Method of controlling radio resources, and radio system

Abstract

There is provided a radio system, comprising: a receiver for receiving uplink channel traffic; a measuring unit for measuring periodicity of the received uplink channel traffic; and a control unit for controlling discontinuous uplink operation on the basis of the measured periodicity of the received uplink channel traffic.

What is claimed is: 
     
         1 . A method of controlling radio resources, the method comprising:
 receiving uplink channel traffic;   measuring periodicity of the received uplink channel traffic; and   controlling discontinuous uplink operation on the basis of at least one of measurement statistics, a gating pattern, a transmission pattern, an activity pattern, and timing information that are based on the measured periodicity.   
     
     
         2 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising determining cumulative distribution of first transmission instants over a predetermined time period when measuring the periodicity of the received uplink channel traffic. 
     
     
         3 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising determining whether or not to activate the discontinuous uplink transmission operation on the basis of the measured periodicity of the received uplink channel traffic. 
     
     
         4 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising:
 determining the activity pattern on the basis of the measured periodicity of the received uplink channel traffic; and   aligning the transmission pattern to the activity pattern.   
     
     
         5 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the measuring is performed by a measuring unit. 
     
     
         6 . The method of  claim 5 , wherein the measuring unit resides in a base station of a network. 
     
     
         7 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising:
 receiving downlink channel traffic;   measuring periodicity of the received downlink channel traffic; and   controlling discontinuous downlink operation on the basis of a measured periodicity of the received downlink channel traffic.   
     
     
         8 . The method of  claim 7 , wherein the downlink channel traffic is network-originated. 
     
     
         9 . The method of  claim 8 , wherein information relative to the downlink channel traffic is available at radio network controllers of a network. 
     
     
         10 . The method of  claim 9 , wherein the network comprises a Universal Terrestrial Radio Access Network (UTRAN). 
     
     
         11 . A radio system in a network infrastructure, comprising:
 a receiver configured to receive uplink channel traffic;   a measuring unit configured to measure periodicity of the received uplink channel traffic; and   a control unit configured to control discontinuous uplink operation on the basis of at least one of measurement statistics, a gating pattern, a transmission pattern, an activity pattern, and timing information that are based on the measured periodicity.   
     
     
         12 . The radio system of  claim 11 , wherein the measuring unit is configured to determine a cumulative distribution of first transmission instants over a predetermined time period when measuring the periodicity of the received uplink channel traffic. 
     
     
         13 . The radio system of  claim 11 , wherein the control unit is configured to determine whether or not to activate discontinuous uplink transmission operation on the basis of the measured periodicity of the received uplink channel traffic. 
     
     
         14 . The radio system of  claim 11 , wherein the measuring unit resides in a base station of the network infrastructure. 
     
     
         15 . The radio system of  claim 11 , wherein the control unit resides in a radio network controller of the network infrastructure. 
     
     
         16 . The radio system of  claim 11 , wherein the measuring unit is configured to determine the activity pattern on the basis of the measured periodicity of the received uplink channel traffic and align the transmission pattern to the activity pattern. 
     
     
         17 . The radio system of  claim 11 , comprising at least one radio network controller configured to provide downlink channel traffic. 
     
     
         18 . The radio system of  claim 17 , wherein the downlink channel traffic is utilized to control discontinuous downlink operation on the basis of a measured periodicity of the downlink channel traffic. 
     
     
         19 . A computer-program product comprising a non-transitory computer-readable medium having computer-readable program code embodied therein, the computer-readable program code adapted to be executed to implement a method of controlling radio resources, the method comprising:
 receiving uplink channel traffic;   measuring periodicity of the received uplink channel traffic; and   controlling discontinuous uplink operation on the basis of at least one of measurement statistics, a gating pattern, a transmission pattern, an activity pattern, and timing information that are based on the measured periodicity.   
     
     
         20 . The computer-program product of  claim 19 , wherein the method further comprises:
 determining the activity pattern on the basis of the measured periodicity of the received uplink channel traffic; and   aligning the transmission pattern to the activity pattern.