method of claim 1 wherein the first segment and the second segment comprise a forward error correction rate, and wherein the forward error correction rate of the first segment is different from the forward error correction rate of the second segment.
- 13. The method of claim 1 wherein the first segment and the second segment comprise a forward error correction rate, and wherein the forward error correction rate of the first segment and the forward error correction rate of the second segment are the same.
- 14. The method of claim 1 wherein the first segment and the second segment comprise a forward error correction method, and wherein the forward error correction method of the first segment is different from the forward error correction method of the second segment.
- 15. The method of claim 1 wherein the first segment and the second segment comprise a forward error correction method, and wherein the forward error correction method of the first segment and the forward error correction method of the second segment are the same.
- 16. The method of claim 1 wherein the first segment and the second segment has a common number of bits.
- 17. The method of claim 1 wherein the first segment and the second segment has a different number of bits.
- 18. The method of claim 1 wherein at least a portion of the steps are implemented in hardware.
- 19. The method of claim 1 wherein at least a portion of the steps are implemented in software.
- 20. The method of claim 1 wherein at least a portion of the steps are a set of instructions that is stored in a storage medium which, when loaded into a microprocessor, cause the microprocessor to perform at least the portion of the steps.
- 21. In a system having at least a first slot, a method comprising the steps of:
providing at least one field in the first slot; and configuring the first slot into at least a signaling communications path based on a value associated with at least a portion of the at least one field associated with the first slot, wherein the signaling communications path comprises a plurality of messages, and wherein at least a first message is addressed to a first subscriber unit and at least a second message is addressed to a second subscriber unit.
- 22. The method of claim 21 wherein at least one message in the plurality of messages is encrypted.
- 23. The method of claim 21 wherein each message in the plurality of messages has a message header.
- 24. The method of claim 21 wherein the plurality of messages is divided into at least one set of messages comprising at least one message, and wherein each set of messages has a message header.
- 25. The method of claim 21 wherein the first slot is further configured to comprise a packet data communications path.
- 26. The method of claim 25 wherein the signaling communications path and the packet data communications path each comprises at least one symbol, and wherein the at least one symbol from the packet data communications path and the at least one symbol from the signaling communications path are interleaved.
- 27. The method of claim 26 wherein the first slot comprises a fixed number of symbols, and further comprising the steps of appropriating a first set of symbols to the signaling communications path and appropriating a second set of symbols to the packet data communications path, wherein the sum of the first set of symbols and the second set of symbols equals the fixed number of symbols.
- 28. The method of claim 21 wherein the first message and the second message each comprises at least one symbols, and wherein the at least one symbol from the first message and the at least one symbol from the second message are interleaved.
- 29. The method of claim 21 further comprising the steps of:
appropriating a number of symbols associated with the signaling communications path in the first slot; and appropriating a dissimilar number of symbols associated with the signaling communications path in the second slot.
- 30. The method of claim 21 wherein at least a portion of the steps are a set of instructions that is stored in a storage medium which, when loaded into a microprocessor, cause the microprocessor to perform at least the portion of the steps.
REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION
[0001] The present application is related to the following U.S. application Ser. No. ______, filed Jun. 11, 2002, titled “Method for Assigning Inbound Transmissions with Minimal Signaling Overhead” by Conrad et al. (attorney docket no. CM05093H), which is commonly owned together with this application by Motorola, Inc.