Patent Application
20120254409
The present application claims priority from Japanese patent application JP2011-081386 filed on Apr. 1, 2011, the content of which is hereby incorporated by reference into this application.
The present invention relates to an apparatus that analyzes communication log information generated by a communication apparatus in a mobile network.
In mobile communication, a communication method referred to as 3rd Generation is introduced to increase communication speed. Main use of communication is shifted from conventional voice communication to data communication. Nowadays, technology development for a communication method referred to as 4th Generation is being promoted to achieve transmission rate of 100 s of Mbit/s to several Gbit/s as fast as wired communication using optical fiber.
On the other hand, terminals in mobile communication have been sophisticated along with increase in communication speed. In conventional mobile communication, the terminals with voice communication function and simple Internet access functions only had been largely used. Nowadays, terminals with sophisticated information processing functions called “smart phone” have been increasing in proportion.
In the sophisticated terminal of smart phone, a wide variety of application programs are available. Compared with the conventional mobile phone terminal, communication volume flowing in a wireless access network significantly increases. This necessitates a solution to reduce the load of the wireless access network.
One method for reducing load of the wireless access network employs offload technology of traffic. The offload technology makes traffic of mobile terminals to bypass a wireless access network and to go through a wired network, so as to reduce load of the wireless access network. Implementation of the offload includes: a method using wireless LAN; a method in which an extremely-compact base station called femtocell is installed at home so as to transfer traffic from the base stations via a optical access network to Internet; and a method for reducing traffic flowing of contents such as video delivery in the wireless access network using: cache technology; and locating contents delivery dedicated network referred as Contents Delivery Network (CDN) close to the terminals.
In business models of the conventional mobile communication, telecommunication carriers operate networks and determine the service specification for the network. Based on this specification, the traffic volume on the network was predicted to design and build the network.
However, smart phones allow users freely to develop applications. Additionally, the users can freely share developed applications between the users to use them. This is shifting the main provider of service from telecommunication carriers to terminal suppliers and service providers. This makes the prediction of traffic volume on the network by telecommunication carriers more difficult than that in the past.
In order to ensure traffic offload, telecommunication carriers need to know network usage accurately.
Associating location and travel route of a terminal with a communication destination used at the location and the travel route is effective in: locating offload cache and CDN; and designing a network that offloads to a wired network using wireless LAN access.
Obtaining location information of the terminal includes use of Global Positioning System (GPS) function on the mobile phone and the smart phone. Using GPS function of the terminal to analyze location information requires that the terminal with the GPS function is always turned on. That is, the terminal is required to: use the GPS function at regular intervals to measure location information at the time; and provide the location information to a carrier who collects location information (usually, a telecommunication carrier operating the mobile network). This causes increased power consumption of the terminal, thus consuming a battery faster. Further, obtaining location information using the GPS function is not associated with communication usage. Thus the carrier is always required to collect location information of the terminal regardless of use of the communication of the terminal. This poses following problems. The first problem is increased information volume collected by a system. The second problem is necessity of association of location information of the terminal in communication use only with communication use among enormous volume of information when associating them. This causes increased throughput for the association.
WO 2009/001400 discloses a method for estimating a travel route and a travel direction of a terminal. Unfortunately, the disclosed invention aims to achieve low power consumption, while this does not disclose a method for associating a location and a connection destination of the terminal in order to predict traffic volume.
In order to achieve the above-described object, according to one aspect of the present invention, a network system includes: plural communication units; and a communication log analyzer configured to connect the plural communication units via a network. The plural communication units generate communication log information, and transmit the generated communication log information to the communication log analyzer. The communication log analyzer may be configured to extract communication log information of communication between each of at least two communication units and a given terminal, from the communication log information received from the plural communication units. The extracted communication log information is used to estimate a travel direction of the given terminal.
The communication units may include a base station. The terminal wirelessly connects the base station. The communication log analyzer may be configured to extract at least one of a first communication log information and a second communication log information. The first communication log information is generated by the base station when the terminal connects to the base station. The second communication log information is generated by the base station when the terminal disconnects the connection to the base station.
The communication log analyzer may be configured to use the extracted communication log information and distance information between the respective base stations so as to estimate a travel distance of the terminal.
The communication log analyzer may be configured to: calculate a travel time from a generation time in the extracted communication log information, the travel time being required for the terminal to travel between the base stations; and estimate a travel speed of the terminal from the travel distance and the travel time.
The communication log analyzer may be configured to estimate at least one of a travel route and a travel method from at least one of route information, the travel speed, and the travel direction, the route information including information on routes within each of transmission ranges of the respective base stations.
The communication units may include: a base station connected to the terminal; and a proxy server being connected when the terminal connects to a WEB server, and the communication log analyzer may be configured to associate third communication log information generated by the proxy server, the travel route, and the travel method. The third communication log information includes information on the WEB server connected to the terminal.
The present invention ensures estimation of a travel direction and other information of the terminal without using the GPS. This reduces information volume for estimating the travel direction and other information of the terminal compared with the use of the GPS.
A more complete appreciation of the invention and many of the attendant advantages thereof will be readily obtained as the same becomes better understood by reference to the following detailed description when considered in connection with the accompanying drawings, wherein:
Embodiments of the present invention will be described below by referring to the accompanying drawings.
An exemplary configuration of the network according to the embodiment of the present invention includes a communication log analyzer 1, a terminal 31, base stations 21, a Serving Gateway (S-GW) 22, which controls packet transfer, a Packet Data Network Gateway (P-GW) 23, which is a connection point at Internet side, a mobility management entity 24, which processes as mobility management of terminals and the like, a Home Subscriber Server (HSS) 25, which controls user subscription information and the like, a Policy and Charging Rules Function (PCRF) 26, which determine policy of charging rules and the like, an Authentication, Authorization, and Accounting (AAA) Server 27, a proxy server 28, which relays between the wireless network 30 and Internet (IP Network) 32, and a Web server 29, which is a connection destination of the terminal.
The present invention may be applied to not only the LTE but also to another mobile communication method such as Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX), a 3rd-Generation mobile communication method of CDMA2000.
The communication log analyzer 1 includes configuration elements such as a network interface 11-1, which collects log information from a network apparatus, a network interface 11-2, which outputs analysis result to the external unit, a CPU12, which executes arithmetic processing such as analyzing, a memory 13, and an auxiliary storage unit 14, which has an accumulating function of the analysis results and the like.
The communication log analyzer 1 includes a processing block 14, which includes a log collector 141, a location information processor 143, and a data mapping unit 146.
The log collector 141 collects log information from, for example, the base station 21 and stores the log information to a log storage 1411 in the log collector 141. In the communication log collected by the base station 21, specific examples of information required for analyzing includes: information for identifying a terminal to communicate, times at which the terminal connects to a base station and begins the communication, times at which the terminal disconnects the connection to the base station and ends the communication, and information for identifying the base station, which is used to identify the location with which the terminal has had wireless communication. Apparatuses other than the base station 21, for example, the S-GW 22 has log information such as a time at which the terminal receives a Create Session Request signal to begin the communication, and a time at which the S-GW 22 sends a Delete Session Response.
The information, which is collected at the base station 21 and extracted, is transmitted to the location information processor 143. The location information processor 143 includes a route estimator 142, a speed calculator 147, a terminal trace table generator 148, a terminal trace table 144, and a base station information database 145. The base station information database 145 includes a route information table 1451 and a distance table 1452. The terminal trace table generator 148 in the location information processor 143 uses the information collected by the log collector 141 in order to generate the terminal trace table 144. The speed calculator 147 uses information of the terminal trace table 144 and the base station information database 145 in order to calculate the travel speed of the terminal. Additionally, the route estimator 142 uses the travel speed of the terminal calculated by the speed calculator 147 and information in the base station information database 145, in order to execute processing for estimating the travel route of the terminal.
The route estimation result analyzed by the location information processor 143 and extracted information from log information, which is collected from apparatuses such as the S-GW 22 and the P-GW 23, are transmitted to the data mapping unit 146. The data mapping unit 146 verifies the terminal and the times in order to associate the log information generated by respective units with communication information of the same terminal at the same time. Thus the data mapping unit 146 generates ID mapping, which is indicated as 1460, of the terminal.
The route information table 1451 includes entries to associate the base stations 21 with line information within respective cells (within the transmission ranges of the respective base stations) which the base stations 21 each cover.
The distance table 1452 includes distances between every two base stations 21 to be set.
The terminal trace table 144 is divided by the every terminal. The terminal trace table 144 includes times, when communication logs are generated, and table entries, which are configured with combinations of base stations that generate the communication log.
In
The communication log analyzer 1 uses these communication logs in accordance with the procedure shown in
The communication log analyzer 1 further verifies the estimated travel route and the travel speed with map information in accordance with the procedure shown in
The estimated travel speed, travel route, and transportation method allow to predict the destination after a certain period of time. In an example shown in
In
Referring to
The terminal sends an Attach Request signal SQ100, to which own terminal information is set, to the base station 21. At this time, the base station 21 generate a communication log for the terminal 31 as shown in
In SQ110, the MME 24 executes the Authentication-information-request/answer between the HSS 25 and the MME 24 to authenticate the terminal. In this process, the MME 24 and the HSS 25 generate communication logs regarding the terminal 31. The communication logs includes information to identify the terminal 31 and the information on the times as shown in
In SQ120, the terminal 31 executes processing for Terminal Authentication between the MME 24 and the terminal 31.
In SQ130, processing for Location Registration of the terminal is executed between the MME 24 and the HSS 25.
The MME 24 sends a Create Session Request signal SQ140 to the S-GW 22. In SQ150, the S-GW 22 obtains information to create a route between the S-GW 22 and the P-GW 23 from the PCRF 26. The S-GW 22 sends a Create Route Request signal SQ160 to the P-GW 23. In SQ170, the P-GW 23 executes processing for User Authentication between the AAA 27 and the P-GW 23. At this time, the AAA 27 notifies an IP address to be assigned to the terminal 31 to the P-GW 23, while the AAA 27 generates a communication log regarding the terminal 31 as shown in
The P-GW 23 sends a Create Route Response signal SQ180 to the S-GW 22.
The MME 24 sends a Bearer Setup Request signal SQ200 between the MME 24 and the base station 21 to the base station 21. The MME 24 further sends an Attach Complete message SQ210 to the terminal 31. The attach complete signal SQ210 includes information such as the IP address to be assigned to terminal 31 issued by the AAA 27.
The base station 21 sends an Initial Setup Response SQ220 to the MME 24 in response to the Bearer Setup Request signal SQ200.
The terminal 31 sends an Attach Complete Response SQ230 to the MME 24 in response to the Attach Complete signal SQ210.
The terminal 31 executes a Measurement Control And Response (SQ300) between the base station 21-1 and the terminal 31 in the connection. In the case where the terminal 31 travels and then the base station 21-2 with better quality of wireless access is found, the base station 21-1 sends a Handover Request (SQ310) to the base station 21-2. The base station 21-2 sends a Handover Request Acknowledge (SQ320). The base station 21-1 sends a Handover Command (SQ330) to the terminal 31. The terminal 31 sends a Handover Confirmation Message (SQ340) to the next base station 21-2. At this time, the base station 21-2 generates log information regarding the terminal 31 as shown in
The terminal 31 sends a Detach Request Signal SQ400 to the MME 24 via the base station 21.
The MME 24 sends a Delete Session Request signal SQ410 to the S-GW 22.
The S-GW 22 executes processing for Session Release (SQ420) between the PCRF 26 and the S-GW 22. The S-GW 22 in SQ430 then deletes a session between the P-GW 23 and the S-GW 22. In this process, the S-GW 22 and the P-GW 23 generates respective log information regarding the terminal 31.
The S-GW 22 sends a Delete Session Response signal SQ470 to the MME 24 in response to the Delete Session Request signal SQ410.
The MME 24 sends a Release Command signal SQ480 between the MME 24 and the base station 21 to the base station 21. The base station 21 sends a Connection Release signal SQ490 to the terminal 31. At this time, the base station 21 generates log information regarding the terminal 31 shown in
The base station 21 sends a Release Complete signal SQ500 to the MME 24 in response to the Release Command signal SQ480.
The terminal trace table regarding the terminal for which the travel speed is estimated is referred (FL110). In the terminal trace table, extracting two entries temporally next to one another extracts two connected base stations during the traveling of the terminal (FL120). A distance between the two extracted base stations is obtained using the distance table (FL130).
The distance between cells are divided by the temporal difference at which the two entries are generated. This value is an estimated value of the travel speed of the terminal (FL140).
The terminal trace table is referred to extract a cell through which the terminal has travelled. The route information table is referred so as to refer to an entry regarding the cell. Thus line information within an area of the cell is searched (FL210).
Similarly to the FL210, the line information is searched within the area of the cell for the cell through which the terminal has travelled (FL220).
The line common to the first cell and the second cell is confirmed (FL230).
In the case where the line in common is not confirmed, the line is determined as absent (FL290). Then the processing is ended (FL300).
In the case where the lines in common are confirmed, the lines in common are determined if it is plural or singular (FL240).
In the case where plural lines are confirmed, it is determined whether use of the estimated travel speed of the terminal allows to identify the line or not (FL250).
If the estimated travel speed of the terminal is available to identify the line, the terminal is determined to be travelling on the line. Then the processing is ended (FL260).
If the estimated travel speed of terminal does not allow to identify the line, the entry regarding the next base station is searched in the route information table (FL270).
In FL240, in the case where it is determined that the single line is confirmed, the terminal is determined to be travelling on the line (FL280). Then the processing is ended (FL300).
The generating procedure of the terminal trace table 144 shown in
The communication log analyzer 1 includes the data mapping unit 146 in the processing block 14. The data mapping unit 146 uses the table for mapping terminal information 1460 shown in
The data mapping unit 146 uses the terminal trace table 144 shown in
The data mapping unit 146 uses the proxy log information 2800 shown in
As described above, the procedure according to the embodiment associates the connection location or the travel route of the terminal with the network connection destination of the terminal.
As an effect of associating the connection location or the travel route of the terminal with the network connection destination of the terminal, an example of implemented traffic offload will be described.
In an example in
The ordinary connection path between the terminal 31 and the video delivery server 51-1 is shown as the RT100. Here, in method according to the embodiment of the present invention, when it is determined that the number of connection of the base station 21 to the video delivery server 51-1 or the traffic volume is large, a path RT300 that includes the contents delivery network 50 is set so as to reduce the traffic of the ordinary connection path including the P-GW 23 and the IP Network 32.
The embodiment according to the present invention allows to associate the travel route and the connection destination of the terminal. This ensures collection of necessary information for network design in order to perform the traffic offload to reduce load of the wireless access network.
Further, this allows to recommend an appropriate connection destination corresponding to the travel destination of the users of the communication. Specifically, in the case where wireless LAN connection service on train is provided, this enables the communication log analyzer to provide the analysis result as follows. For users who have repeatedly used the line in the past and connected to the network, the wireless LAN connection service on train is recommended to use instead of the network via wireless access network.
Related attribution (such as age and gender) of the users of the communication, the location of the communication by the users, and the travel route may be associated to obtain information that is available to provide service corresponding to the location.
The present invention can be embodied and practiced in other different forms without departing from the spirit and essential characteristics of the present invention. Therefore, the above-described embodiments are considered in all respects as illustrative and not restrictive. The scope of the invention is indicated by the appended claims rather than by the foregoing description. All variations and modifications falling within the equivalency range of the appended claims are intended to be embraced therein.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2011-081386 | Apr 2011 | JP | national |
