Mac extensions for smart antenna support

Abstract

Apparatus and methods implement aggregation frames and allocation frames. The aggregation frames include a plurality of MSDUs or fragments thereof aggregated or otherwise combined together. An aggregation frame makes more efficient use of the wireless communication resources. The allocation frame defines a plurality of time intervals. The allocation frame specifies a pair of stations that are permitted to communicate with each other during each time interval as well as the antenna configuration to be used for the communication. This permits stations to know ahead of time when they are to communicate, with which other stations and the antenna configuration that should be used. A buffered traffic field can also be added to the frames to specify how much data remains to be transmitted following the current frame. This enables network traffic to be scheduled more effectively.

What is claimed is: 
     
         1 . A process of wireless data transmission, comprising:
 A. forming a forward frame in a coordinator, the forming including:
 i. forming a frame control field, a direction traffic stream identifier field, a sequence control field, a frame body, and a frame check sum field; 
 ii. arranging the frame control field to specify the frame as a forward frame; 
 iii. arranging the direction traffic stream identifier field to specify the traffic stream to which the data contained in the frame body belongs; 
 iv. arranging the sequence control field to contain sequence control values for data in the frame body; 
 v. arranging the frame body to contain data; 
 vi. arranging the frame check sum field to enable error detection; and 
   B. transmitting the forward frame from the coordinator using only a single input single output antenna.   
     
     
         2 . The process of  claim 1  in which the transmitting includes transmitting from an access point that includes the coordinator. 
     
     
         3 . The process of  claim 1  in which arranging the frame control field includes identifying the frame as a forward frame by encoding type and subtype subfields. 
     
     
         4 . The process of  claim 1  in which arranging the frame control field includes identifying the frame as a forward frame by encoding a type subfield as 11 and encoding a subtype subfield as 0000. 
     
     
         5 . The process of  claim 1  in which arranging the direction traffic stream identifier field includes replacing 24 octet address fields of conventional data frames with a two octet field. 
     
     
         6 . The process of  claim 1  in which arranging the direction traffic stream identifier field includes arranging a direction bit concatenated to a traffic stream identifier field, the traffic stream identifier field including a traffic stream identifier and an association identifier. 
     
     
         7 . The process of  claim 1  in which arranging the direction traffic stream identifier field includes arranging a direction bit concatenated to a traffic stream identifier field, the direction bit being encoded as a “0” to indicate a frame from a coordinator to a station and a “1” to indicate a frame from a station to the coordinator or another station.