Location determination based on phase difference

Abstract

Embodiments of the present disclosure relate to phase difference-based location determination. Disclosed are embodiments for determining the location of a device based on phase differences in signals received from the device. In some embodiments, expected phase differences are determined for signals transmitted from multiple regions. The expected phase differences are differences in the signals when received at each of multiple receiving elements of a receiving device. The location of the device is determined by comparing the phase differences of the signals received from the device with the expected phase differences.

Description

[0001] CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

[0002] This application claims priority to U.S. Provisional Application No. 62 / 968,754, filed on January 31, 2020, entitled “Location Determination Based on Phase Differences.” This application also claims priority to U.S. Application No. 16 / 915,447, filed on June 29, 2020, entitled “Location Determination Based on Phase Differences.” The contents of these prior applications are considered part of this application and are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety. Technical Field

[0003] The present application relates to wireless communications, and more particularly to methods and / or apparatus for deploying wireless access points (APs) used to determine the location of objects associated with a wireless network. Background Art

[0004] Estimating the location of a wireless transmitter is used to provide many functions. For example, location-based services include navigation, location-specific content delivery, and many other applications. There are many known methods for determining the location of a wireless transmitter, including RSSI-based methods, time of arrival methods, and angle of arrival methods. Summary of the Invention

[0005] According to some embodiments, an apparatus is disclosed that includes: a hardware processing circuit device; one or more hardware memories storing instructions that, when executed, configure the hardware processing circuit device to perform operations, the operations including: obtaining, for each geographic area in a plurality of geographic areas, a corresponding plurality of first expected phase differences of a first waveform that is transmitted by a first wireless device from the corresponding area to a pair of receiving elements of a second wireless device; obtaining measured phase differences of the first waveform transmitted by the first wireless device to the pair of receiving elements of the second wireless device; determining which of the plurality of expected phase differences matches the measured phase differences; conditionally marking each of the plurality of geographic areas as a possible location of the first wireless device if the expected phase difference for the corresponding geographic area is equal to the measured phase difference; and estimating the location of the first wireless device based on the marked geographic areas.

[0006] According to some embodiments, a method is disclosed that includes: obtaining, for each geographic area in a plurality of geographic areas, a corresponding plurality of first expected phase differences of a first waveform transmitted by a first wireless device from the corresponding area to a pair of receiving elements of a second wireless device; obtaining measured phase differences of the first waveform transmitted by the first wireless device to the pair of receiving elements of the second wireless device; determining which expected phase differences of the plurality of expected phase differences match the measured phase differences; conditionally marking each geographic area in the plurality of geographic areas as a possible location of the first wireless device if the expected phase difference for the corresponding geographic area is equal to the measured phase difference; and estimating the location of the first wireless device based on the marked geographic areas.

[0007] According to some embodiments, a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium is disclosed, comprising instructions, the instructions comprising: obtaining, for each geographic area in a plurality of geographic areas, a corresponding plurality of first expected phase differences of a first waveform transmitted by a first wireless device from the corresponding area to a pair of receiving elements of a second wireless device; obtaining measured phase differences of the first waveform transmitted by the first wireless device to the pair of receiving elements of the second wireless device; determining which of the plurality of expected phase differences matches the measured phase differences; conditionally marking each of the plurality of geographic areas as a possible location of the first wireless device if the expected phase difference for the corresponding geographic area is equal to the measured phase difference; and estimating the location of the first wireless device based on the marked geographic areas. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0008] Figure 1 An example system is shown that may be implemented in one or more of the disclosed embodiments.

[0009] Figure 2A A plurality of geographic regions are shown, each of which may include a wireless transmitter.

[0010] Figure 2B is a diagrammatic overview of an example system including two access points that implement at least one of the disclosed embodiments.

[0011] Figure 2C Transmitting and receiving devices are shown in a number of areas.

[0012] Figure 2D Example data structures implemented in one or more of the disclosed embodiments are shown.

[0013] Figure 3 The relative positions of the access point and the antenna of the access point are shown.

[0014] Figure 4A misalignment between the orientations of the two devices is shown.

[0015] Figure 5 A first wireless device alignment process is shown.

[0016] Figure 6 A second wireless device alignment process is shown.

[0017] Figure 7 A third wireless device alignment procedure is shown.

[0018] Figure 8 is a block diagram of an example access point in accordance with one or more of the disclosed embodiments.

[0019] Figure 9 shows an example of a wireless interface, such as Figure 8 Any one or more interfaces in the interface.

[0020] Figure 10 An example top physical view of an example AP is shown.

[0021] Figure 11 is a block diagram of an example of a location determination and site provisioning manager (SPM) apparatus.

[0022] Figure 12 is a block diagram of an example of a network node.

[0023] Figure 13 is a block diagram of an example communication device.

[0024] Figure 14 An example misalignment between the orientations of two wireless devices is shown.

[0025] Figure 15A An example topology including a first wireless device and a wireless interface is shown.

[0026] Figure 15B is a timing diagram illustrating waveforms received via receiving elements spaced apart by a distance greater than λ / 2.

[0027] Figure 16A Two access points are shown.

[0028] Figure 16B The results of minimizing a function of the distance between two access points are shown.

[0029] Figure 17 is a two-dimensional example map illustrating a method of determining the location of a wireless transmitter based on the phase difference between two receiving elements.

[0030] Figure 18It is a two-dimensional map determination of the location of the wireless transmitter based on the phase differences at the three receiving elements.

[0031] Figure 19 is a map showing possible locations of access points and two receiving elements.

[0032] Figure 20 is similar to Figure 19 Map 2000, except that two additional receivers are shown.

[0033] Figure 21 The positions of the antennas of two access points in two-dimensional space are shown.

[0034] Figure 22 The antenna locations of two access points in two-dimensional space are shown.

[0035] Figure 23 is a graph illustrating a method for determining desired phase differences at regions and determining whether received phase differences match those desired phase differences.

[0036] Figure 24 is a diagram illustrating how a transmitter in three-dimensional space may be positioned by one or more of the disclosed embodiments.

[0037] Figure 25 is a flow chart of an example process for determining desired phase differences for multiple geographic regions.

[0038] Figure 26 is a flow chart of an example process for determining the location of a wireless transmitter using phase differences experienced at multiple receivers.

[0039] Figure 27 is a flow chart of an example method for determining a desired phase difference.

[0040] Figures 28A-28B is an example flow chart describing a method for determining and utilizing the location and position of a second AP.

[0041] Figure 29 is a flow chart describing an example method for determining a location of a wireless terminal based on expected phase differences for signals from multiple devices.

[0042] Figure 30 is a flow chart of an example method for estimating a location of a wireless terminal.

[0043] Figure 31 is a flow chart of an example method for estimating a location of a wireless terminal.

[0044] Figure 32is a flow chart of an example method for estimating a location of a transmission antenna.

[0045] Figure 33 is a flow chart of an example method for estimating the location and orientation of a wireless device.

[0046] Figure 34 is a flow chart of an example method for generating alignment instructions for a wireless device.

[0047] Figure 35 is a flow chart of an example method for determining a location of a wireless terminal.

[0048] Figure 36 is a flow chart of an example method for determining a location of a wireless device. DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0049] This disclosure describes example embodiments for determining the location of a first wireless device based on a phase difference in waveforms exchanged between the first wireless device and a second wireless device. In some embodiments, the location of the device transmitting the waveform is determined based on the phase difference. In some other embodiments, the location of the device receiving the waveform is determined based on the phase difference. In some embodiments, the phase difference observed between the signal transmitted by the device and the signal received by the device is used to determine the location of the device.

[0050] At least one of the first wireless device and the second wireless device includes multiple receiving elements. Unlike some existing approaches, the disclosed embodiments do not require a stable reference signal, which can be difficult to maintain in different environments. Instead, the disclosed embodiments utilize multiple receiving elements (e.g., antennas) distributed in a two-dimensional or three-dimensional orientation.

[0051] Some disclosed embodiments define multiple geographic regions of proximity to wireless devices and then identify an expected phase difference (Phase Difference Signature (PDS)) for each of the multiple geographic regions. In some embodiments, the location of the device receiving the signal and determining the phase difference is unknown. In some embodiments, the location of the device transmitting the signal is unknown. For each of these scenarios, an expected phase difference is determined for signals received from transmitters located in the multiple geographic regions.

[0052] Expected phase differences are generated to aid in determining the location of a wireless transmitter in an unknown location. Each of the expected phase differences describes the phase difference experienced by a receiving element of a receiving device at a given location. Because the expected phase differences will vary depending on the location of the wireless transmitter, a different expected phase difference is determined / generated for each of a plurality of geographic regions. An estimate of the location of the wireless transmitter is then determined by comparing the measured phase difference of a signal received from the transmitter at the receiving element of the receiver with the expected phase difference for one or more of the plurality of regions. The difference between the expected phase difference and the measured phase difference for each region provides an indication of the location of the wireless transmitter.

[0053] The signal exchange described above can be used not only to determine the location of a device, but also its orientation. As described above, while the phase difference of received signals can be used to estimate the location of a wireless transmitter, these received signals can also be used to determine the location of a specific transmission element (e.g., an antenna). Thus, two wireless devices exchange signals, wherein the phase difference of the exchanged signals determines the distance between the transmit / receive element pairs of the two devices. Thus, for example, if each device includes four antennas, there are six pairs of transmit / receive elements between the two devices. The location of each transmission element of the first wireless device can be determined based on at least the phase difference information collected from the four receiving elements of the second device. If the device receives signals via four receiving elements labeled A1, A2, A3, and A4, then in some example embodiments, the expected phase difference is calculated based on the difference in received signals between A1 and A2, A1 and A3, A1 and A4, A2 and A3, A2 and A4, and A3 and A4. These combinations are valid for signals transmitted by each transmission element of the transmitting device. Thus, for example, if the transmitting device includes four transmission elements, some embodiments generate 4*6=24 different expected phase differences. Note that in various embodiments, the expected phase difference is calculated for one or more frequencies because signals of different frequencies will result in different phase differences experienced at the receiver. Therefore, if the above expected phase differences are generated for two frequencies, then in some embodiments, 24*2 or 48 expected phase differences are calculated.

[0054] Once the location of each transmission element has been determined, the location of the transmission element can be compared to the known layout of the transmission elements of the device. For example, some embodiments maintain a library of transmission element layout information for the device. This transmission element layout information defines the relative orientation and position of the transmission elements of a particular type of device. This known layout can be shifted and / or rotated in three-dimensional space until a correspondence is found between the layout and the determined transmission element locations. The shifted and / or rotated layout that matches the determined transmission element locations corresponds to the location and orientation of the device.

[0055] In some cases, it may be desirable to align the orientations of multiple wireless devices. Accordingly, some disclosed embodiments generate instructions describing how to align a first orientation of a first wireless device with a second orientation of a second wireless device. For example, once the relative orientation of a first wireless device with respect to a second wireless device is determined, these embodiments generate instructions for adjusting the first wireless device with respect to rotation about one or more of a horizontal (e.g., X) axis, a vertical (e.g., Y) axis, or a rotational (e.g., Z) axis. By updating the orientation of the first wireless device to align with the orientation of the second wireless device, and by determining the relative distance between the two devices, a location estimate generated by the first wireless device for the other wireless device can be more easily converged with a location estimate generated by the second wireless device.

[0056] In some embodiments, location estimation is performed by multiple wireless devices using a single coordinate system and, therefore, a unified plurality of geographic regions defined based on the single coordinate system. For example, in some embodiments, once the relative position and relative orientation between two wireless devices are known, a first expected phase difference generated by a transmitter in each of the plurality of regions is determined based on a first location and first orientation of a first wireless device. A second set of expected phase differences generated by a transmitter in each of the plurality of regions is determined based on a second location and second orientation of a second wireless device. Using these two different sets of expected phase differences, the location of a wireless transmitter within any of the unified plurality of geographic regions can be determined using signals experienced by the first wireless device and / or the second wireless device. Because both the first wireless device and the second wireless device estimate location using a unified coordinate system and unified plurality of regions, there is no need to convert the location estimate performed by one device to a different coordinate system / multiple regions used by the second wireless device.

[0057] In other embodiments, each wireless device defines or is assigned a separate plurality of geographic regions, where each of the plurality of geographic regions is based on a separate coordinate system. In these embodiments, the location estimate generated by each wireless device is relative to the respective coordinate system and / or plurality of regions of that wireless device. Thus, in these embodiments, a desired phase difference is generated for a particular wireless device and for each of the plurality of regions of that particular wireless device. In embodiments utilizing separate independent coordinate systems / regions for each device, to achieve the degree to which location estimates from multiple wireless devices can be combined, they must first be converted to a common coordinate system.

[0058] Figure 1An example system 100a, implemented in one or more of the disclosed embodiments, is shown. System 100a includes multiple access points (APs) 142a-d. In various embodiments, an AP is an access point, router, switch, or any other device capable of providing network access. System 100a also includes authentication, authorization, and accounting (AAA) server(s) 110, dynamic host configuration protocol (DHCP) server(s) 116, domain name system (DNS) server(s) 122, one or more web servers 128, and a network management system (NMS) 136. These servers are coupled together via a network 134 (e.g., the Internet and / or a corporate intranet). Location and position server(s) 165 include a site provisioning manager (SPM) module. Network 134 includes multiple routers 185 and multiple switches 180. Network communication link 111 couples AAA server(s) 110 to network 134. Network communication link 117 couples DHCP server(s) to network 134. Network communication link 123 couples DNS server(s) to network 134. Network communication link 129 couples Web server(s) to network 134. Network communication link 137 couples network management server(s) 136 to network 134. Network communication link 166 couples location and position server(s) 165 to network 134.

[0059] System 100a also includes a plurality of user equipment (UE 1 138, ..., UE Z 140, UE 1' 146, ..., UE Z' 148). A user equipment is any wired, wireless, or optical device that provides network access to a communication device used by a user (such as a person) or an automated device (such as an IoT device). Some of the UEs (138, 140, 146, and 148) are wireless transmitters and receivers and move throughout system 100a.

[0060] In the example system 100a, a collection of access points are located at different customer premises sites. Customer premises site 1 102 (eg, a shopping mall) includes access point 142a and access point 142b. Customer premises site 1 102 is connected to network 134 via network communication link 153.

[0061] The second customer premises site 104 (e.g., a stadium) includes access point 142c and access point 142d. Figure 1As shown, UEs (UE 1 138, ..., UE Z 140) are currently located at a first customer premises site 102; and UEs (UE 1' 146, ..., UE Z' 148) are currently located at a second customer premises site 104. Second customer premises site 104 is coupled to network 134 via network communication link 145. In some embodiments, each of the servers, routers, switches, APs, UE NMSs, and other servers attached to the network includes a system log or error log module, wherein each of these devices records the status of the device, including normal operating status and error conditions.

[0062] As discussed above, at least some disclosed embodiments determine a first location of a first wireless device relative to a second wireless device based at least on a phase difference in signals exchanged between the two wireless devices. For example, in some embodiments, the first location and / or orientation of first AP 142c is determined based on the second location and second orientation of a second AP (e.g., AP 142d). Alternatively, in some embodiments, the first location and / or first orientation of first AP 142c is determined with reference to the coordinates of the second location and second orientation of the second AP (e.g., AP 142d). In these embodiments, the second location and first orientation of one AP (in this case, the second AP) are typically known. Specifically, in some embodiments, the location and orientation of the second wireless device are determined via location (or multiple locations) (e.g., via a Global Positioning System receiver) and / or orientation sensor included in the second wireless device, or via an external measurement tool (e.g., a compass, a level, a laser, etc.). Based on the learned second location and second orientation of the second AP, the first location and first orientation of the first wireless device are derived. In at least some embodiments, the first location and the first position are derived based on a phase difference of one or more signals transmitted by the first AP and received by the second AP.

[0063] Figure 1 Example wireless devices include multiple radio transmitters and receivers (not shown) capable of transmitting and receiving signals at multiple frequencies, such as 2.4 GHz, 5 GHz, and / or other frequency bands. One or more of the APs use multiple transmission elements and / or reception elements (e.g., antennas) to transmit and receive signals to and from other wireless receivers and transmitters.

[0064] The deployment of APs can be a complex and time consuming process. Some APs are deployed so that their locations and orientations are precisely aligned with desired coordinates, or alternatively, are known in a precise manner.

[0065] The SPM module 190 of the location and position server 165 communicates with one or more of the APs 142a-d using the network communication link 166. Via the network communication link 166, the SPM can control the transmitters of the APs 142a-d and command them to transmit at any of their operating frequencies. The SPM can also obtain information related to signals received from any one or more of the APs 142a-d via the network communication link 166. For example, in some embodiments, the SPM commands a first AP among the APs 142a-d to transmit a signal via a particular antenna and can then obtain, from at least one other AP among the APs 142a-d, the phase difference between the signals received by any pair of antennas of a receiving device. In at least some embodiments, obtaining this phase difference information is accomplished via channel state information (CSI) and / or capabilities built into the device driver firmware of the Wi-Fi receiver integrated with the receiving AP.

[0066] According to one example, SPM 190 uses network communication link 166 to instruct AP 142c to transmit a signal at a specific frequency f1. In this example, the location and position of AP 142d are known. Figures 14-27 As depicted, AP 142d measures phase differences between signals received by multiple pairs of receiving elements of AP 142d. AP 142d then forwards the measured phase differences to SPM 190 via network communication link 166.

[0067] In some embodiments, this process is performed iteratively using different transmission elements of AP 142c and / or using different frequencies. For example, each of the transmission elements of some APs may transmit signals in each of the 2.4 GHz band and each of the 5 GHz band. Other frequency bands are utilized by other embodiments. For each of these transmissions (a signal of a particular frequency transmitted on a particular transmission element), SPM 190 collects the phase difference between the signals received at any one (or more) pairs of receiving elements of the receiving AP.

[0068] In some embodiments, once the receiving AP (e.g., AP 142d) has measured the phase difference information, the information is provided to the SPM 190. In some embodiments, for a pair of two wireless devices, the SPM commands a first set of signal transmissions, wherein the first of the two wireless devices transmits signals on one or more transmit elements (e.g., antennas) and the signals are received by the plurality of receive elements of the second wireless device. Phase difference information is then determined for this set of signal exchanges.

[0069] As shown below Figure 3As discussed in more detail, some embodiments maintain a library of information defining a layout of transmit and / or receive elements for a particular type of wireless device. The layout defines the location of the transmit and / or receive elements relative to their wireless device (e.g., housing) and the relative distance between the antennas of each wireless device. Some embodiments utilize the information included in the layout and the estimated distance between the transmit and receive elements of two wireless devices to determine the location and orientation of one of the two wireless devices based on the known location and orientation of the other wireless device.

[0070] Figure 2A A plurality of geographic regions are shown, each of which may include a wireless transmitter. Figure 2A A geographic area 205 is shown divided into a plurality of geographic regions. An example geographic region 210 is shown. Figure 2B A two-dimensional view of geographic region 205 and geographic regions such as geographic region 230 is shown, at least some disclosed embodiments operate on three-dimensional geographic regions and areas. Each area is labeled as including a hypothetical transmitter, labeled T 1..36 , each region has one hypothetical transmitter.

[0071] Also shown is a wireless receiver 215. The wireless receiver 215 receives a signal from one of the geographic regions within the geographic area 205, which signal is detectable by a plurality of receiving elements of the wireless receiver 215. Note that although Figure 2A Wireless receiver 215 is illustrated as being located outside geographic area 205 , but in some embodiments, the wireless receiver is located inside geographic area 205 .

[0072] Some disclosed embodiments determine that when receiving a message from multiple geographic regions T 1..36 The expected phase difference that the wireless receiver 215 will experience when transmitting each signal in . Figure 2A The diagram illustrates that, in some embodiments, by matching the transmission device (such as the one located at the T 1..36 The position of the transmitting device is determined by measuring the phase difference of a signal transmitted by a transmitting device in any of the regions and received by a receiving device (e.g., wireless receiver 215). Note that in some embodiments, the expected phase difference for each region includes multiple phase differences. The multiple phase differences represent the phase differences of signals received by two receiving elements (e.g., a reference receiving element and a second receiving element). At least in some embodiments, the phase differences of signals at multiple frequencies are also included in the expected phase difference.

[0073] Figure 2B is an overview diagram of an example system including two wireless devices that implement at least one of the disclosed embodiments. Figure 2BTwo wireless devices are shown, access point 191A and access point 191B. Each of access points 191A and 191B has defined a corresponding plurality of zones. Access point 191A has defined a first plurality of zones 192A. Access point 191B has defined a second plurality of zones 192B. Figure 2B The first plurality of regions 192A and the second plurality of regions 192B are shown to be misaligned. For example, in some cases, one region within the first plurality of regions 192A spans a portion of more than one region within the second plurality of regions 192B. Similarly, one region within the second plurality of regions 192B spans a portion of more than one region within the first plurality of regions 192A. Furthermore, the boundaries of the first plurality of regions 192A and the second plurality of regions 192B are not parallel or aligned. Figure 2B The first plurality of areas 192A and the second plurality of areas 192B are shown as two-dimensional areas, but at least some disclosed embodiments contemplate access points 191A and / or 191B defining multiple areas in three-dimensional space.

[0074] Each of the first plurality of areas 192A and the second plurality of areas 192B is used by their respective access points to estimate the location of another device (such as another access point or a wireless terminal). For example, in some embodiments, access point 191A estimates the location and / or orientation of access point 191B within the plurality of areas 192A. When performing this estimation, access point 191A estimates the location of access point 191B to be within area 193A, which is included in the first plurality of areas 192A. In some embodiments, access point 191B estimates the location of access point 191A to be within area 193B, which is included in the second plurality of areas 192B.

[0075] In some embodiments, each of access points 191A and 191B also estimates the location of wireless terminal 194. Thus, for example, access point 191A estimates the location of wireless terminal 194 to be within area 195A, which is included in first plurality of areas 192A. Access point 191B estimates the location of wireless terminal 194 to be within area 195B, which is included in second plurality of areas 192B.

[0076] Some disclosed embodiments map a location determination by access point 191A within an area in the first plurality of areas to a second area in the second plurality of areas. Thus, for example, while access point 191A estimates the location of wireless terminal 194 as area 195A, these embodiments convert or map area 195A to an area used or defined by access point 191B of a reference device, and specifically, to area 195B in the second plurality of areas 192B. By mapping from first plurality of areas 192A to second plurality of areas 192B, some disclosed embodiments allow multiple location determinations by multiple access points to be aggregated, thereby providing a more accurate location determination for wireless terminal 194 that would not be possible if only a single access point were used to estimate the location of wireless terminal 194.

[0077] Figure 2C Transmitting and receiving devices are shown in a number of areas. Figure 2C A geographic region 220 divided into a plurality of areas 235 is shown. Figure 2C Also shown are two devices: a transmitting device 222 and a receiving device 224. The transmitting device includes a plurality of transmitting elements. Figure 2C In the embodiment shown, the transmission device 222 includes four transmission elements: transmission element 230a, transmission element 230b, transmission element 230c, and transmission element 230d. The receiving device 224 includes a plurality of receiving elements. In the embodiment shown, the receiving device includes four receiving elements: receiving element 230e, receiving element 230f, receiving element 230g, and receiving element 230h. Each of the plurality of transmission elements is located in a different area of ​​the plurality of areas. For example, Figure 2C Transmitting element 230a is shown as being located in region 232a. Transmitting element 230b is shown as being located in region 232b. Transmitting element 230c is shown as being located in region 232c. Transmitting element 230d is shown as being located in region 232d. Similarly, each of the plurality of receiving elements is shown as being located in a separate region of the plurality of regions 235. Receiving element 230e is shown as being located in region 232e. Receiving element 230f is shown as being located in region 232f. Receiving element 230g is shown as being located in region 232g. Receiving element 230h is shown as being located in region 232h.

[0078] Figure 2CEach of the transmitting device 222 and the receiving device 224 is also shown as having corresponding reference points, which are shown as reference point 226 for the transmitting device 222 and reference point 228 for the receiving device 224. Some disclosed embodiments maintain layout information for each of the devices 222 and 224. The layout information for the transmitting device 222 defines the relative position of each transmitting element 230a-d and the reference point 226. The layout information for the receiving device 224 defines the relative position of each receiving element 230e-h and the reference point 228.

[0079] As discussed above, in at least some embodiments, the transmission device 222 transmits one or more signals to the receiving device 224. The signals are received at each of the receiving elements 232e-h. Because the receiving elements are located at different distances from any of the transmission elements 230a-d, the signals are received at different phases at each of the receiving elements 232e-h. Therefore, in some embodiments, phase difference information is generated that describes the phase difference of the signals received by the receiving elements 230e-h from one or more of the transmission elements 230a-d.

[0080] In at least some embodiments, the location of each of receiving elements 230e-h is known. In other words, some embodiments store data indicating that receiving element 230e is located in region 232e, receiving element 230f is located in region 232f, receiving element 230g is located in region 232g, and receiving element 230h is located in region 232h. In another example embodiment, data indicating the x, y, and z coordinates and orientation of the receiving wireless device is stored. Based on these known locations of each of receiving elements 232e-h, some embodiments generate expected phase differences for each of a plurality of regions 235 that will be experienced by receiving device 224 resulting from signals transmitted from each of the plurality of regions 235. Thus, in some embodiments, a transmitting device transmits at least one signal from each of transmitting elements 232a-d, which is received by at least two of receiving elements 230e-h. By comparing the phase differences of the received signals with the expected phase differences generated for each of the plurality of regions 235, the disclosed embodiments are able to identify in which region each of transmitting elements 232a-d is located.

[0081] Once the location of each of the transmission elements 230a-d is known (eg, the regions 232a-d, respectively), some disclosed embodiments determine the position of the transmission device 222 based on the known locations of the transmission elements 230a-d.

[0082] Figure 2D1 shows an example data structure implemented in one or more of the disclosed embodiments. Figure 2D These example data structures are described as relational database tables, but other embodiments utilize other data architectures. For example, some embodiments use arrays, linked lists, trees, unstructured data storage, or other data structure architectures. Figure 2D A device type table 250, a transmission element table 260, and a receiving element table 270 are shown. Device type table 250 stores the properties of a specific device type. Device type table 250 includes a device type identifier field 252, a device model number field 254, a transmission element quantity field 256, a reception element quantity field 258, and a reference point location field 259. Device type identifier field 252 uniquely identifies a specific device type. In some embodiments, each device supported by the disclosed embodiments, which differs in the number and / or relative position of transmission or reception elements, is assigned a unique device type identifier. Device model number field 254 stores the model number assigned to the device type (identified via field 252). Transmission element quantity field 256 defines the number of transmission elements supported by the indicated device type (e.g., field 252). Reception element quantity field 258 defines the number of reception elements supported by the indicated device type (e.g., field 252). Reference point location field 259 defines the location of the reference point for the device type. For example, the reference point location field 259 indicates whether the reference point is the center of mass of the wireless device, a specific corner of the wireless device, or a specific location of the reference point on the device.

[0083] The transmission element table 260 includes a device identifier field 262, a transmission element identifier field 264, an x-offset field 266, a y-offset field 268, and a z-offset field 269. The device identifier field 262 uniquely identifies a particular device type and is cross-referenced with the device type identifier field 252. The transmission element identifier field 264 identifies a particular transmission element. For example, some embodiments identify transmission elements via a numeric identifier (e.g., one (1), two (2), three (3), four (4), etc.). The x-offset field 266 identifies the x-coordinate of the identified transmission element. In some embodiments, the x-offset field 266 identifies the x-offset of the center of mass of the identified transmission element or the tip of the identified transmission element. The y-offset field 268 identifies the y-offset from a reference point of the identified transmission element (e.g., via field 264). In some embodiments, the y-offset field 268 identifies the y-offset of the center of mass of the identified transmission element or the tip of the identified transmission element. The z-offset field 269 identifies the z-offset from a reference point of the identified transmission element. In some embodiments, the z-offset field 269 identifies the z-offset of the center of mass of the identified transmission element or the tip of the identified transmission element.

[0084] Receiver element table 270 includes a device identifier field 272, a receive element identifier field 274, an x ​​offset field 276, a y offset field 278, and a z offset field 279. Device identifier field 272 uniquely identifies a particular device type and is cross-referenced with device type identifier field 252. Receiver element identifier field 274 identifies a particular receive element. For example, some embodiments identify a receive element via a numeric identifier (e.g., one (1), two (2), three (3), four (4), etc.). x offset field 276 identifies the x coordinate of the identified receive element. In some embodiments, x offset field 276 identifies the x offset of the center of mass of the identified receive element or the tip of the identified receive element. y offset field 278 identifies the y offset from a reference point of the identified receive element (e.g., via field 274). In some embodiments, y offset field 278 identifies the y offset of the center of mass of the identified receive element or the tip of the identified receive element. The z-offset field 279 identifies the z-offset from a reference point of the identified receiving element. In some embodiments, the z-offset field 279 identifies the z-offset of the center of mass of the identified receiving element or the tip of the identified receiving element.

[0085] Figure 3 The relative positions of a wireless device and its antennas 390A-E are shown. The wireless device 380 is shown in a three-dimensional space defined by three axes (X axis 392A, Y axis 392B, and Z axis 392C). Some disclosed embodiments utilize predefined spatial positions of antennas of devices such as the wireless device 380. Examples of these predefined spatial positions are relative to Figure 2D As illustrated, in some embodiments, a data structure of these predefined spatial positions is used to define the position of a wireless device relative to a reference point or a transmitting element and / or receiving element of the device. In some embodiments, the predefined spatial position of an antenna is a relative position. As described above, in some embodiments, the position of an antenna is relative to a reference point on the device. In some embodiments, the reference point is one of the transmitting elements or one of the receiving elements of the device.

[0086] Figure 3 An example reference point 393 is shown. In some embodiments, the relative positions of antennas 390A-E are determined relative to the origin of a three-dimensional axis, such as represented by X-axis 392A, Y-axis 392B, and Z-axis 392C. Thus, some embodiments refer to the origin of the three-dimensional axis as Figure 3 393 as an origin 394 above reference point 393. The coordinates of each of antennas 390A-E are then determined relative to the origin and / or reference point 394 / 393. These relative coordinates are Figure 3395A-E. Some disclosed embodiments utilize the relative coordinates 395A-E of each antenna 390A-E to help determine the location and / or orientation of the wireless device 380, as discussed below. For example, some embodiments determine the location of each antenna 390A-E of the wireless device 380. Based on the determined locations and the relative coordinates 395A-E of the antennas, some disclosed embodiments determine the orientation of the wireless device 380.

[0087] Figure 3 The rotation direction is also shown in three dimensions. Rotation angle 396A shows the magnitude of rotation about X-axis 392A. Rotation angle 396B shows the magnitude of rotation about Y-axis 392B. Rotation angle 396C shows the magnitude of rotation about Z-axis 392C. Some embodiments shift and rotate the relative position of the antenna, represented by coordinates 395A-E, by a magnitude of rotation in each dimension, as shown by rotation angles 396A-C. As described further below, this rotation is managed to determine the orientation of the device.

[0088] Figure 4 The misalignment between the orientations of the two devices is shown. Figure 4 Two wireless devices are shown: wireless device 480 and wireless device 481. The two wireless devices are shown in a three-dimensional space defined by three axes, shown as X-axis 492A, Y-axis 492B, and Z-axis 492C. These three axes intersect at an origin 494. In some disclosed embodiments, one or more of the wireless devices is an access point. In some disclosed embodiments, one or more of the devices is a wireless terminal. Wireless device 480 is shown in a first orientation 480O, and wireless device 481 is shown in a second orientation 481O. The second orientation 481O has rotated wireless device 481 relative to wireless device 480 about Z-axis 492C. Figure 4 The angular difference between the first orientation 480O and the second orientation 481O is shown as angle 497. Angle 497 shows that the first orientation 480O rotates the wireless device 481 about the Z axis relative to the first orientation 480O of the wireless device 480 in the direction indicated by angle 498. Some disclosed embodiments generate instructions to align the orientations of the two devices. For example, these embodiments generate instructions to rotate the wireless device 481 in the direction indicated by arrow 499 to eliminate the misalignment represented by angle 497. Although Figure 4 Shown in Figure 4 The misalignment in three-dimensional space shown is based on rotation about the Z axis 492C, but some embodiments align the two devices between the three rotational axes. Figure 4 For clarity, this misalignment is not shown here.

[0089] Figure 5A first wireless device alignment process is shown. Figure 5 Two wireless devices are shown: a first wireless device 552a and a second wireless device 552b. In various embodiments, one or both of the wireless devices 552a-b are similar to or identical to any of the APs discussed above. Figure 5 Signals 554a exchanged between a first wireless device 552a and a second wireless device 552b are shown. Based on the exchanged signals, at least some disclosed embodiments determine the position of the first wireless device 552a relative to the second wireless device 552b. Details of this position determination are further explained below. Some embodiments of the present disclosure generate instructions to align the position of the first wireless device 552a with the position of the second wireless device 552b. For illustration purposes, Figure 5 An alignment dialog box 556a is shown displaying instructions for aligning the orientation of wireless device 552a with the orientation of wireless device 552b. Figure 5 In the example shown in FIG5 , the instructions indicate that the first wireless device 552a should be rotated 20 degrees to the right to better align with the second wireless device 552b. After the instructions 558a are displayed, a person 560 can rotate the first wireless device 552a according to the instructions. In some embodiments, after manually adjusting the orientation of the first wireless device, an updated orientation of the first wireless device is again determined based on (in some embodiments) a phase difference of a signal received by the second wireless device from the first wireless device. Then, in some embodiments, updated instructions are generated based on the updated orientation alignment of the first wireless device with the second wireless device.

[0090] Figure 6 A second wireless device alignment process is shown. Figure 6 The same two wireless devices are shown: Figure 5 The first wireless device 552a and the second wireless device 552b after the alignment process. The signal 554b is exchanged between the first wireless device 552a and the second wireless device 552b so as to Figure 5 After the described alignment process has been performed, the position of the first wireless device 552a is determined relative to the position of the second wireless device 552b. Figure 6 It shows that if the person 560 rotates the first wireless device 552a more than Figure 5 If the first alignment process specifies 20 degrees, then, in at least some embodiments, a request is provided via additional alignment dialog 556b (or, in other embodiments, via alignment dialog 556a) to perform further alignment in the same (e.g., X) dimension (but opposite in direction or magnitude) as relative to Figure 5 Additional instructions 558b for alignment are executed.

[0091] Figure 7A third wireless device alignment procedure is shown. Figure 7 Also shown are a first wireless device 552a and a second wireless device 552b. Signals 554c are exchanged between the first wireless device 552a and the second wireless device 552b to determine the orientation of the first wireless device 552a relative to the orientation of the second wireless device 552b. An alignment dialog box 556c displays instructions 558c requesting a user to adjust the first wireless device 552a relative to a second dimension that is different than the orientation relative to the first wireless device 552a. Figure 5-Figure 6 Instructions 558c request adjustment of the first wireless device such that the left side of the first wireless device 552a is higher relative to the right side of the first wireless device 552a. Some disclosed wireless devices provide adjustable feet (e.g., feet 562) to facilitate alignment of the wireless device about each of the yaw (Y), pitch (X), and roll (Z) axes. Figure 7 It is illustrated that the contemplated alignment process can generate instructions for aligning wireless devices in at least three dimensions and verifying those alignments.

[0092] Although Figure 5-Figure 7 A manual alignment process for wireless devices is described, where the manual alignment is driven by instructions generated by the disclosed embodiments, but other embodiments provide for alignment of the orientation of wireless devices without manual intervention. For example, some embodiments of wireless devices are configured with motors capable of changing the orientation of the wireless device about each of the X, Y, and Z axes. In these embodiments, the orientation difference between the two devices is provided to an orientation controller included in one of the devices. The orientation controller is configured to adjust the orientation of the motor as needed to position the first wireless device in an orientation consistent with the orientation of the second wireless device. In some embodiments, the first and / or second wireless devices are configured to be ceiling-mountable. In these embodiments, the orientation controller is configured to control the orientation of the first wireless device relative to the orientation of the second wireless device and the ceiling so that the first and second wireless devices are aligned.

[0093] Figure 8 8 is a block diagram of an example access point 800 (e.g., any one or more of the access points AP 142a-d) according to one or more disclosed embodiments. The access point 800 includes a wired interface 830, wireless interfaces 836, 842, a hardware processor 806 (e.g., a CPU), one or more hardware memories 812, and an assembly of components 808 (e.g., an assembly of hardware components, such as an assembly of circuits), which are coupled together via a bus 809 through which the various elements can exchange data and information. The wired interface 830 includes a receiver 832 and a transmitter 834. The wired interface 830 couples the access point 800 to Figure 1The access point may be connected to a network 134 (e.g., the Internet). The first wireless interface 836 (e.g., a Wi-Fi interface or an 802.11 interface) includes: a receiver 838 coupled to a receive antenna 839, via which the access point can receive wireless signals from a communication device (e.g., a wireless terminal); and a transmitter 840 coupled to a transmit antenna 841. The access point transmits wireless signals to the communication device (e.g., a wireless terminal) via the transmit antenna 841. The second wireless interface 842 (e.g., a Bluetooth interface) includes: a receiver 844 coupled to an antenna 845, via which the access point can receive wireless signals from a communication device (e.g., a wireless terminal); and a transmitter 846 coupled to a transmit antenna 847, via which the access point can transmit wireless signals to the communication device (e.g., a wireless terminal). To simplify the illustration, only a single antenna (e.g., antenna 845) is shown connected to the receiver 844. In some contemplated deployments, the system utilizes multiple receive antennas and processes the received signals to obtain a phase difference between the signals received on any pair of antennas. Figure 9 More details of this phase processing are provided in

[0066] The wireless interface (eg, 836 and / or 842) can, and typically does, include a phase difference determination component, as described below with reference to

[0067] Figure 9 Explained in more detail.

[0094] The one or more hardware memories 812 include routines 814 and data / information 816. The routines 814 include an assembly of components 818 (e.g., an assembly of software components) and an application programming interface (API) 820. The data / information 816 includes configuration information 822, a device status log (including error events and normal events captured as messages in a system log or error log 824), and a dynamic list 826 of measured arrival phase values ​​that identifies the relative arrival phases of signals transmitted from a second AP at different antennas of an AP. According to another example embodiment, the memory stores the phase differences between signals arriving at any pair of antennas (not shown).

[0095] Figure 9 is a diagram 900 illustrating an example of a wireless interface 950, such as a Figure 8 Any one or more of interfaces 836 or 842. In this illustrative example, an interface is shown with four receivers 954a, 954b, 954c, and 954d, which are connected to four receiver antennas 955a, 955b, 955c, and 955d, respectively. Similarly, four transmitters 956a, 956b, 956c, and 956d are connected to four transmitter antennas 957a, 957b, 957c, and 957d.

[0096] Those skilled in the art will recognize that the disclosed embodiments can have any number of receivers (and their associated antennas) and any number of transmitters (and their associated antennas), and that the number of transmitters and receivers need not be the same. In some embodiments, the waveform received by antenna 955a and receiver 954a is used as a reference. Various embodiments may select any antenna of the receiving device as a reference. The reference is fed into phase differentiators 960, 962, and 964. The other inputs of the phase differentiators are connected to the outputs of receivers 954b, 954c, and 954d, respectively. The phase differentiators detect the difference between the phase of the reference signal and the waveform received via antennas 955b, 955c, and 955d and their corresponding receivers 954b, 954c, and 954d.

[0097] The outputs 970, 972 and 974 of the phase differentiators 960, 962 and 964 provide the phase difference:

[0098] PD i =Phase(Ref))-Phase(Signal i ) Equation 1

[0099] in:

[0100] PDi – the phase difference between the reference waveform and the waveform from the i-th receiving element,

[0101] Phase(Sig(Ref)) – the phase of the reference signal,

[0102] Phase(Signal i ) – the phase of the i-th waveform arriving at the i-th receiving element.

[0103] Since it is uncertain whether the waveform from the transmitter reaches the reference receiving element or the i-th receiving element first, the differentiator also generates a 360-degree complementary angle of phase difference at its outputs 971, 973, and 975. Specifically:

[0104] CPD i =360-PD i Equation 2

[0105] in:

[0106] CPD i The 360-degree complementary angle of the i-th phase difference,

[0107] PD i The phase difference between the reference waveform and the waveform from receiving element i.

[0108] In some embodiments having n pairs of receiving elements, n independent phase differences are generated. In some embodiments, these phase differences are represented by an n-dimensional vector, such as:

[0109] PDV = [p1, p2, p3, …… p n Equation 3

[0110] Where:

[0111] PDV is the received phase difference vector, and

[0112] pi is the phase difference between the reference waveform and the i-th signal.

[0113] Thus, the complementary received phase difference vector is given by:

[0114] CPDV = [360 - p1, 360 - p2, 360 - p3, …… 360 - p n Equation 4

[0115] Although Equations 3 and 4 illustrate the generation of phase differences for waveforms of a single frequency, some embodiments include phase differences desired from signals of different frequencies. Thus, the first set of p i (where i ≤ n) defines the desired phase difference for the waveform at the first frequency, and the second set of p i (where n < i < m) defines the desired phase difference for the waveform at the second frequency. The above process can be repeated for more than two frequencies, as this is only used as an example.

[0116] Thus, the desired phase differences generated by the various embodiments include those generated according to Equation 2 and / or Equation 3. As explained in more detail below, the location of the wireless transmitter is determined by comparing the components of the desired phase difference with the measured phase difference. If the desired phase difference includes both the phase difference and its complement, the wireless receiver only needs to generate the measured phase difference (and not the complement of the measured difference). However, if the signature does not include complementary phase differences, the differentiator needs to generate both the measured phase difference and its complement.

[0117] Figure 10An example top physical view 1000 of an example AP 1050 is shown. Example AP 1050 includes multiple antennas labeled antenna 1060a, antenna 1060b, antenna 1065a, antenna 1065b, and antennas 1070a-f. In an example embodiment, antenna 1060a and antenna 1060b are used to monitor and control a radio, such as a Wi-Fi network. In an example embodiment, antennas 1065a and 1065b are used for communication in the 5.4 GHz frequency band between the AP and a user device UE (such as a WT). In an example embodiment, antennas 1070a-f are used for communication in the 2.4 GHz or 5.4 GHz frequency band between the AP and a user device UE (such as a WT). Some embodiments use these antennas to determine the distance between any transmit antenna on a first AP and a receive antenna on a second AP, as well as the distance between any transmit antenna on a second AP and a receive antenna on the first AP. The distance is determined based on the difference in arrival phase values ​​of signals from one or more antenna pairs communicating on one or more frequency bands. A detailed explanation of how to calculate the distance between each pair of transmitter / receiver antennas is provided in the Phase Difference application.

[0118] Each antenna is used to transmit and receive signals that help estimate the position and orientation of one AP relative to another.

[0119] Figure 11 1 is a block diagram of an example location determination and SPM apparatus 1100. In some embodiments, the location determination and SPM apparatus 1100 is a network node, for example, a location and position server such as an automation equipment location determination server. In some embodiments, Figure 11 The location determination and SPM device 1100 is Figure 1 In some embodiments, the location determination and SPM device 1100 is located in the cloud or is an access point (such as Figure 1 a portion of any of the access points or devices shown in ).

[0120] Location determination and SPM apparatus 1100 includes a communication interface 1130, a hardware processor 1106, an output device 1108 (e.g., a display, printer, etc.), an input device 1110 (e.g., a keyboard, keypad, touch screen, mouse, etc.), one or more hardware memories 1112, and an assembly of components 1140 (e.g., an assembly of hardware components, such as an assembly of circuits), coupled together via a bus 1109, through which the various components can exchange data and information. In some embodiments, communication interface 1130 includes an Ethernet interface. Communication interface 1130 couples location determination and SPM apparatus 1100 to a network and / or the Internet. Communication interface 1130 includes a receiver 1132, via which a location and position server apparatus can receive signals from wireless transmitters, and a transmitter 1134, via which location determination and SPM apparatus 1100 can transmit data and information, such as information regarding the location of various wireless transmitters to the transmitters themselves, to any other network-attached servers (such as a network management server), and so forth.

[0121] The one or more hardware memories 1112 include routines 1114 and location signature data / information 1120. The routines 1114 include an assembly of components 1118 (e.g., an assembly of software components) and an application programming interface (API) 1117. In some embodiments, the routines 1114 define software that implements methods for generating instructions for directing the positioning and orientation of an AP to a defined position and orientation aligned with the position and orientation of a reference AP. In some embodiments, the routines determine the location and orientation of each AP by reference to the reference AP and use this information to determine the location and orientation of other mobile devices such as Figure 1 The location signature data / information 1120 includes area coordinates 1124. Depending on the particular application, the coordinates may have a single dimension (for locating a wireless transmitter along a particular straight path), two dimensions (for locating a device in a two-dimensional plan, such as locating a device on a floor of a business), or three dimensions (for locating a wireless device within a three-dimensional volume, such as a device located on a particular shelf in a storage room).

[0122] As explained in more detail below, the location signature data / information 1120 also includes columns 1125, 1126, 1127, 1128, and 1129, each of which indicates the relative phase of the waveform expected to be received from a particular area by a particular receiving element (e.g., A1, A2, A2', A3, and A3'). In this illustrative example, receiving element A1 is selected as the reference receiving element and is assigned a phase difference of 0 (relative to itself). The phases of the signals received by the other receiving elements are measured with reference to the waveform received by receiving element A1 (e.g., the reference phase). Although this example only illustrates the phase differences of the signals received by receiving elements A1, A2, and A3, those skilled in the art will recognize that various embodiments will utilize any number (smaller or larger) of receiving element pairs. In some embodiments, antenna element A2 can be selected as another reference antenna, thereby generating additional phase differences between the signals received by antennas A2-A3, A2-A4, etc. Accordingly, the number of columns in the location signature data / information will increase or decrease accordingly. Assuming that the waveform from a wireless transmitter located in a particular area first arrives at the reference receiving element and then arrives at the corresponding i-th receiving element, columns 1126 and 1128 provide phase differences. Assuming that the waveform from a wireless transmitter located in a particular area first arrives at the corresponding i-th receiving element and then arrives at the reference receiving element, columns 1127 and 1129 provide 360-degree complementary phase differences.

[0123] As explained above, when the site signature does not include a column with a 360 degree complementary angle phase difference signature, Figure 9 The wireless interface 950 generates a 360-degree complementary angle phase difference.

[0124] The one or more hardware memories 1112 also include configuration information 1122, which includes operating parameters programmed into the system or entered by a system administrator.

[0125] The one or more hardware memories 1112 also include example phase increment tables 1150, 1155, and 1160 containing phase difference information. In some embodiments, these tables include 360-degree complementary phase difference information. In some embodiments, the information in the tables is periodically refreshed (e.g., once per second) to reflect the updated position of the wireless device (e.g., transmitter).

[0126] Phase increment tables 1150, 1155, and 1160 include the IDs 1151, 1156 to 1161 of the wireless transmitters from which the received waveforms were transmitted and for which the phase increments were measured. The tables also include phase increment information 1152, 1157 to 1162 measured between signals arriving at any antenna pair.

[0127] Some embodiments account for phase increment measurement errors, which may vary with the embodiment. In some embodiments, the phase increment measurement error is configurable or dynamically determined. An example phase increment measurement error is ± ten (10) degrees. The measurement error can be fixed (e.g., hard-coded) or configured via a user interface as one of the configuration information 1122. In operation, the measured phase difference information is compared with the desired phase difference information (or its 360-complement) for a specific region (the desired phase difference for each region). In some embodiments, if the measured phase difference falls within a predefined error tolerance level, they are considered to match the desired phase difference. If the phase difference matches the phase difference expected in the region, some embodiments determine that a wireless antenna may be located in that region. In some cases, multiple regions are identified as possible locations of the antenna. These one or more identified regions are represented by region 1165. In some embodiments, a location signature vector is generated to store the desired phase difference for a region. Such a vector is given by:

[0128] LSIV(x,y,z) = [s1,s2,s3,…,s n Equation 5

[0129] Where:

[0130] LSIV(x,y,z) location signature vector contains the desired phase difference based on the signals from transmitters located at x, y, z; and

[0131] s i The ith element of the location signature vector. Each element of the vector represents the phase difference of the signals at two different antennas.

[0132] Some embodiments determine whether a measured set of phase differences "matches" the desired set of phase differences for a specific region based on Equation 6 below:

[0133] abs(si – pi) < threshold Equation 6

[0134] Where:

[0135] abs absolute value function,

[0136] si the ith component of the desired phase difference vector,

[0137] pi the ith component of the example measured phase difference vector, and

[0138] i is an index starting from 0 < i < n, where n is the dimension of the phase difference vector, which depends on the number of antenna pairs and the number of frequencies employed.

[0139] Figure 12is a block diagram of an example of a network node 1200. In some embodiments, the network node 1200 is a device or server attached to the network 134. In some embodiments, Figure 12 The network node 1200 represents Figure 1 Any one or more of the servers 110, 116, 122, 128, 136, and / or one or more of the routers 185, and / or Figure 1 The network node 1200 includes a communication interface 1202 (e.g., an Ethernet interface), a hardware processor 1206, an output device 1208 (e.g., a display, a printer, etc.), an input device 1210 (e.g., a keyboard, a keypad, a touch screen, a mouse), one or more hardware memories 1212, and an assembly of components 1216 (e.g., an assembly of hardware modules, an assembly of circuits, or one or more of the following), which are coupled together via a bus 1209. The various components can exchange data and information via the bus 1209. The communication interface 1202 couples the network node 1200 to a network and / or the Internet. Although only one interface is shown, those skilled in the art will recognize that routers and switches can and typically do have multiple communication interfaces. The communication interface 1202 includes: a receiver 1220, through which the network node 1200 (e.g., a server) can receive data and information (e.g., including information related to operations such as registration requests, AAA services, DHCP requests, Simple Notification Service (SNS) lookups, and web page requests); and a transmitter 1222, through which the network node 1200 (e.g., a server) can send data and information (e.g., including configuration information, authentication information, web page data, etc.).

[0140] The memory 1212 includes routines 1214 and data information 1230. The routines 1214 include an assembly of components 1232, such as an assembly of software components. The data information 1230 includes system logs and / or error logs.

[0141] Figure 13is a block diagram of an example communication device. In some embodiments, the communication device 1300 is a user equipment (UE), such as any of the devices UE 1 138, ..., UE Z 140, UE 1' 146, ..., UE Z' 148 discussed in more detail above. The communication device 1300 includes a wired interface 1302, a wireless interface 1304, a hardware processor 1306 (e.g., a CPU), an electronic display 1308, an input device 1310, one or more hardware memories 1312, and an assembly of components 1316 (e.g., an assembly of hardware modules, such as an assembly of circuits), which are coupled together via a bus 1309 via which the various elements can exchange data and information. The wired interface 1302 includes a receiver 1320 and a transmitter 1322. The wired interface 1302 couples the communication device 1300 (e.g., a UE) to Figure 1 network 134 (eg, the Internet).

[0142] The wireless interface 1304 includes a cellular interface 1324, a first wireless interface 1326 (e.g., an 802.11 Wi-Fi interface), and a second wireless interface 1328 (e.g., a Bluetooth interface). The cellular interface 1324 includes: a receiver 1332 coupled to a receiver antenna 1333, via which the communication device 1300 (e.g., a UE) can receive wireless signals from a wireless device (such as any of the access points 142a-d); and a transmitter 1334 coupled to a transmission antenna 1335, via which the communication device 1300 (e.g., a UE) can transmit wireless signals to a wireless device (such as any of the access points 142a-d). The first wireless interface 1326 (e.g., a Wi-Fi interface, e.g., an 802.11 interface) includes a receiver 1336 coupled to a receive antenna 1337, via which the communication device 1300 (e.g., a UE) can receive wireless signals from a communication device (e.g., an AP), and a transmitter 1338 coupled to a transmit antenna 1339, via which the communication device 1300 (e.g., a UE) can transmit wireless signals to the communication device (e.g., an AP). The second wireless interface 1328 (e.g., a Bluetooth interface) includes a receiver 1340 coupled to a receive antenna 1341, via which the communication device 1300 (e.g., a UE) can receive wireless signals from a communication device (e.g., an AP), and a transmitter 1342 coupled to a transmit antenna 1343, via which the communication device 1300 (e.g., a UE) can transmit wireless signals to the communication device (e.g., an AP).

[0143] Memory 1312 includes routines 1314 and data / information 1317. Routine 1314 includes assembly 1315 of components, such as software components. Data / information 1317 may include configuration information and any additional information required for the normal operation of communication device 1300. Data / information may also include system logs or error logs.

[0144] Figure 14 An example misalignment 1400 between the orientations of two wireless devices is shown. The two wireless devices include a first wireless device 1405 and a second wireless device 1445. In some embodiments, each of the two wireless devices is an access point. The position and orientation of the wireless device 1405 are known. In addition, the position and orientation of the wireless device AP 1405 are known, or aligned, relative to a first coordinate system represented by an X-axis 1402 and a Y-axis 1404. The first wireless device 1405 is aligned with the first coordinate system because a predefined fixed location or feature of the first wireless device 1405 (e.g., one or more corners of the second wireless device 1445, one or more antenna locations of the second wireless device 1445, etc.) has specific coordinates within the first coordinate system. In some embodiments, the wireless device 1405 defines a first plurality of regions (e.g., Figure 2A-2C any one of the multiple regions shown in FIG.

[0145] 1467. The second wireless device 1445 also includes transmitters TX3 1450 and TX4 1455 and their associated antennas A7 1452 and A8 1457. Figure 14 The orientation of the second wireless device 1445 is illustrated as being aligned with a second coordinate system including an X' axis 1406 and a Y' axis 1408. The second AP 1445 is aligned with the second coordinate system because a predefined fixed location or feature of the second wireless device 1445 (e.g., a corner of the second AP 1445, one or more antenna locations of the second AP 1445, etc.) has specific coordinates within the second coordinate system.

[0146] Although Figure 14While wireless devices are shown with distinct and separate transmit and receive antennas, some embodiments utilize a single antenna for both transmission and reception of signals. In such embodiments, antennas 1412 and 1422 are the same physical antenna. Similarly, in these embodiments, antennas 1417 and 1427 are the same, antennas 1452 and 1462 are the same, and antennas 1457 and 1467 are the same.

[0147] Figure 14 Shown are signals 1480a exchanged between antennas 1452 and 1412, signals 1480b exchanged between antennas 1457 and 1417, signals 1480c exchanged between antennas 1462 and 1422, and signals 1480d exchanged between antennas 1467 and 1427. In various embodiments, these signals can be any waveform, including but not limited to cellular waveforms, acoustic waveforms, Wi-Fi waveforms, optical waveforms, or Bluetooth waveforms. In some embodiments, the signals are transmitted by the first wireless device 1405 and received by the second wireless device 1445. In some embodiments, the signals are transmitted by the second wireless device 1445 and received by the first wireless device 1405. Figure 14 The distances between each of these antenna pairs are also shown as distances D1-D4. To simplify the explanation, this figure (and the associated explanation) does not show that, using the same method, the system also determines the distances between transmit antenna A7 and receive antenna A2, the distance between transmit antenna A8 and receive antenna A1, the distance between transmit antenna A3 and receive antenna A6, and the distance between transmit antenna A4 and receive antenna A5.

[0148] The disclosed embodiments determine the phase difference between signals received via different antenna pairs originating from a particular transmitting antenna. For example, some embodiments may transmit a signal from antenna 1452 and measure the phase difference between the signals received by each of antennas 1412 and 1417. A second signal may be transmitted from antenna 1457 and the phase difference between the second signals as received by antenna pairs 1412 and 1417 may be determined. A third signal may be transmitted from antenna 1422 and the phase difference between the signals as received by antennas 1462 and 1467 may be determined. Alternatively, a fourth signal may be transmitted from fourth antenna 1427 and the phase difference between the fourth signals as received by each of antennas 1462 and 1467 may be determined.

[0149] When signals are received, the phase difference of the received signals is measured, and in some embodiments, the phase difference between the signals received at different antennas is used to determine the region (location) of the transmitting antenna and estimate the distance between the paired transmitting and receiving antennas. Some embodiments determine multiple location / region estimates for each transmitting antenna, where each of the multiple locations / regions based on different signal frequencies is used to estimate a corresponding distance. Some embodiments determine multiple distance estimates for each antenna pair, where each of the multiple distances based on different signal frequencies is used to estimate a corresponding distance.

[0150] Some disclosed embodiments determine a desired phase difference for each region. In some embodiments, the phase difference is stored as a vector or signature of phase differences between signals received by multiple antenna pairs and applied to signals at one or more frequencies. In some embodiments, the desired phase difference is determined according to Equation 1. In some embodiments, each individual desired phase difference corresponds to a specific transmit antenna, a specific receive antenna pair, and a specific signal frequency.

[0151] The difference between the arrival phases of the signals originating from each transmitter (and at each signal frequency) is measured and compared to the expected phase difference associated with transmissions in multiple regions. In one exemplary embodiment, the differences between the measured and expected phase differences are assumed to have a Gaussian distribution. Based on this assumption, a probability is assigned to each determined difference. The composite probability that the transmitting antenna is within a particular region is then determined by aggregating the probabilities associated with each phase difference measurement for all signals received by the antenna pair and for all signals at different frequencies. In other embodiments, the probabilities are generated based on distributions other than Gaussian.

[0152] Some disclosed embodiments rely on the physical location of antennas on a particular access point to determine the orientation of a wireless device relative to another wireless device. For example, some embodiments may define the center location of a wireless device as the center of a coordinate system (e.g., coordinates (0,0,0)). The locations of each of the wireless device's antennas are then located within the coordinate system based on the well-known locations of each of their antennas. For example, if a particular antenna is 3 centimeters from the center location of a wireless device in the X dimension, that antenna is assigned a location in the coordinate system that is consistent with its offset from the center location of the wireless device. Thus, in some embodiments, each wireless device is associated with the coordinates of each of the wireless device's antennas within its respective coordinate system. When determining the orientation of a wireless device, the physical location information of its antennas is used to determine the orientation of the wireless device based on the estimated locations of its antennas.

[0153] Figure 15AAn example topology 1500A is shown, which includes a first wireless device 1502a and a second wireless device 1502b. The first wireless device 1502a communicates with a receiving element 1504a and a second receiving element 1504b of the second wireless device 1502b. The receiving element 1504a and the receiving element 1504b are integrated into the second wireless device 1502b. The wireless device 1502a includes a transmitter 1505 operatively connected to a transmitting receiving element 1508. The waveform transmitted from antenna 1508 is received by the second wireless device 1502b (specifically, by receivers 1520a and 1520b) via the receiving element 1504a and the receiving element 1504b. The waveform from 1508 to 1504a travels a distance 1522a, while the waveform from 1508 to 1504b travels a distance 1522b. The distance between the arrival times of the waveforms at the respective receiving elements of the receiver is given by the following equation:

[0154] Δt=t1-t2=(D1–D2) / S wave =ΔD / S wave Equation 7

[0155] in:

[0156] Δt is the arrival time difference of the waveforms arriving at receiving elements 1504a and 1504b,

[0157] ΔD is the difference between the distance travelled by the signal / wave,

[0158] t1 is the time it takes for the waveform to travel from 1508 to 1504a.

[0159] t2 is the time it takes for the waveform to travel from 1508 to 1504b.

[0160] The distance of D1 from 1508 to 1504a,

[0161] The distance of D2 from 1508 to 1504b,

[0162] S wave The speed of a wave traveling through a medium.

[0163] The speed of a wave traveling through any medium is related to the frequency of the wave and is given by:

[0164] S wave =f wave *λ Equation 8

[0165] in:

[0166] S wave The speed of the waveform through the medium,

[0167] f wave The frequency of the wave,

[0168] The wavelength of the lambda wave.

[0169] The duration of a wave is related to its frequency and is given by:

[0170] T=1 / f wave Equation 9

[0171] in:

[0172] The duration of a wave can also be expressed in terms of an angle of 360 degrees or 2π.

[0173] Substituting Equation 8 into Equation 7 yields:

[0174] Δt=t1-t2=ΔD / S wave =ΔD / (f wave *λ) Equation 10

[0175] And using the relationship in Equation 8 we get:

[0176] Δt=ΔD*T / λ=ΔD*2π / λ Equation 11

[0177] or

[0178] ΔD=λ*Δt / T=λ*Δφ / 2π Equation 12a

[0179] or

[0180] Δφ=2π*ΔD / λ Equation 12b

[0181] in:

[0182] Δφ is the arrival phase difference between the waveforms arriving at the two receiving elements.

[0183] For a waveform with a specific wavelength and a known differential distance between two receiving elements while maintaining a constant phase difference, Equation 12 defines a hyperbola where a mobile device transmitting the waveform from anywhere along the hyperbola will transmit a signal that will arrive at both receiving elements with the same phase difference.

[0184] When the receiving elements are located at a distance less than λ / 2, the receiver provides information that can be processed to determine which receiving element first receives the waveform. However, when the receiver is located at a distance greater than λ / 2, determining which receiving element first receives the waveform is more challenging, so we need to check the assumption that the waveform first arrives at any receiving element, as shown in the reference Figure 15B Explained.

[0185] Figure 15B15 is a timing diagram 1500B illustrating a waveform received via receiving elements spaced apart by a distance greater than λ / 2. Waveform 1510 begins transmission at reference time t0 and is received at a first receiving element such as Figure 15A is received at a receiving element 1504a). Figure 15A The same transmitted waveform 1530 (originating from the same starting time t0) is received at receiving element 1504b of the second receiving element. The transmitted waveform travels a shorter path to the second receiving element, so it arrives at the second receiving element earlier. At time 1515, for example, using a phase differentiator such as Figure 9 The phase difference between the two received signals is measured using phase differentiators 960, 962, and 964. The phase difference is determined to be Δφ1535.

[0186] Because the receiving elements are spaced apart by a distance greater than λ / 2, the receiver cannot determine which receiving element received the waveform first. The same waveform may have a shorter path to the first receiving element than to the second receiving element and still exhibit the same phase difference between the signals received at the second receiving element. Specifically, the same transmitted waveform 1540 (originating from the same start time t0) is received at the second receiving element. The transmitted waveform traveled a longer path to reach the second receiving element, so it arrives at the second receiving element later. At time 1515, for example, using a phase differentiator such as Figure 9 Phase differentiators 960, 962, and 964 are used to measure the phase difference 1535 between the two received signals. Phase difference 1535 is determined to be Δφ when the actual phase difference is 360-Δφ. Due to the ambiguity of the system, it is difficult to distinguish whether the phase difference should be Δφ, as shown in phase difference 1535, or 1560-Δφ, as shown in phase difference 1545. The disclosed embodiment illustrates both possibilities. We denote the term 360-Δφ as Δφ':

[0187] Δφ' = 360 - Δφ Equation 13

[0188] in:

[0189] Δφ - Arrival phase difference is less than 360 degrees.

[0190] Figure 16A Two access points are shown: a first AP 1610 and a second AP 1620. The access points are in a first orientation relative to each other. Figure 16A, reference AP 1610 and second AP 1620 are each depicted as having only two antennas. AP 1610 has antennas 1612 and 1614, and AP 1620 has antennas 1622 and 1624. Each of these antennas is configured to receive and / or transmit signals at multiple different frequencies. As described above, SPM commands the various transmitters on one AP to transmit signals of different frequencies to the other AP, determines the phase difference between the signals received by any pair of antennas, and estimates the area / location where the second AP's antennas are located.

[0191] Figure 16A The antenna site of the second AP is shown to be estimated to be within the area described by estimated antenna site 1623 and estimated antenna site 1625, respectively. The position and orientation of the second AP are then estimated based on estimated antenna site 1623 and estimated antenna site 1625. For example, some embodiments determine the best fit between the position and orientation of the second AP and estimated antenna site 1623 and estimated antenna site 1625. In some embodiments, the position and orientation of the second AP are estimated by minimizing the accumulated measurements of distance d1 1630 and distance d2 1632. Distance d1 is the distance between first antenna site 1622 and estimated antenna site 1623, and distance d2 is the distance between second antenna site 1624 and estimated antenna site 1625. As discussed above, the relative locations of the antennas of AP 1620 are known based on layout information that defines the physical dimensions of AP 1620 and the locations of the antennas of AP 1620 relative to the physical dimensions. Figure 2D An example of a data structure used by some embodiments to store layout information for wireless devices (such as access points) is provided. Figure 3 Another example of using layout information is described.

[0192] Some embodiments rely on Equation 14 below to determine the location of a wireless device:

[0193]

[0194] in:

[0195] Position Description of the location of the device antenna,

[0196] PositionMin() is the position of the antenna that minimizes the term in (), and

[0197] f(d i ) is a function of the distance between the estimated antenna positions and the physical distance of the antennas.

[0198] In some embodiments, the function f(d i ) is a function of the mean square of the distance. In another embodiment, the function f(di ) is the absolute value. The disclosed embodiments contemplate other functions.

[0199] Figure 16B Shown are the results of minimizing a function of the distance between the estimated positions of the antennas while taking into account the physical structure of the AP including the well-known relative locations of the antennas. Figure 16B A second location and orientation between the reference AP 1610 and the second AP 1620 is shown. The second location and orientation 1600b minimizes the measurements of the distances d1 and d2, which is Figure 16A For clarity, the Figure 16B 16. Distances d1 and d2 are omitted in FIG. 16. However, a first distance between a first antenna location 1622 and an estimated antenna location 1623, and a second distance between a second antenna location 1624 and an estimated antenna location 1625 are shown. The locations of the antennas of the second AP 1620 are determined as location 1626 and location 1628, respectively. This determination is a result of minimizing the cumulative function of the distances di in Equation 14 at these locations. Figure 16B The position and orientation of the second access point have been modified to provide a relative Figure 16A The distances d1 and d2 shown in FIG are reduced distances.

[0200] Once the location of the second AP's antenna is determined, the distance and relative orientation between the reference AP and the second AP are determined.

[0201] Figure 17 17 is a two-dimensional example map 1700 illustrating a method for determining the location of a wireless transmitter based on the phase difference between two receiving elements. In this example, receiving element 1710 and receiving element 1715 are located at a distance of 3.5λ. Example transmitter T1 1720 is located midway between these two receiving elements 1710 and 1715. Because the wireless transmitter is equidistant from these two receiving elements, the waveforms at these two receiving elements arrive with a phase difference of zero (0) degrees. Similarly, waveforms from any transmitter located on line 1730 travel the same distance to reach the two receiving elements, so the phase difference between the signals received at these two receiving elements is also zero degrees.

[0202] In example map 1700, transmitters T4 1723 and T5 1724 are located at a distance of λ from transmitter T1. These transmitters are located at distances of 0.75λ and 2.75λ from receiving elements A1 and A2. The difference between the distances that the signals from these transmitters need to travel to reach receiving elements 1710 and 1715 and the distance that the waveform from T1 1720 needs to travel to reach the receiving elements is one wavelength. In other words, the arrival phase difference between the transmitters at these locations at receiving element 1710 or 1715 is two wavelengths. Therefore, the arrival phase difference at receiving elements A1 and A2 is zero degrees. Similarly, the waveforms from any transmitter located on hyperbola 1732 or 1734 travel the same distance to reach both receiving elements, so the phase difference between the signals received at these two receiving elements is also zero degrees. Those skilled in the art will recognize that straight line 1730 is actually a special case of the hyperbola in Equation 12, where ΔX = 0.

[0203] Transmitters T2 1721 and T3 1722 are located at a distance of λ / 2 from transmitter T1. These transmitters are located at distances of 1.25λ and 2.25λ from the receiver's receiving elements, so the signals from these two transmitters arrive at one of receiving elements A1 and A2 with a delay of 1.25λ, a phase difference of one wavelength. Furthermore, these transmitters are located at the same distance from receiving elements A1 1710 and A2 1715, so the signals from these transmitters arrive at both receiving elements at the same phase, and the phase difference between the signals received at these two receiving elements is zero degrees. Similarly, for the same reason, the waveforms from any transmitter located on the hyperbola passing through T2 and T3 will exhibit the same zero-degree phase difference.

[0204] Transmitters T6 1725 and T7 1726 are located at distances of 0.25λ and 3.25λ from receiver elements A1 and A2, respectively. Since the distance difference from either transmitter 1725 or transmitter 1726 to any receiving element is a multiple of the wavelength, the signals will arrive at both receiving elements with the same phase, and therefore with a phase difference of zero (0) degrees. Similarly, waveforms from any transmitter located on the hyperbola passing through T6 and T7 will exhibit the same zero-degree phase difference.

[0205] Therefore, relying solely on the phase difference of the waveforms received at the two receiving elements results in an infinite number of possible locations for the transmitter. Each of these infinite possible locations produces an equal phase difference at the two receiving elements. Therefore, in these cases, uncertainty still exists in the location of the transmitter based solely on these phase differences.

[0206] Therefore, some embodiments rely on more than two receiving elements to increase the certainty of the location estimate. By adding additional receiving elements located at different distances from the two original receiving elements A1 and A2, the additional phase differences provide additional independent information that can help determine the location of the wireless transmitter more accurately.

[0207] Figure 18 is a receiver topology 1800 illustrating determining the location of a wireless transmitter based on phase differences at three receiving elements. Figure 18 A third receiving element 1817 (labeled A3) is shown. Figure 18 In the example, the receiving elements A1 and A2 and the transmission from location T1 to T7 are the same as those previously described with respect to Figure 17 Similarly, hyperbolas 1831, 1832, 1833, 1834, and 1835 depict locations where transmissions to receiving elements A1 and A2 arrive at equal phase (e.g., with a phase difference of zero degrees). As mentioned above, hyperbola 1835 represents a special hyperbola where ΔX = 0 (a straight line).

[0208] A receiving element 1817 is added to the receiver topology 1800, and the phase difference between the arrival phases at A1 and at receiving element A3 1817 is measured. For the reasons explained above, when the transmitters are located at T8 location 1840, T9 location 1841, T10 location 1842, T11 location 1843, T12 location 1844, location T13 1845, and T14 location 1846 (these locations are spaced 0.5λ apart) and T8 location 1840 is located 0.25λ from receiving element A1, the signals arriving from locations on the hyperbolas 1861, 1862, 1863, 1864, and 1865 have the same arrival phase. Thus, the difference between the arrival phases of the signals at A1 and A3 is zero.

[0209] Figure 18 It shows that for any given phase increment, using two receiving elements and a single transmission frequency, there are many hyperbolas at the same distance from the two receiving elements. A waveform transmitted from any of these hyperbolas will result in signals received at antennas A1 and A2 having the same phase difference. By adding a third receiving element and measuring the phase difference between the waveforms received at antennas A1 and A3, as well as the phase difference at antennas A2 and A3 (not shown in the figure for simplicity), the locations of wireless transmitters are further restricted to those that also lie on the new hyperbola, representing locations that match the phase difference of receiving elements A1 and A3.

[0210] The phase difference between antennas A1 and A2 is shown to be zero, and the phase difference between antennas A1 and A3 is also zero. Therefore, the only place where the waveform can be transmitted must be at the intersection of hyperbolas 1831, 1832, 1833, 1834, and 1835 (which are straight lines) and hyperbolas 1861, 1862, 1863, 1864, and 1865 (which are straight lines). The intersection of these hyperbolas corresponds to line 1870.

[0211] Line 1870 is 45 degrees because this example is a special case where the Δφ for the signals at antennas A1 and A2 is zero, and the Δφ for the signals at A1 and A3 is also zero. For any other different Δφ, the hyperbola will intersect on a different line, indicating a possible location for a different transmitter than this example. So far, this illustration has only considered a single frequency. Repeating the measurement using different transmission frequencies provides additional possible locations for each antenna. The system then determines the location and orientation of the second device by aggregating the estimated area / location based on the phase difference between any two antenna pairs and using one or more transmission frequencies.

[0212] Figure 18 We show that by adding another receiving element and collecting additional independent information about the phase difference of the signal, and specifically calculating the phase difference, we further restrict the possible places from which the wireless transmitter could have been located (and transmitted from) to those that result in the signal's Δφ matching the measured Δφ.

[0213] Expanding on this concept and adding another receiving element, the system generates additional received signals with independent additional information about the location from which the wireless transmitter is transmitting. In other words, measuring the arrival phase differences of the signals received in A1, A2, A3, ..., Ak, and determining the locations that satisfy all hyperbolas leads to determining the location of the wireless transmitter. In some embodiments, the above method is performed using different signal frequencies. Each frequency results in additional measured phase differences and additional constraints that help narrow down the specific location of the transmitter's operation.

[0214] Figure 19 is a map 1900 showing possible locations of two receiving elements and access points. Figure 19 Two wireless receivers 1902a and 1902b are shown. Figure 19 Three possible locations of a wireless transmitter (eg, included in a wireless terminal, access point, etc.) are also shown at 1904a, 1904b, and 1904c. Figure 19Also shown is line 1905, with each point on line 1905 being equidistant from both receivers 1902a-b. Thus, signals from a wireless transmitter (such as any of the access points at locations 1904a-1904b and 1904c) will experience similar phase differences (e.g., zero) when received at the multiple receiving elements of each of the two receivers 1902a-b.

[0215] Figure 20 is with Figure 19 The map is similar to map 2000, except that in addition to the two receivers 1902a-b, two additional receivers 1902c-d are shown. Figure 20 Receivers 1902a and 1902b are shown equidistant from a transmitter (e.g., an access point) located at location 1904b. These equal distances are shown as distances 1912a and 1912b. Location 1904b is distance 1912c from receiver 1902c and distance 1912d from receiver 1902d. Therefore, due to these additional distances, distances 1912c and 1912d differ from distances 1912a-b. Consequently, the waveform generated at location 1904c experiences different phase differences at receivers 1902c and 1902d when compared to the phase differences of the waveforms received at receivers 1902a and 1902b. These distance differences and resulting phase differences relative to receivers 1902a-b help some disclosed embodiments identify the location of the wireless transmitter located at location 1904b.

[0216] Thus, in some embodiments, a set of expected phase differences is generated for a signal transmitted by a wireless transmitter at location 1904a (e.g., a region centroid) when received at each pair of receiving elements of receivers 1902a-d. This set of expected phase differences for a particular transmitter location and a particular receiver location is different from a second set of expected phase differences for a different transmitter location (such as locations 1904a and 1904c), but the same particular receiving location. In other words, when determining the expected phase differences at a particular region or region centroid, some disclosed embodiments determine the expected phase differences for multiple receivers or receiving antennas. For example, at Figure 20 In the example of FIG, each desired phase difference for a region or region centroid will include at least four sets of desired phase differences, one set for each receiver. Thus, in these embodiments, the number of desired phase differences for a region or region centroid will be at least the number of receive element pairs used in an embodiment multiplied by the number of frequencies used.

[0217] Figure 2121 shows example locations of antennas for two access points in a two-dimensional space 2100. Although the disclosed embodiments are capable of determining the difference in access point orientation in each of up to three dimensions, for simplicity, Figure 21 Only two dimensions are shown. The Z axis is not shown.

[0218] Relative to Figure 21 Locations are depicted within X-axis 2102 and Y-axis 2104. A reference AP includes two antennas at locations 2112 and 2114. A second AP also has two antennas at locations 2126 and 2128. Based on the relative positions of locations 2112 / 2114 and locations 2126 / 2128, it can be inferred that the orientation of the second AP is different from the orientation of the reference AP.

[0219] This difference in orientation is expressed as the angle between the Y' axis 2106 and the Y axis 2104 aligned with the reference AP. Reflected in Figure 21 In some embodiments, the angle It is determined based on trigonometric equations:

[0220]

[0221] in:

[0222] X1, Y1 are the locations of the first antenna of the second AP, and

[0223] X2 and Y2 are the positions of the second antenna of the second AP.

[0224] The above example illustrates that the second AP has a different roll (without any pitch or yaw relative to the reference AP). Some embodiments use similar calculations to determine any pitch difference and / or yaw difference between the second AP and the reference AP. In order to calculate any pitch difference and / or roll difference for the second AP, the location of each of the two antennas is determined in the reference three-dimensional space. In particular, the first antenna location is estimated to be at location [X1, Y1, Z1] in the reference three-dimensional space, and the second antenna is estimated to be at location [X2, Y2, Z2] in the reference three-dimensional space. The pitch angle α of the second AP relative to the reference AP three-dimensional space can be calculated by the following equation:

[0225] Tangent α = (X2 - X1) / (Z2 - Z1) Equation 16

[0226] And the roll angle β of the second AP relative to the reference AP can be calculated by the following equation:

[0227] Tangent β = (Y2 - Y1) / (Z2 - Z1) Equation 17

[0228] in:

[0229] X1, Y1, Z1 - the position of the first antenna of the second AP in the reference 3D space, and

[0230] X2, Y2, Z2—positions of the second antenna of the second AP in the reference three-dimensional space.

[0231] According to an embodiment, once the position and orientation of the second AP in the reference three-dimensional space have been calculated, instructions are generated indicating how to change the orientation (pitch, yaw, and roll) of the second AP to align its orientation with the orientation of the reference AP. For example, some embodiments determine instructions for rotating the Y' axis 2106 of the second AP, which passes through the two positions of the two second antennas, so that the Y' axis 2106 is parallel to the Y axis 2104.

[0232] In some embodiments, this guidance is provided via LEDs mounted on the second AP. In some embodiments, the LEDs use different colors of light to signal whether the technician should push a specific corner to lift or rotate the AP in a specific direction. A command to push a specific corner of the AP can be interpreted as a command to pull the opposite corner. In some embodiments, the intensity of the light or the number of LEDs used indicates the amount of rotation to be applied to the second AP.

[0233] After modifying the second AP's position, the second AP's position is recalculated relative to the reference AP. This continues until the second AP's position is aligned with the reference AP. In some embodiments, the second AP is aligned with the reference AP when each of the differences in pitch, roll, and yaw angles between the second AP and the reference AP is below a corresponding predefined threshold.

[0234] In some embodiments, the visual guidance is provided using the screen of a mobile device or some other device (eg, a computer, tablet, etc.) that may be associated with a site provisioning manager (SPM).

[0235] Some embodiments provide audible guidance using a mobile device (eg, mobile phone) or other device (eg, computer, tablet, etc.) associated with a site provisioning manager (SPM).

[0236] Figure 22Example antenna locations for two access points within a two-dimensional space 2200 are shown. Instead of ensuring alignment between a reference access point and a second access point, some embodiments instead store information defining the relative distance and orientation difference between the reference AP and the second AP. This information is then used to adjust the location determination that relies on the second AP's position information. For example, in some embodiments, an estimate of the WT's location can be performed based on the second AP's orientation relative to the second AP. The location is then adjusted (mapped) to a location consistent with the reference AP's orientation and location based on the stored information using the second AP's location and orientation.

[0237] refer to Figure 22 , the reference AP has antennas located at antenna site 2212 and second antenna site 2214. Antenna site 2212 and second antenna site 2214 are shown relative to X-axis 2202 and Y-axis 2204. Antenna site 2212 and second antenna site 2214 are aligned with Y-axis 2204. A second AP has two antennas located at antenna sites 2226 and 2228. Y' axis 2206 illustrates that antenna sites 2226 and 2228 are not aligned with the Y-axis, nor with antenna site 2212 and second antenna site 2214, but are aligned with a different set of reference axes, X' 2208 and Y' 2206. This difference in alignment between the two sets of axes is indicated by the angle Antenna locations 2226 and 2228 are alternatively aligned with a different axis (Y' axis 2206).

[0238] Based on measurements of the difference in arrival phases of signals at the different antennas, some disclosed embodiments determine that the second antenna is located at [X1, Y1] and [X2, Y2].

[0239] During operation, both the reference AP and the second AP estimate the location of the WT 2230. In some embodiments, each AP determines the location of the WT relative to its own position, and the system then aggregates the estimated locations, for example, by averaging the two estimated locations. As explained in more detail in the phase difference application, in an example embodiment, the system uses a weighted average based on the probability estimate of the WT being in each of the locations.

[0240] For simplicity, we assume that the reference AP is located at:

[0241] Reference AP position = [X3, (Y3 + Y4) / 2] Equation 18

[0242] And, the location of the second AP is:

[0243] The position of the second AP = [(X1+X2) / 2, (Y1+Y2) / 2] Equation 19

[0244] For practical reasons, it can be assumed that the distance between the coordinates of two antennas in the AP is negligible compared to the distance between the AP and the WT.

[0245] In operation, information from the reference AP indicates that the location of WT 2230 is located in the area at location [X5, Y5] relative to the reference AP's orientation. Similarly, information from the second AP indicates that the location of WT 2230 is located at location [X'5, Y'5] relative to the Y' axis 2206 and the X' axis 2208, which is aligned with the second orientation of the second AP. To facilitate aggregation of information from the two APs, the location information from the second AP is converted or mapped to an orientation relative to the reference AP.

[0246] In the example shown, the origin of the coordinates of the second AP is located at [X0, Y0] in the reference coordinates. Therefore, converted to the reference coordinates, the location of the WT is:

[0247]

[0248] as well as

[0249]

[0250] According to yet another embodiment, rather than estimating the location of the WT relative to the position of the second AP and then converting that location to a position relative to a reference AP, some embodiments use the position of the second AP to determine a regional signature of phase differences arriving at the second AP's antenna from a region defined by the position of the reference AP. Thus, the second AP determines the location of the WT directly in the reference AP's reference coordinates (axes), which facilitates easier convergence of the estimated location of the WT by the second AP with the location estimate of the WT performed by the reference AP.

[0251] Figure 23 23 is a diagram illustrating the physical configuration of multiple antennas relative to a two-dimensional plane. Two-dimensional plane 2305 is defined by an X-axis 2310 and a Y-axis 2315, respectively. Two-dimensional plane 2305 is divided into a plurality of regions, one of which is designated 2320. In some embodiments, each of the plurality of regions has a length, for example, 1.3 times the wavelength (λ) of the waveform being analyzed. Two-dimensional plane 2305 represents a surface on which a wireless transmitter (e.g., a wireless transmitter included in a wireless terminal such as a smartphone) can travel and transmit and / or receive wireless communications.

[0252] The physical configuration of the antennas can be used in a method to determine expected phase differences within an area of ​​a two-dimensional plane. Those expected phase differences can then be compared with the actual received phase differences to determine whether a transmitter is located in that area.

[0253] Figure 23 A transmitter "T" is shown located in area 2320. Transmitter "T" transmits signals received by each of four receiver antennas 2330a-d. In some embodiments, the receiving elements are co-located on or within a single wireless device (e.g., an AP). In some other embodiments, the receiving elements are distributed across multiple wireless devices.

[0254] exist Figure 23 In some embodiments, the locations of the receiver antennas 2330a-d are known. These locations are determined during the installation process and manually entered by an administrator. In some embodiments, once the location and orientation of the AP are determined, the specific locations of the antennas are determined by the physical configuration (e.g., physical properties) of the AP. Alternatively, the locations can be known via a satellite positioning system receiver included in one or more wireless devices. Alternatively, in some embodiments, the locations of the receiver antennas 2330a-d are known via the techniques described in the present disclosure. For example, in some embodiments, the location of the receiver is determined in advance based on the phase difference of a signal exchanged with another wireless device at a known location.

[0255] For each region in the two-dimensional plane 2305, the disclosed embodiments determine the distance (such as distance 2340a-d) between the centroid of the two-dimensional region 2320 and the corresponding receiving element 2330a-d. A reference receiving element is selected from the available receiving elements 2330a-d (e.g., receiving element 2330), and the distance from the transmitter to the other receiving elements is evaluated. For each receiving element i:

[0256] ΔX i =D ref –D i Equation 22

[0257] in:

[0258] ΔX i = the difference in distance traveled from transmitter T to the reference receiving element and to receiving element i.

[0259] D ref The distance traveled from the transmitter T to the reference receiving element,

[0260] D i The distance traveled from the transmitter T to the receiving element i.

[0261] Some embodiments determine the difference in travel distance using Equation 22. For example, the difference in travel distance is converted into a difference in the arrival phase of the waveform from the transmitter T to the various receiving elements in a given region (x, y).

[0262] Δφ i =ΔX i*2π / λ Equation 23

[0263] For a system with n antennas, there are k = (n-1) + (n-2) + (n-3) + ..1 pairs of antennas. The expected phase difference in each region can be expressed as a phase difference signature by the following equation:

[0264] [Δφ1,Δφ2,Δφ3,...Δφ k ,Δφ'1,Δφ2,Δφ'3,....Δφ' k ,] Equation 24

[0265] Equation 24 assumes a single frequency. When more than one frequency is used, the number of phase differences increases accordingly, and the dimension of the signature vector of Equation 24 increases proportionally. For example, in a simplified system with four receiving elements, in one example embodiment, the desired phase difference for a particular region may have the following values:

[0266] [10,65,185,15,33,235,350,295,175,345,327,125] Equation 25

[0267] Some embodiments periodically (e.g., every second) measure the signal from a wireless transmitter such as Figure 23 The embodiments then compare the actual received phase difference with the expected phase difference for each region. Regions where the expected phase difference matches the actual received phase difference are determined to be possible locations of wireless transmitters.

[0268] As explained with reference to Equation 5, some embodiments compensate for errors in the measurement of the phase difference by comparing the received phase difference with the expected phase difference while taking into account a predetermined error tolerance or margin. To facilitate this comparison, the expected phase difference for a particular region (e.g., Equation 23) is replaced with a difference that includes an error tolerance (e.g., a range of acceptable values). For example, when a vector is used to represent the received phase difference and the expected phase difference, the vector of the adjusted expected phase difference is described below:

[0269] [s1,s2,s3,…s k ,s'1,s'2,s3,…s' k ,] Equation 26

[0270] in:

[0271] s i - the ith element of the phase difference segment location signature

[0272] si=[Δφ i ,+δ,Δφ i ,-δ] Equation 27

[0273] in:

[0274] δ - Estimated error in the arrival waveform phase measurement.

[0275] Using the example phase difference of Equation 25 and an estimated error δ of ± ten (10) degrees, an example of a location signature for the region of Equation 25 is given by Equation 28 below, which defines a range of phase differences rather than a single degree value:

[0276] [0-20,55-75,175-195,,5-25,23-43,225-245,340-360,285-305,165-185,335-355,317-337,115-135] Equation 28.

[0277] Some embodiments determine whether expected phase differences (signatures) across regions overlap and the extent to which they overlap. For example, in some embodiments, if the number of overlapping regions is above a predetermined threshold, a notification is generated indicating that additional APs / receiving elements should be added or additional frequencies should be used, thereby increasing the dimensionality of phase differences across multiple frequencies and the ability to distinguish between regions. The notification is provided via any known messaging technique or annotations in an error log. Relative to a solution that employs fewer receiving elements or uses fewer transmission frequencies, adding additional receiving elements or increasing the number of frequencies used increases the probability that location determination can be made more accurately and will reduce the amount of overlap between expected phase differences in different regions. The above explanation also applies when determining location in three-dimensional space, as described below with respect to Figure 24 described.

[0278] Figure 24 is a diagram 2400 illustrating how a transmitter in three-dimensional space may be positioned by one or more disclosed embodiments. Figure 24 A three-dimensional geographic volume 2405 is shown, which is bounded by an X axis 2410, a Y axis 2412, and a Z axis 2414. The three-dimensional geographic volume 2405 is composed of a plurality of three-dimensional regions, an example of which is shown by three-dimensional region 2420. Figure 24 Transmitter "T" is shown located within three-dimensional area 2420 at varying distances from each of four receiving elements 2430a-d. These distances are shown as 2440a-d, respectively. As discussed above, at least some disclosed embodiments determine the phase difference expected by receiving elements 2430a-d if a wireless transmitter were located within three-dimensional area 2420. If the expected phase difference matches the phase difference actually experienced by receiving elements 2430a-d when receiving a signal from transmitter "T," at least some disclosed embodiments determine that three-dimensional area 2420 is a likely location of the wireless transmitter generating the signal.

[0279] Figure 25 25 is a flow chart of an example process for determining desired phase differences for a plurality of geographic regions. Each of the plurality of geographic regions may have a corresponding phase difference comprising a plurality of desired phase differences. The corresponding phase difference for each region is based on a distance difference between the corresponding region and a receiving element that would receive a waveform from the wireless transmitter if the wireless transmitter were located in the corresponding region. In some embodiments, the following with respect to method 2500 and Figure 25 One or more of the functions discussed are performed by hardware processing circuitry (e.g., 806, 1106, 1206, 1306). In some embodiments, instructions (228, 314, 428, 529) stored in memory (e.g., 812, 1112, 1212, 1312) configure the hardware processing circuitry to perform one or more of the functions discussed below.

[0280] After start operation 2505, method 2500 moves to operation 2510, which identifies a geographic region. Identifying the geographic region may include determining the boundaries of the geographic region within which the wireless transmitter is located. For example, in embodiments defining a two-dimensional region, operation 2510 may include determining a geographic region similar to two-dimensional plane 2305. In embodiments defining a three-dimensional region, operation 2510 may include determining a geographic volume similar to three-dimensional geographic volume 2405. In some embodiments, the region or volume is represented by a centroid or other similar location within the region or volume.

[0281] In operation 2512, a plurality of receiving elements are located in space relative to the geographic area. In some embodiments, the plurality of receiving elements are a plurality of antennas. For example, with respect to the above description of Figure 9 As discussed, some embodiments of wireless interface 950, operation 2512 include determining locations of two or more antennas (such as 955a, 955b, 955c, or 955d, for example) relative to a geographic area.

[0282] In operation 2514, the distance to each area is determined for each receiving element. For example, because each receiving element is located in a different location, its corresponding distance to the center of mass of each area in three-dimensional geographic space is different (in some embodiments). Therefore, for each area, some disclosed embodiments calculate the distance to each receiving element. In some embodiments, the difference determined in operation 2514 varies depending on the type of device transmitting the signal and / or the type of device receiving the signal. As discussed above, some embodiments maintain information defining the relative positions of the transmitting elements and / or receiving elements of the device. Depending on the placement of the receiving element and / or the transmitting element, the distance between the transmitting element and the receiving element will vary.

[0283] In operation 2516, the distance difference from each region to the receiving element is then determined. Some embodiments of operation 2516 define a pair of receiving elements, with one element in the pair serving as a reference receiving element. The phase difference is then defined as the difference between the phase of the signal received at the reference receiving element and the phase of the signal received at the non-reference receiving element. In at least some embodiments, this process is repeated for multiple pairs of receiving elements.

[0284] In operation 2520, the distance difference is converted into a desired phase difference. In some embodiments, operation 2520 determines the desired phase difference based on the distance, the frequency of the waveform, and the wavelength of the waveform. Thus, for example, to determine the number of wavelengths between a first receiving element and the centroid of the region, the distance is divided by the wavelength to obtain the number of wavelengths. A similar calculation is performed for the second receiving element. Once the number of wavelengths between the centroid of the region and each receiving element is known, the phase difference can be determined by subtracting the fractional portion of the number of wavelengths and multiplying the fractional portion by 360° (or 2π). Some embodiments of operation 2520 determine the desired phase difference based on Equations 7-12b discussed above.

[0285] So, for example, in one example, the first distance between the centroid of the region and the first receiving element is 100.12 meters. The second distance between the centroid of the region and the second receiving element is 100.3 meters. The frequency is 5.4 GHz, or 5.4*109. Using equations 8 and 12 above and taking the result modulo 360, we get a phase difference of 87.207 degrees.

[0286] In operation 2526, the expected phase differences for the region are constructed. (The expected phase differences are sometimes referred to in this disclosure as location signatures.) As described above, some embodiments represent these expected phase differences via location signature vectors. Vectors are described here for ease of notation only, and not all embodiments generate vectors.

[0287] Decision operation 2528 determines whether the expected phase difference for additional regions needs to be calculated. If more regions need to be processed, then method 2500 moves from decision operation 2528 to operation 2514, which selects another region in the geographic area and continues processing. Otherwise, method 2500 moves from decision operation 2528 to operation 2530.

[0288] In operation 2530, the expected phase differences (location signatures) are compared to obtain overlap. In some embodiments, the overlap comparison takes into account the errors associated with phase determination / measurement across multiple regions. For example, the error in the phase difference measurement can be ±10 degrees, as an example. When this variation is added to each expected phase difference for each region (yielding an acceptable phase difference range), some regions may share some portion of the phase difference range. In this case, an embodiment experiencing a received waveform with a phase difference within a range that overlaps in two or more regions will not be able to determine which of the overlapping regions the transmission originated from.

[0289] Decision operation 2532 determines whether the number of regions with overlapping desired phase differences is too large or meets a criterion (e.g., greater than a predetermined threshold). If there is too much overlap, method 2500 moves to operation 2534, which, in some embodiments, generates an alert or notification. In some embodiments, the notification indicates that there is too much overlap and therefore the location of the wireless transmitter cannot be determined with sufficient accuracy. Alternatively, the notification may include a step of adding additional receiving elements (e.g., antennas) and / or access points to increase the number of antennas used to determine the phase difference and, therefore, increase the accuracy of the location determination.

[0290] In some embodiments, operation 2534 generates a notification suggesting that more frequencies be added to the process. Additional frequencies or additional antenna elements increase the size (dimension) of the phase difference signature vector. The process then returns, at least in some aspects, to operation 2512. If the overlap between the predicted phase differences is not too large (or nonexistent) so that sufficient location determination accuracy can be achieved, the process moves from decision operation 2532 to end operation 2550.

[0291] Figure 26 is a flow chart of an example process for determining the location of a wireless transmitter using phase differences measured between signals received by multiple receiving elements. Figure 26 One or more of the functions discussed are performed by hardware processing circuitry (e.g., 806, 1106, 1206, 1306). In some embodiments, instructions (228, 314, 428, 529) stored in a memory (e.g., any of memories 812, 1112, 1212, 1312) configure the hardware processing circuitry to perform one or more of the functions discussed below.

[0292] After starting operation 2605, method 2600 moves to operation 2610, which receives a waveform from a wireless transmitter via a plurality of receiving elements. In some embodiments, the receiving elements are antennas. In operation 2612, a reference receiving element is determined. In some embodiments, the reference receiving element is determined at design time, so there is no dynamic determination of the reference receiving element. According to another exemplary embodiment, rather than determining the reference receiving element, the operation involves determining an antenna element pair (not shown) whose received signals / waves are to have their measured phase differences measured.

[0293] In operation 2613, the phase difference between the arrival waveforms at the second receiving element and the reference receiving element is determined. Figure 9 As discussed, some embodiments of operation 2613 determine, for example, the phase difference between receive antenna 955a and receive antenna 955b, receive antenna 955a and receive antenna 955c, and receive antenna 955a and receive antenna 955d. In this example, receive antenna 955a is the reference receive element. In some embodiments, rather than using only a single reference antenna, multiple antenna pairs with different reference antennas are utilized. For example, receive antennas 955b and 955c, antennas 955b and 955d, and antennas 955c and 955d. In some embodiments, the phase difference is obtained from channel state information (CSI). In some embodiments, operation 2613 is repeated for additional frequencies. This results in a collection of phase differences across multiple frequencies.

[0294] In operation 2615, one of the plurality of geographic regions is selected. An example region is Figure 24 24. Three-dimensional region 2420 of three-dimensional geographic area 2405 is shown in FIG. Three-dimensional geographic space (or volume) 2405 includes multiple regions, such as three-dimensional region 2420.

[0295] In operation 2616, the determined received phase difference of operation 2613 is compared to the expected phase difference if the wireless transmitter is located in the selected area (e.g., in some embodiments, these are determined by the above relative Figure 23 26 and 28). The comparison performed in operation 2616 takes into account a phase difference error tolerance, which may vary depending on the embodiment. For example, as discussed above with respect to equations 26 and 28, in some embodiments, the expected phase difference is modified to an expected phase difference range based on an acceptable error tolerance.

[0296] Decision operation 2620 determines whether the expected phase difference for the selected region matches the measured phase difference (including any consideration of error margins). If the phase difference does match, method 2600 moves to operation 2622, which marks the selected region as a possible location for the wireless transmitter. In some embodiments, marking the region includes writing a value to a memory location indicating the marking. Thus, based on whether the expected phase difference for the geographic region matches the measured phase difference (determined in operation 2613), the region is conditionally marked as a possible location.

[0297] Note that, at least in some aspects, the phase difference does not necessarily represent an exact value, but rather has an associated error margin. For a particular technique, and perhaps even for a particular measurement, a probability density function can be used based on the error from the average location. For example, the average phase difference may be 20 degrees, with a maximum error range of + / - 3 degrees. Therefore, potential locations that match the phase difference will be some distance from the average offset, so in this case, the error is an element in [-3 degrees, +3 degrees].

[0298] In some embodiments, the probability density function is defined as Pdf(x), where x is the distance to the mean phase difference. Pdf(x) has probability values ​​from [0, 1]. These values ​​can be applied to the operation of matching potential locations. In order to generate the final surface, some embodiments aggregate all the probabilities in the map, represented by the probability Paggr. Depending on the specific implementation, assuming that the aggregation is not zero ("0"), the probability Pdf(x) of each location in the map is divided by the probability Paggr to generate a surface probability that totals "1".

[0299] Decision operation 2624 determines whether the currently selected area is the last area or whether additional areas of the plurality of areas remain to be examined. If additional areas remain, method 2600 moves from decision operation 2624 to operation 2615, where another area of ​​the plurality of areas is selected. If no additional areas need to be evaluated, method 2600 moves from decision operation 2624 to operation 2626, where the marked area is reported as a possible location of the wireless transmitter. In some embodiments, reporting the marked area in operation 2626 includes outputting data indicating the marked area. In some embodiments, the data is output to an electronic display, a data repository, or a network interface (e.g., in some embodiments, an indication of the marked area is provided to a network management device). According to an example embodiment, the output data includes a probability associated with each area, the probability being the area from which the transmitted wave / signal originated. After operation 2626, method 2600 moves to end operation 2630.

[0300] Some embodiments of method 2600 determine the geographic location of an apparatus or device performing method 2600. In various embodiments, the geographic location is determined via various positioning techniques. For example, in some embodiments, the apparatus or device includes a satellite positioning receiver and the geographic location is determined based on the satellite positioning receiver. In other embodiments, the geographic location is determined via configuration parameters, which, at least in some embodiments, are manually entered.

[0301] While the above description of method 2600 describes the use of at least two receiving elements, embodiments are contemplated that include at least a third receiving element and may include a fourth, fifth, and / or sixth receiving element. In embodiments that include at least a third receiving element, additional phase differences generated by the third receiving element are generated. For each of a plurality of geographic regions, a corresponding plurality of expected phase differences between waveforms transmitted from the corresponding region and received by a plurality of antenna pairs are generated. These phase differences are measured as they would be received by the antennas of any pair of receiving elements. A conditional flag then considers the additional expected phase differences between received signals when determining whether a signal may have been transmitted from any of the plurality of regions.

[0302] Figure 27 is a flow chart of an example method for determining a desired phase difference. In at least some disclosed embodiments, the following is relative to Figure 27 One or more of the functions discussed with respect to method 2700 are performed by hardware processing circuitry (e.g., any one or more of the hardware processors (e.g., 806, 1106, 1206, or 1306)). For example, in some embodiments, instructions (e.g., any one or more of routines 814, 1114, 1214, 1314) stored in electronic memory (e.g., any one or more of hardware memory 812, 1112, 1212, or 1312) configure the hardware processing circuitry to perform the following steps with respect to Figure 27 and one or more of the functions discussed in method 2700.

[0303] In at least some embodiments, phase differences are used to estimate the location (region) of a transmitting antenna. In a first pass, the method is used to establish expected phase differences associated with multiple regions for transmission from a first wireless device's antenna based on a second device located at a known location in the multiple regions. The location and orientation of the first wireless device within the multiple regions are then determined based on the expected phase differences. In a second pass, some embodiments then estimate the position and orientation of a third wireless device based on the determined location and orientation of the first wireless device. For example, in these embodiments, a second set of expected phase differences is determined for transmissions from the third wireless device as received by the first wireless device at its determined location and orientation. In some embodiments, the location of the third wireless device is first determined in the coordinate system of the first device (e.g., using a region definition defined by the first device) and then mapped to the coordinate system defined by the second device (based on the region definition defined by the second device). In other embodiments, the first device obtains information related to the coordinate system defined by the second device and / or the definition of the region defined by the second device. Using this information, the first device is able to determine the location of the third device relative to the coordinate system of the second device. In either case, the estimated location of the third device is generated by aggregating the estimated locations of the third device obtained by the first and second devices.

[0304] Method 2700 begins in operation 2705 and proceeds to operation 2710, where an area of ​​interest is defined and divided into regions. The method proceeds to operation 2712, where the locations (regions) of the reference AP antennas are determined. For example, a specific region or X and Y coordinates are determined for each reference antenna. In operation 2714, the orientation of the receiving element or antenna of the AP is determined. In some embodiments, the orientation of the AP is determined based on an orientation sensor integrated with the AP. In other embodiments, the orientation of the AP is determined relative to a second AP, as discussed above. In some embodiments, the orientation of the AP is based on configuration information. For example, some embodiments provide a configuration file or other user interface that allows an operator to manually configure the orientation information of the AP. In operation 2716, the operating frequency is determined. In operation 2718, a specific region among the multiple regions is selected.

[0305] In operation 2720, a pair of receiving elements of the AP is selected. In operation 2722, the distance difference between the selected area and the two antennas is determined and converted into a difference in signal arrival phase based on the transmission frequency and the speed of wave propagation. Note that in at least some embodiments, the distance between the selected area and the two antennas is based on the layout information of the receiving device and the orientation of the receiving device. For example, as discussed above, with respect to Equations 7-12b, the phase difference experienced at the antenna pair is a function of the distance difference between the transmitting antenna and the two antennas. The distance difference is a function of the total distance between the transmitting antenna and the device receiving the signal, the orientation of the receiving device, and the relative position of the two receiving antennas to each other. In at least some embodiments, the relative position is defined by the layout information. For example, with respect to Equations 7-12b above, Figure 2D The described data structures describe one embodiment of layout information maintained by one or more disclosed embodiments.

[0306] In operation 2724, the arrival phase differences are stored (e.g., in a phase difference vector to create a phase difference signature for the selected region). Operation 2726 determines whether there are other receive element pairs for which arrival phase differences should be calculated. If there are other receive element pairs, a new antenna pair is selected in operation 2728, and the method loops back to operation 2720.

[0307] However, if it is determined that phase differences are calculated for all antenna pairs, the method continues to operation 2730 where the method determines whether there are any other operating frequencies for which phase differences of arriving signals should be calculated.

[0308] If operation 2730 determines that there are additional operating frequencies for which the phase difference of the arriving signals should be determined, the method proceeds to operation 2732 where another operating frequency is selected and the method loops back to operation 2722 .

[0309] However, if it is determined that phase differences are calculated for all operating frequencies, the method continues to operation 2734 where the method determines whether there are any other regions where phase differences of arriving signals should be calculated.

[0310] If operation 2734 determines that there are additional regions for which the phase differences of the arriving signals should be determined, the method proceeds to operation 2736 where a new region is selected and the method loops back to operation 2722 .

[0311] However, if it is determined that the phase differences have been calculated for all regions, the method ends at operation 2750.

[0312] Above relative to Figure 27The described method describes an embodiment in which the expected phase difference vector (phase difference signature) and the location of the WT are calculated in reference coordinates. According to another embodiment, each AP can use its own phase difference vector to estimate the area of ​​the WT in its own coordinates. To facilitate aggregation of WT location estimates from multiple APs, the area is then mapped (transformed) into the reference coordinates based on the estimated location and orientation of the first AP in the coordinates of the second AP.

[0313] Figures 28A-28B is an example flow chart describing a method for determining and utilizing the location and orientation of a first wireless device. In at least some disclosed embodiments, the following is a flow chart with respect to Figures 28A-28B One or more of the functions discussed in methods 2800A-2800B are performed by hardware processing circuitry (e.g., any one or more of 806, 1106, 1206, or 1306). For example, in some embodiments, instructions (e.g., any one or more of routines 814, 1114, 1214, 1314) stored in electronic memory (e.g., any one or more of hardware memory 812, 1112, 1212, or 1312) configure the hardware processing circuitry to perform the following steps with respect to Figures 28A-28B and one or more of the functions discussed in methods 2800A-2800B. Methods 2800A and 2800B illustrate how at least some disclosed embodiments iteratively determine distances between antennas in a pair of antennas and utilize these determined distances to estimate a position of a first wireless device and an orientation of the first wireless device relative to a second wireless device.

[0314] The method begins at operation 2805 and proceeds to operation 2810, where an initial transmission antenna is selected. The method proceeds to operation 2812, where an initial transmission frequency is selected. The method proceeds to operation 2814, where an initial transmission frequency is selected. The method proceeds to operation 2814, where an initial transmission frequency is transmitted by the selected transmitter using the antenna.

[0315] The method proceeds to operation 2816 where signals are received by one or more antenna pairs and associated phase differences of the received signals on the plurality of antenna pairs are determined. In operation 2820, the phase differences are stored (eg, in a phase difference vector).

[0316] The method proceeds to operation 2822, which determines whether additional signals using different frequencies should be transmitted. If this operation determines that other frequencies should be used, method 2800A returns to operation 2812, where a different transmission frequency is selected. If operation 2822 determines that there are no further operating frequencies, the method proceeds to operation 2826, where the location of the transmission antenna is estimated. As discussed above, operation 2826 estimates the location of the transmission antenna by comparing the determined phase difference with the expected phase difference signatures in multiple regions.

[0317] The method proceeds to operation 2828, where it determines whether there are additional antennas (antennas of the AP whose location and orientation the system is estimating). If the operation determines that there are other antennas whose locations should be estimated, the method 2800A returns to operation 2810, where a different transmit antenna is selected.

[0318] If operation 2828 determines that a location for the transmit antenna is no longer required, the method proceeds to operation 2832, where the location of the first wireless device is determined relative to the location of the second wireless device. In some embodiments, operation 2832 compares the estimated location of the transmit antenna to the known layout of antennas on the first wireless device and uses the operation of Equation 14 to determine the location of the antenna that provides the best fit with the known layout of antennas. In at least some embodiments, the centroid of those selected transmit antenna locations is selected as the location of the first wireless device.

[0319] In operation 2834, the orientation of the first wireless device relative to the second wireless device is determined. In some embodiments, the best fit between the known antenna layout of the first wireless device and the transmission antenna location determined by the operations of method 2800A described above is used to identify the location and orientation of the first wireless device. Thus, the orientation is determined as the orientation defined by the best fit between the estimated transmission antenna location and the known first wireless device antenna layout. Operation 2836 stores the determined location and orientation. In some embodiments, the stored location and orientation information is used for further location determination performed by the first wireless device. For example, when determining an expected phase difference experienced by the first wireless device, the location and orientation of the first wireless device is relevant because it will affect the distance between the first wireless device's receive element and one or more of the multiple regions for which the expected phase difference is determined.

[0320] In some embodiments, method 2800A then proceeds to connect operation 2840 .

[0321] Via connect operation 2840, method 2800A moves to Figure 28BOperation 2850 determines whether the first wireless device is aligned with the second wireless device. For example, the method determines the difference between the roll, yaw, and pitch of the first wireless device and the corresponding roll, yaw, and pitch of the second wireless device. According to an example embodiment, the second set of coordinates is assumed to be reference coordinates, and therefore its roll, yaw, and pitch are considered to be zero. Therefore, when the roll, yaw, and pitch of the first device are determined to be equal to zero or below a predetermined small threshold in the reference coordinates, such alignment is considered to be achieved. If any of these angular differences exceeds a predefined threshold, the method proceeds to operation 2852, in which instructions are generated for manually aligning the first wireless device to minimize the angular difference(s). The instructions are output as audible or visual instructions. For example, in some embodiments, the visual instructions are provided via an LED mounted on an AP via a screen of an associated mobile phone, iPad, or computer.

[0322] Method 2800A proceeds to operation 2854, where the method loops until input is received indicating that the manual alignment process has been completed according to the generated instructions. Upon detecting that the manual alignment is complete, the method loops back to operation 2805 via connector operation C 2844, where the new location of the antenna and the orientation of the AP are estimated.

[0323] However, if operation 2850 determines that the first wireless device is aligned with the second wireless device, then method 2800B ends in operation 2856.

[0324] The following embodiments describe two examples of how to utilize the location and orientation of the first wireless device.

[0325] Figure 29 is a flow chart describing an example method for determining the location of a WT based on an expected phase difference of at least two other wireless devices. In at least some disclosed embodiments, the following is a flow chart describing an example method for determining the location of a WT based on an expected phase difference of at least two other wireless devices. Figure 29 One or more of the functions discussed with respect to method 2900 are performed by hardware processing circuitry (e.g., any one or more of 806, 1106, 1206, or 1306). For example, in some embodiments, instructions (e.g., any one or more of routines 814, 1114, 1214, 1314) stored in electronic memory (e.g., any one or more of hardware memory 812, 1112, 1212, or 1312) configure the hardware processing circuitry to perform the following steps with respect to Figure 29 and one or more of the functions discussed in method 2900.

[0326] Method 2900 begins at operation 2905 and proceeds to operation 2910, where signal(s) from a WT are received by multiple antennas. The method proceeds to operation 2912, where a pair of antennas is selected, and in operation 2914, the difference in arrival phase of the signals at the two antennas is determined and stored.

[0327] Method 2900 proceeds to operation 2916, where it is determined whether there are additional antenna pairs to be processed. If the operation determines that there are additional antenna pairs to be processed, method 2900 returns to operation 2912 and selects the next antenna pair. However, if operation 2916 determines that all phase differences from all antenna pairs have been determined, the method proceeds to operation 2920, where a region is selected.

[0328] In some embodiments, method 2900 proceeds to operation 2922 by ending operation 2940 to determine the location of the WT. Operation 2922 compares the phase difference of the received signals at the different antennas with the expected phase difference for the selected area. As discussed above, the expected phase difference is determined according to one or more of Equations 7-12b. In at least some embodiments, because the layout of the transmitting and / or receiving elements affects the distance between the elements, the expected phase difference is also a function of the layout information of the transmitting and / or receiving devices.

[0329] Decision operation 2930 determines whether the comparison indicates that the measured phase difference and the expected phase difference for the selected area match. As described above, the reason for determining whether a match occurs can vary depending on the embodiment. If a match is detected, method 2900 moves from decision operation 2930 to operation 2932, in which the area is marked as a potential location for the WT. In some embodiments, in addition to storing an indication that the area is a possible match, an associated probability is also stored. The probability indicates the likelihood that the area is a match. After identifying all "matching" areas, some embodiments use these stored probabilities to weight a location estimate among multiple stored location estimates or to select a location estimate from multiple stored location estimates. Returning to the discussion of decision operation 2930, if the measured phase difference does not match the expected phase difference for the area, method 2900 moves from decision operation 2930 to decision operation 2934.

[0330] In either case, the method 2900 proceeds to decision operation 2934, which checks whether there are additional areas that need to be evaluated as potential locations for the WT. If the operation determines that there are additional areas, the method 2900 returns to operation 2920 and selects the next area. However, if the decision operation 2934 determines that all areas have been processed, the method 2900 moves from decision operation 2934 to operation 2938, in which the location of the WT is determined and reported. In one example embodiment, the location of the WT is determined based on a weighted average of the areas marked in operation 2932. In some embodiments, the weighting is based on the respective probabilities that the WT is located in the corresponding areas. According to yet another example embodiment, the method determines that the WT is located in the area with the highest probability.

[0331] According to another embodiment, the location of the WT is calculated in the coordinates of each WT, and then the corresponding location is mapped / transformed based on the orientation of each AP relative to the reference coordinates. In either case, the location of the WT is determined and reported. After operation 2938, the method 2900 moves to end operation 2940.

[0332] Figure 30 is a flow chart of an example method for estimating the location of a wireless terminal. In at least some disclosed embodiments, the following Figure 30 One or more of the functions discussed with respect to method 3000 are performed by hardware processing circuitry (e.g., any one or more of 806, 1106, 1206, or 1306). For example, in some embodiments, instructions (e.g., any one or more of routines 814, 1114, 1214, 1314) stored in electronic memory (e.g., any one or more of hardware memory 812, 1112, 1212, or 1312) configure the hardware processing circuitry to perform one or more of the functions discussed below.

[0333] After starting operation 3005, method 3000 moves to operation 3008, where a first position and a first orientation of a first wireless device are determined. In some embodiments, the first wireless device is a reference access point. In some embodiments, the first position and the first orientation are determined based on operator-provided configuration information. In other embodiments, the first position and the first orientation are determined based on an integrated orientation and / or positioning sensor of the first wireless device.

[0334] In operation 3015, a first expected phase difference of a signal received at a reference AP is determined. The first expected phase difference is calculated for each of the plurality of regions. In some embodiments, the plurality of regions are defined by the first wireless device and / or based on a first position and / or a first orientation of the first wireless device. In some embodiments, the plurality of regions are defined by the first wireless device and / or based on a first position and / or a first orientation of the first wireless device. Figure 272700 as discussed above to perform operation 3015. In some embodiments, operation 3015 is performed for each region according to one or more of Equations 7-12b discussed above.

[0335] In operation 3018, a second position and a second orientation of the second wireless device are determined. In some embodiments, the second position and the second orientation are based on the first position and orientation. The determination is also based on the first expected phase difference. In some embodiments, the determined second position and the second orientation are relative to the first wireless device. For example, as discussed above, in some embodiments, through at least some disclosed embodiments, the location of the second wireless device is determined by comparing a phase difference of a signal received at the first wireless device (where the signal was transmitted by the second wireless device) with an expected phase difference and a first expected phase difference defined for a plurality of regions (such as the plurality of regions discussed above with respect to operation 3015). In some embodiments, operation 3018 is similar to the above with respect to Figure 14 The discussion and / or following with respect to Figure 32 The operations of method 3200 discussed above are consistent with those of method 3200 discussed above. For example, in some embodiments, operation 3018 is repeated for multiple antennas of the second wireless device. In some embodiments, operation 3018 includes receiving, by the first wireless device, multiple signals from the second wireless device. The multiple signals are transmitted at different frequencies and / or via multiple different transmission elements of the second wireless device. Thus, some embodiments of operation 3015 discussed above generate a desired phase difference for multiple signals transmitted from multiple antennas and / or at multiple different frequencies.

[0336] As also discussed above, some disclosed embodiments compare an expected phase difference to the phase difference of a signal received from a device to determine the location of the device.

[0337] As shown below relative to Figure 33 As discussed, some embodiments obtain a predefined layout that defines the relative physical locations of the transmission elements of the second wireless device. The relative physical locations are shifted and / or rotated in three-dimensional space until a best fit is obtained between the relative locations defined by the layout and the estimated positions of the transmission elements of the second wireless device.

[0338] In operation 3020, a second expected phase difference for a signal received at the second wireless device is determined. This uses the second location and second orientation of the second wireless device determined in operation 3018 to determine expected phase differences for the second wireless device across a plurality of regions. In other words, in method 3000, both the first wireless device and the second wireless device use a common coordinate space and / or a common plurality of regions to determine a location estimate. Because the first wireless device and the second wireless device are located at different positions relative to the common plurality of regions, the expected phase differences used by each device for location determination will be different. However, both sets of expected phase differences reference the same set of regions for location estimation. As discussed further below, this facilitates combining the location estimates generated by the two wireless devices.

[0339] In some embodiments, operation 3020 includes determining the location of each of the plurality of regions relative to the second wireless device. In some embodiments, this includes determining the location and orientation of the second wireless device relative to the first location and first orientation of the first wireless device. Once the relative location and orientation of the second wireless device are known, the relative location of each of the plurality of regions relative to the receiving element of the second wireless device can also be understood because the relative orientations of the plurality of regions and the first location and first location are known. Based on this information, a second expected phase difference can be determined. The above with respect to method 2700 and Figure 27 An example of one embodiment of operation 3020 is described.

[0340] In operation 3030, a third location of the third wireless device is estimated based on the signal received by the first wireless device from the third wireless device. The third location is further determined based on the first expected phase difference. In some embodiments, operation 3030 is performed according to the following relative to Figure 32 The method 3200 discussed herein operates to estimate a third location of a third wireless device. In some embodiments of operation 3030, the method 3200 is performed once for each transmission element (or at least a plurality of transmission elements) of the third wireless device. Thus, in some embodiments, operation 3030 estimates a third location for each transmission antenna (or transmission element) of the third wireless device.

[0341] In operation 3035, a fourth location of the third wireless device is estimated based on the signal received by the second wireless device from the third wireless device. The fourth location is further determined based on the second expected phase difference. Since the second expected phase difference is determined relative to a plurality of areas common to the first location estimate of operation 3030, the fourth location of the third wireless device determined by the second wireless device is also relative to a plurality of areas common to the first location estimate of operation 3030. In some embodiments, operation 3035 is similar to the above-discussed Figure 14 operating in accordance with the discussion below with respect to Figure 32The method 3200 discussed herein operates to generate a second estimate of the location of the third wireless device. In some embodiments of operation 3035, the method 3200 is performed once for each transmission element of the third wireless device. Thus, in some embodiments, operation 3035 estimates the location of each transmission element or antenna of the third wireless device.

[0342] In operation 3040, the first and second location estimates (e.g., a location estimate derived from signals exchanged between the third wireless device and the first wireless device, and a location estimate derived from signals exchanged between the third wireless device and the second wireless device) are aggregated. In some embodiments, aggregating includes averaging some or all of the location estimates. In some embodiments, outlier location estimates are discarded before averaging. In some embodiments, a centroid of the location estimates is determined and used as the location estimate for the third wireless device.

[0343] Some embodiments aggregate the third and fourth location estimates by determining a midpoint of the location estimates. In some embodiments, a centroid of the location estimates is determined. In some embodiments, each of operations 3030 and 3035 obtains multiple location estimates for the third wireless device. Operation 3040 then aggregates the two multiple estimates. An aggregated location estimate is then determined based on the aggregated probabilities. For example, the regions are weighted based on their probabilities to determine the aggregated location estimate. In some embodiments, operation 3040 discards outlier location estimates and identifies a subset of the two multiple estimates that are within a threshold distance of the centroid of the subsets. The subset of location estimates is then averaged or aggregated.

[0344] In some embodiments, each of the third and fourth location estimates has an associated probability. In some of these embodiments, the aggregation is based on the associated probabilities. For example, some embodiments weight each of the third and fourth location estimates based on its corresponding probability (higher confidence estimates receive more weight than lower confidence estimates).

[0345] Some embodiments of method 3000 determine an aggregated location estimate based on the aggregated first and second location estimates. In some embodiments, the first and second location estimates are averaged, or a weighted average is determined based on a probability associated with each of the first and second location estimates.

[0346] In some embodiments, the location estimate of the third wireless device is based on the aggregated estimate, but is also augmented by motion information received from the third wireless device itself and previous location estimates.

[0347] Some embodiments of method 3000 transmit the aggregated location estimate to another device over a network. For example, in some embodiments, the location estimate is sent to a backend and / or backhaul server. The backend or backhaul server then distributes the location estimate to one or more services. In some embodiments, the location estimate is transmitted to the other device along with information identifying the third wireless device, such as the station address of the third wireless device, a mobile identification number (MIN), or other unique identifier of the wireless terminal. In some embodiments, the determined and / or collected information is transmitted to an advertising network, which uses the information to select advertisements to display on the screen of the third wireless device.

[0348] After operation 3040 is completed, method 3000 moves to end operation 3045.

[0349] Figure 31 is a flow chart of an example method for estimating the location of a wireless terminal. In at least some disclosed embodiments, the following Figure 31 One or more of the functions discussed with method 3150 are performed by hardware processing circuitry (e.g., any one or more of 806, 1106, 1206, or 1306). For example, in some embodiments, instructions (e.g., any one or more of routines 814, 1114, 1214, 1314) stored in electronic memory (e.g., any one or more of hardware memory 812, 1112, 1212, or 1312) configure the hardware processing circuitry to perform one or more of the functions discussed below.

[0350] After start operation 3155, method 3150 moves to operation 3160, which determines a first position and a first orientation of the first AP. In some embodiments, operation 3160 operates according to method 3200 discussed below to determine a first position and a first orientation of the first wireless device.

[0351] In operation 3165, a first expected phase difference is determined. The first expected phase difference is determined for the transmitter in each of the first plurality of zones. The first plurality of zones are assigned to the first wireless device and / or defined by the first wireless device. In other words, the first wireless device performs its location estimate with reference to the first plurality of zones. The first expected phase difference is the phase difference that two or more receiving elements will experience at the first wireless device location and orientation when the transmitter transmits from each of the plurality of zones. In some embodiments, according to the above with respect to Figure 27 The method 2700 discussed determines a first desired phase difference.

[0352] In operation 3166, a second position and a second location of the second wireless device are determined. In some embodiments, the second position and the second location are relative to the first position and the first location of operation 3160. Some embodiments of operation 3166 operate in a manner similar to operation 3018. For example, the second position and the second location are determined based on the first expected phase difference and the signal transmitted by the second wireless device and received by the first wireless device. By comparing the phase difference of the transmitted signal with the first expected phase difference of operation 3015, the location(s) of the one or more transmitting elements of the second wireless device within the first plurality of areas are determined.

[0353] In operation 3170, a second desired phase difference is determined. The second desired phase difference is determined for a transmitter in each of a second plurality of regions defined by and / or assigned to the second wireless device. In other words, the second wireless device performs location estimation with reference to the second plurality of regions. Furthermore, the desired phase differences used for those location estimates are relative to the second plurality of regions.

[0354] The second expected phase differences are those phase differences that the receiver will experience at the second wireless device location and orientation when the transmitter transmits from each of the plurality of second wireless device regions. Figure 27 The method 2700 discussed determines a second expected phase difference in the coordinates of the second wireless device.

[0355] Operation 3175 estimates the first location(s) of the third wireless device based on the signal received by the first wireless device from the third wireless device.The first location(s) are further estimated based on the first expected phase difference and relative to the first plurality of regions.

[0356] Operation 3180 generates a second estimate of the second location(s) of the third wireless device in the coordinates of the second wireless device based on the signal received by the second wireless device from the third wireless device.The second location(s) are further estimated based on the second expected phase difference and relative to the second plurality of regions.

[0357] Alternatively, operation 3185 maps the estimate(s) of the second location(s) relative to the second plurality of areas to be relative to the first plurality of areas. The mapping is based at least on the second location / location and second orientation of the second wireless device relative to the first location / position and first orientation of the first wireless device. The relative positions define a shift operation that transforms the second location of the second wireless device to be equal to the first location of the first wireless device, as discussed above with respect to operation 3160. This shift operation is then applied to the second location estimate to shift the second location estimate to an equivalent position within the first plurality of areas. Thus, in some embodiments, the mapping transforms the second location estimate from an estimate relative to the second plurality of areas to a third location estimate relative to the first plurality of areas.

[0358] In operation 3190, the first and third location estimates (e.g., location estimates derived from signals exchanged between the third wireless device and the first wireless device, and location estimates derived from signals exchanged between the third wireless device and the second wireless device) are aggregated. In some embodiments, aggregating includes averaging some or all of the location estimates. In some embodiments, outlier location estimates are discarded before averaging. In some embodiments, a centroid of the location estimates is determined and used as the location estimate for the third wireless device. After operation 3190 is completed, method 3150 moves to end operation 3195.

[0359] Figure 32 is a flow chart of an example method for estimating the location of a transmission antenna. In at least some disclosed embodiments, the following Figure 32 One or more of the functions discussed with method 3200 are performed by hardware processing circuitry (e.g., any one or more of 806, 1106, 1206, or 1306). For example, in some embodiments, instructions (e.g., any one or more of routines 814, 1114, 1214, 1314) stored in electronic memory (e.g., any one or more of hardware memory 812, 1112, 1212, or 1312) configure the hardware processing circuitry to perform one or more of the functions discussed below.

[0360] After starting operation 3205, method 3200 moves to operation 3210, in which a signal from a transmit antenna is received by a plurality of receive antennas. For example, as discussed above, a wireless terminal or access point transmits a signal via a transmit antenna. The signal is received by another device (such as an access point). In some embodiments, the receiving device is a reference access point. The plurality of receive antennas includes a reference antenna and one or more non-reference antennas. The reference antenna is used to generate a relative phase difference between the signal received by the reference antenna and each non-reference antenna, as discussed further below.

[0361] Operation 3215 determines the relative phase difference between the signal received at the reference receive antenna and the signal received at each non-reference receive antenna.

[0362] In operation 3220, a region is selected. The selected region is one of a plurality of regions defined by a location relative to the access point. For example, in some embodiments, the selected region is one of the first plurality of regions 192A or the second plurality of regions 192B, as discussed above with respect to FIG. 2 . In operation 3225, the phase difference measured / determined in operation 3215 is compared to the expected phase difference for the selected region. For example, as discussed above with respect to FIG. Figure 27 Some embodiments calculate the expected phase difference to be experienced by a particular pair of antennas of a receiving device at a particular location from devices located in a particular region among multiple regions, as discussed with respect to method 2700. For example, in an example embodiment, the expected phase difference of a signal generated by WT 194 of FIG. 2 as received by a pair of receive antennas of access point 191A or access point 191B is determined.

[0363] Decision operation 3230 evaluates the results of the comparison performed by operation 3225. If the expected phase difference from the selected region matches the phase difference determined in operation 3215, then method 3200 moves from decision operation 3230 to operation 3235, which marks, records, or stores an indication that the selected region is a possible location for the device. After operation 3235 is completed, method 3200 moves to decision operation 3240.

[0364] If the expected phase difference for the region is substantially different from the phase difference determined in operation 3215 (e.g., greater than a predefined threshold), method 3200 moves from decision operation 3230 to decision operation 3240 (and operation 3235 is not performed). Decision operation 3240 evaluates whether to evaluate additional regions of the plurality of regions. If more regions are available for evaluation, method 3200 moves from decision operation 3240 to operation 3220, where additional regions are selected. If no additional regions are available for evaluation, method 3200 moves from decision operation 3240 to end operation 3245.

[0365] Figure 33 is a flow chart of an example method for estimating the location and orientation of a wireless device. In some embodiments, the wireless device is an access point. In at least some disclosed embodiments, the following Figure 33One or more of the functions discussed with method 3300 are performed by hardware processing circuitry (e.g., any one or more of 806, 1106, 1206, or 1306). For example, in some embodiments, instructions (e.g., any one or more of routines 814, 1114, 1214, 1314) stored in electronic memory (e.g., any one or more of hardware memory 812, 1112, 1212, or 1312) configure the hardware processing circuitry to perform one or more of the functions discussed below.

[0366] After starting operation 3305, method 3300 moves to operation 3310, which determines the transmission element layout of the device. The transmission element layout defines the relative positions of multiple device transmission elements. For example, as shown above relative to Figure 3 As discussed above, in some embodiments, the layout includes relative antenna coordinates 395A-E that represent the location of the transmission element relative to a reference point (e.g., reference point 393) of a device (e.g., wireless device 480). Figure 2D Example data structures for storing antenna (eg, transmit element, receive element) position information in some embodiments are provided.

[0367] Operation 3315 selects a location estimate for a transport element of the device from the stored transport element location determinations. For example, as described above with respect to Figure 32 As discussed, operation 3235 stores the locations of transmission elements that exhibit a relative match to the expected phase difference of the signal received from the transmission element. In some embodiments, method 3200 operates iteratively to store the locations of multiple transmission elements for a single device. Furthermore, in some embodiments, multiple possible or candidate location estimates for a single transmission element are stored via operation 3235. Thus, operation 3315 selects a single set of location estimates for a group of device transmission elements.

[0368] In operation 3320, initial candidate positions for the transmission elements are determined. In some embodiments, these initial candidate positions are based on the estimated centroids for the locations of the transmission elements and the relative positions of the transmission elements defined by the layout. For example, in some embodiments, a reference point defined by the layout is aligned with the estimated centroids for the locations, and then candidate positions are determined based on the relative positions of the antennas relative to the reference point defined by the layout.

[0369] In operation 3330, an aggregation function of the differences between the candidate positions and the location estimate is determined. For example, a different distance is determined between each transmission element position defined by the candidate position and the location estimate of that transmission element obtained in operation 3315. (See Equation 14).

[0370] Operation 3330 compares the function of the aggregated differences in the transmission element positions determined by operation 3330 to previously obtained aggregated differences. For example, if the layout defines the positions of five different transmission elements of the device, operation 3330 generates at least five differences between the candidate transmission element positions for these five transmission elements and the location estimates obtained in operation 3315. Operation 3330 then aggregates these differences.

[0371] Decision operation 3340 determines whether the function of the aggregate difference determined in operation 3330 is the minimum among those evaluated so far (the initial evaluation of operation 3340 assumes that the first aggregate difference is the minimum). If a minimum aggregate difference is identified, method 3300 moves from decision operation 3340 to operation 3355, which stores the candidate position for the transmission element. Decision operation 3345 determines whether additional orientations and / or positions of the candidate transmission element position are to be evaluated. For example, some embodiments of method 3300 shift the candidate transmission element position from an initial position based on the centroid through multiple x, y, and z coordinates (in both positive and negative directions), as discussed above. These embodiments also rotate the candidate transmission element position defined by the layout by rotating about each of the x, y, and z axes. If all of these shifting and rotating operations have been completed, method 3300 moves from decision operation 3345 to operation 3365, which determines the device location and orientation based on the stored candidate transmission positions representing the minimum aggregate difference determined by decision operation 3340. In some embodiments, operations 3340 through 3360 determine the location of the transmission element as described above based on Equation 14.

[0372] If additional shifts and / or rotations of the candidate transmission element position are to be evaluated, process 3300 moves from decision operation 3345 to operation 3350 where such shifts and / or rotations occur. Processing then returns to operation 3330.

[0373] Figure 34 is a flow chart of an example method for generating alignment instructions for a wireless device. In some embodiments, the wireless device is an access point. In some embodiments, the wireless device is an access point (e.g., a "second access point") whose orientation is to be aligned with a reference access point orientation. In at least some disclosed embodiments, the following description of Figure 34One or more of the functions discussed with respect to method 3400 are performed by hardware processing circuitry (e.g., any one or more of 806, 1106, 1206, or 1306). For example, in some embodiments, instructions (e.g., any one or more of routines 814, 1114, 1214, 1314) stored in electronic memory (e.g., any one or more of hardware memory 812, 1112, 1212, or 1312) configure the hardware processing circuitry to perform one or more of the functions discussed below.

[0374] After start operation 3405, method 3400 moves to operation 3410 of selecting a dimension. Possible dimensions selected in operation 3410 include a horizontal dimension or yaw, a vertical dimension or pitch, and a rotational dimension or roll. These dimensions can also be viewed as the X, Y, and Z axes that define three-dimensional space.

[0375] In operation 3420, a difference between the reference device orientation and the second device orientation is determined. For example, in some embodiments, after determining the orientation of the reference AP and determining the second orientation of the second AP, a relative difference between the first orientation and the second orientation is determined. Some embodiments of operation 3420 determine the relative difference in each of the three dimensions discussed above with respect to operation 3410, namely, pitch, roll, and yaw. For example, as discussed above with respect to Figure 4 As discussed, the orientation difference between the two devices is shown by angles 497 and 498. In some embodiments, operation 3420 determines angle 497, as well as angles about other axes such as Figure 4 Similar rotation angles about the X and Y axes).

[0376] In operation 3430, the sign of the difference between the orientation of the device and the orientation of the second device is determined. In other words, some embodiments represent directions in one dimension as positive and the opposite direction in that dimension as negative. Thus, if two devices differ in their orientations relative to a particular dimension, the difference is represented as a positive or negative value, depending on the direction in which the non-reference device needs to be rotated in order to align with the reference device in that dimension. For example, if Figure 4 As shown, the sign of the difference is related to the direction of misalignment between the two devices. Figure 4 As shown, the device 481 is relative to Figure 4 The sign that wireless device 480 is misaligned is shown by angle 498. A rotation with opposite sign (e.g., arrow 499) is required to align the orientation of the two devices (wireless device 480 and wireless device 481).

[0377] In operation 3440, based on the magnitude of the difference in the dimension between the non-reference device and the reference device and the sign of the difference, instructions are generated to rotate the non-reference device about the selected axis. For example, in some embodiments, instructions are generated to rotate the non-reference device in a direction opposite to the determined difference. In at least some embodiments, the magnitude of the instructed rotation is equal to the magnitude of the difference determined in operation 3420. For example, although Figure 4 Angle 498 shows the misaligned direction of device 481 relative to wireless device 480, and arrow 499 shows the rotation direction required to realign the two devices at least about Z-axis 492C.

[0378] Decision operation 3450 determines whether alignment along additional dimensions needs to be evaluated (in some embodiments, method 3400 is repeated three times, once for each of the three axes). If more dimensions need to be evaluated, method 3400 moves from decision operation 3450 to operation 3410, where a different dimension is selected. Otherwise, method 3400 moves from decision operation 3450 to end operation 3460. According to another example embodiment, alignment is performed in an iterative manner, where in each iteration, only a portion of the alignment is completed and the process is repeated until the misalignment is driven below a predetermined threshold.

[0379] Figure 35 is a flow chart of an example method for determining the location of a wireless terminal. In some embodiments, one or more of the functions discussed below are performed by an access point. In at least some disclosed embodiments, the following with respect to Figure 35 One or more of the functions discussed with respect to method 3500 are performed by hardware processing circuitry (e.g., any one or more of 806, 1106, 1206, or 1306). For example, in some embodiments, instructions (e.g., any one or more of routines 814, 1114, 1214, 1314) stored in electronic memory (e.g., any one or more of hardware memory 812, 1112, 1212, or 1312) configure the hardware processing circuitry to perform one or more of the functions discussed below.

[0380] After starting operation 3505, method 3500 moves to operation 3510, where a first position of the first wireless device is determined. Some embodiments obtain the first position via a position sensor integrated into the first wireless device. According to another example embodiment, the location and position of the wireless device are obtained using a tool external to the wireless device. Some embodiments set the position of the first wireless device to a reference predefined position. For example, some embodiments use the position of the first wireless device as a reference position, and in some of these embodiments, the location of the first wireless device is set to coordinates (0, 0, 0), and the position (pitch, roll, yaw) is also set to (0, 0, 0).

[0381] In operation 3515, signals are exchanged between the first wireless device and the second wireless device. In some embodiments, exchanging signals includes receiving a signal at the first wireless device, where the signal was transmitted by the second wireless device. In some other embodiments, exchanging signals includes receiving a signal at the second wireless device, where the signal was transmitted by the first wireless device. The disclosed embodiments can operate with any waveform as the signal. In various embodiments, the signal is a Wi-Fi signal / waveform, a Bluetooth signal / waveform, a cellular signal / waveform, an optical signal / waveform, or an acoustic waveform.

[0382] In operation 3520, a phase difference is determined when the signal is received at the plurality of antenna pairs. As discussed above, in some embodiments, operation 3520 receives a signal from the first wireless device at the plurality of antenna pairs of the second device. A phase difference is determined between the signal received at a reference antenna of the second device and each of the plurality of antennas. According to another example embodiment, rather than defining a reference antenna, the phase difference is measured between any pair of receiver antennas.

[0383] In operation 3525, a second location and orientation of the second wireless device is determined based on the determined phase difference. Figure 15B As discussed, some embodiments estimate the locations of multiple antennas of the second wireless device. In some embodiments, these location estimates are made by comparing the phase differences determined in operation 3520 with expected phase differences in multiple regions. Regions having expected phase differences that match the phase differences determined in operation 3520 are indicators that the antenna generating the signal is located in that region.

[0384] Once the antenna sites are determined, some embodiments obtain a predefined layout of relative antenna sites on the second wireless device (e.g., as described above with respect to Figure 3 Some embodiments maintain a library or data repository of antenna layouts for various wireless devices. In some embodiments, a specific layout is identified based on the model or other description of the wireless device.

[0385] Some embodiments then move and rotate the layout of the multiple antennas of the second device in three-dimensional space and compare the moved and rotated layout with the estimated antenna locations of the second device. The orientation of the second device is then based on the rotation (pitch, yaw, and roll) of the layout that provides the best fit with the estimated antenna locations. As discussed above, in some embodiments, the orientation (such as the second orientation) is defined by three angular spaces (e.g., pitch, yaw, roll). In some embodiments, the orientation is relative to another orientation. For example, in some embodiments, the second orientation is determined relative to a first orientation of a reference device. In some other embodiments, the second orientation is defined relative to a predefined reference orientation.

[0386] In operation 3530, a difference between the first orientation and the second orientation is determined. In some embodiments, operation 3530 determines between one and three differences between the first orientation and the second orientation. The first difference is relative to a rotation about a first axis in three-dimensional space (e.g., pitch about the X axis). The second difference is relative to a rotation about a second axis in three-dimensional space (roll about the Y axis). The third difference is relative to a rotation about a third axis in three-dimensional space (e.g., yaw about the Z axis).

[0387] In operation 3535, instructions are generated to reduce or eliminate the difference. In some embodiments, as discussed above, operation 3535 includes generating one or more instructions for each of pitch, roll, and yaw rotations depending on the difference determined in operation 3530. Some embodiments of operation 3535 include the above with respect to Figure 34 and one or more functions discussed in method 3400.

[0388] Operation 3540 causes the display of the instructions generated in operation 3535. As discussed above, in various embodiments, the instructions for aligning the wireless devices take different forms. In some embodiments, the instructions are displayed by illuminating one or more lights (e.g., LEDs) physically attached to the wireless devices. In some embodiments, the instructions are displayed via an electronic display, such as an electronic display on a mobile device or a management console. In some embodiments, the instructions are displayed via audio (e.g., an audio signal is generated and provided to a speaker). For example, some wireless devices generate verbal instructions to align the second wireless device with the first wireless device. After operation 3540 is completed, method 3500 moves to end operation 3545. Figure 5-Figure 7 Any one or more of provides examples of instructions generated and displayed in operations 3535 and 3540.

[0389] Some embodiments of method 3500 iteratively perform the alignment process described above. Thus, these embodiments iteratively determine the orientation of the second wireless device, calculate the difference between the orientation and the orientation of the first wireless device, and generate instructions to correct any misalignment between the two orientations. Instructions are then displayed and additional orientation determinations are performed until an input is received to end the alignment process or the alignment between the two devices satisfies a criterion (e.g., one or more dimensions of the alignment fall within an alignment tolerance).

[0390] Figure 36 is a flow chart of an example method for determining a location of a wireless device. In some embodiments, one or more of the functions discussed below are performed by an access point. According to yet another example embodiment, one or more of the functions discussed below are performed by a location engine (e.g., Figure 1 In at least some disclosed embodiments, the following is relative to Figure 36 One or more of the functions discussed with method 3600 are performed by hardware processing circuitry (e.g., any one or more of 806, 1106, 1206, or 1306). For example, in some embodiments, instructions (e.g., any one or more of routines 814, 1114, 1214, 1314) stored in electronic memory (e.g., any one or more of hardware memory 812, 1112, 1212, or 1312) configure the hardware processing circuitry to perform one or more of the functions discussed below.

[0391] After starting operation 3605, method 3600 moves to operation 3610, where a frequency is selected. As discussed above, in at least some embodiments, the wireless device can transmit and / or receive at multiple radio frequencies. Accordingly, operation 3610 selects one of the multiple radio frequencies. As discussed below, in at least some embodiments, method 3600 iterates, such that operation 3610 selects a different frequency in each iteration.

[0392] Operation 3615 determines one or more phase differences between signals exchanged with the wireless device at the selected frequency based on the selected frequency. In some embodiments, operation 3615 includes transmitting a signal at the selected frequency and receiving information from the wireless device indicating a phase difference between the signals received by any pair of antennas of the device. In some other embodiments, operation 3615 includes receiving a signal at the selected frequency and measuring phase differences at multiple antenna pairs.

[0393] In operation 3620, the phase difference determined in operation 3615 is compared to a desired phase difference for each of the plurality of regions. A difference between the measured phase difference and the desired phase difference is determined at each of the plurality of regions.

[0394] In operation 3625, a probability is determined for each of the regions that the wireless device is located in the corresponding region based on the difference associated with each region. In various embodiments, these probabilities are also based on a probability distribution, such as a Gaussian distribution. Other types of distributions are also contemplated.

[0395] Decision operation 3630 determines whether there are additional frequencies to be processed. For example, if the wireless device supports multiple frequencies, decision operation 3630 determines whether all multiple frequencies have been processed via method 3600. If there are additional frequencies, method 3600 returns to operation 3610 where a difference frequency is selected and processing continues as described above.

[0396] If no additional frequencies need to be processed, the method 3600 moves from decision operation 3630 to 3635, which aggregates the probabilities associated with each region. Thus, for example, the probabilities associated with the first region are aggregated into a first aggregated probability, while the probabilities associated with the second region are aggregated into a second aggregated probability. In some embodiments, aggregating the probabilities includes multiplying the probabilities.

[0397] In operation 3640, the location of the wireless device is estimated based on the aggregated probabilities. In some embodiments, operation 3640 selects the region with the highest aggregated probability as the estimated location of the wireless device. In other embodiments, multiple regions with the highest probabilities are selected, and the centroid of the selected regions is used as the estimated location. Other embodiments vary from these two examples. After operation 3640 is completed, method 3600 moves to end operation 3650.

[0398] The techniques of the various embodiments may be implemented using software, hardware, and / or a combination of software and hardware. Various embodiments relate to apparatuses, such as management entities (e.g., network monitoring nodes), routers, gateways, switches, access points, DHCP servers, DNS servers, AAA servers, user equipment (e.g., wireless nodes such as mobile wireless terminals), base stations, communication networks, and communication systems. Various embodiments also relate to methods, such as methods of controlling and / or operating one or more communication devices (e.g., network management nodes, access points, wireless terminals (UEs), base stations, control nodes, DHCP nodes, DNS servers, AAA nodes, mobility management entities (MMEs), networks, and / or communication systems). Various embodiments also relate to non-transient machines, such as computers, readable media (e.g., ROMs, RAMs, CDs, hard disks, etc.), comprising machine-readable instructions for controlling the machine to implement one or more steps of the method.

[0399] It is to be understood that the specific order or hierarchy of steps in the disclosed processes is provided as an example. Based on design preferences, it is to be understood that the specific order or hierarchy of steps in the processes can be rearranged while remaining within the scope of the present disclosure. The accompanying method claims present elements of the various steps in a sample order and are not meant to be limited to the specific order or hierarchy presented.

[0400] In various embodiments, the devices and nodes described herein are implemented using one or more modules to perform steps corresponding to one or more methods, such as waveform generation, transmission, emission, processing, analysis, and / or reception steps. Thus, in some embodiments, various features are implemented using modules. Such modules can be implemented using software, hardware, or a combination of software and hardware. In some embodiments, each module is implemented as a separate circuit, wherein the device or system includes separate circuits for implementing the functionality corresponding to each described module. Many of the above-described methods or method steps can be implemented using machine-executable instructions (such as software) contained in a machine-readable medium (such as a memory device, such as RAM, a floppy disk, etc.) to control a machine (e.g., a general-purpose computer with or without additional hardware), such as one or more nodes, to implement all or part of the above-described methods. Therefore, among other things, various embodiments relate to a machine-readable medium, such as a non-transitory computer-readable medium, comprising machine-executable instructions for causing a machine (e.g., a processor and associated hardware) to perform one or more steps of the above-described method(s). Some embodiments relate to a device including a hardware processor configured to implement one, more, or all of the steps of one or more of the disclosed methods.

[0401] In some embodiments, one or more processors (e.g., CPUs) of one or more devices (e.g., communication devices such as routers, switches, network-connected servers, network management nodes, wireless terminals (UEs), and / or access nodes) are configured to perform the steps of the methods described as being performed by the devices. The configuration of the processor can be achieved by controlling the configuration of the processor using one or more modules (e.g., software modules) and / or by including hardware (e.g., hardware modules) in the processor to perform the enumerated steps and / or control the configuration of the processor. Thus, some, but not all, embodiments relate to a communication device (e.g., user equipment) having a processor that includes a module corresponding to each step of the various described methods performed by the device including the processor. In some, but not all, embodiments, the communication device includes a module corresponding to each step of the various described methods performed by the device including the processor. These modules can be implemented purely in hardware (e.g., as circuits) or mechanical devices, or can be implemented using software and / or hardware or a combination of software and hardware.

[0402] Some embodiments relate to a computer program product comprising a computer-readable medium comprising code for causing one or more computers to perform various functions, steps, actions, and / or operations (e.g., one or more of the steps described above). Depending on the embodiment, the computer program product may, and sometimes does, include different code for each step to be performed. Thus, a computer program product may, and sometimes does, include code for each individual step of a method (e.g., a method of operating a communication device (e.g., a network management node, access point, base station, wireless terminal, or node)). The code may be in the form of machine (e.g., computer) executable instructions stored on a computer-readable medium (such as RAM (random access memory), ROM (read-only memory), or other type of storage device). In addition to relating to computer program products, some embodiments also relate to a processor configured to perform one or more of the various functions, steps, actions, and / or operations of one or more of the methods described above. Thus, some embodiments relate to a processor (e.g., a CPU) configured to perform some or all of the steps of the methods described herein. This processor may be used, for example, in the communication devices or other devices described herein.

[0403] Although described in the context of communication systems including wired, optical, cellular, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and BLE, at least some of the methods and apparatus of various embodiments may be applied to various types of communication systems including IP-based and non-IP-based OFDM, non-OFDM, and / or non-cellular systems. Some embodiments may be applied to passive detection systems for detecting natural events such as earthquakes, solar flares, and other natural events.

[0404] In view of the above description, many other variations of the methods and apparatus of the various embodiments described above will be apparent to those skilled in the art. Such variations should be considered within the scope. The methods and apparatus can be, and in various embodiments are, used with IP and non-IP based, wired and wireless (such as CDMA), orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM), Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, BLE, optical and / or various other types of communication technologies that can be used to provide communication links between network attached or associated devices or other devices (including receiver / transmitter circuits and logic and / or routines) for implementing these methods.

[0405] Example 1 is an apparatus comprising: a hardware processing circuit device; one or more hardware memories storing instructions that, when executed, configure the hardware processing circuit device to perform operations comprising: obtaining, for each geographic area in a plurality of geographic areas, a corresponding plurality of first expected phase differences of a first waveform transmitted by a first wireless device from the corresponding area to a pair of receiving elements of a second wireless device; obtaining a measured phase difference of the first waveform transmitted by the first wireless device to the pair of receiving elements of the second wireless device; determining which of the plurality of expected phase differences matches the measured phase difference; conditionally marking each geographic area in the plurality of geographic areas as a possible location of the first wireless device if the expected phase difference for the corresponding geographic area is equal to the measured phase difference; and estimating the location of the first wireless device based on the marked geographic areas.

[0406] In Example 2, the subject matter of Example 1 optionally includes that the operations further include: determining a distance difference between each of the plurality of geographic regions and each of the receiving elements of the second wireless device, wherein an expected phase difference for the geographic region of the plurality of geographic regions is based on a respective distance difference between the region and each of the receiving elements of the second wireless device.

[0407] In Example 3, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 1-2 optionally includes that the operation further includes: obtaining, for each geographic area in the plurality of geographic areas, a corresponding plurality of second expected phase differences of a second waveform exchanged between a pair of receiving elements of a first wireless device and a third wireless device in the corresponding area; obtaining a measured second phase difference of the second waveform exchanged between a pair of receiving elements of the first wireless device and the third wireless device; determining which second expected phase differences of the plurality of second expected phase differences match the measured second phase difference; and conditionally marking each geographic area in the plurality of geographic areas as a possible location of the first wireless device for a second time if the second expected phase difference of the corresponding geographic area is equal to the measured second phase difference, wherein the estimate of the location of the first wireless device is based on the geographic area that has been marked for the second time.

[0408] In Example 4, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 1-3 optionally includes: wherein the first waveform has a first frequency, the operation further comprising: obtaining, for each geographic area in a plurality of geographic areas, a corresponding plurality of second expected phase differences of a waveform having a second frequency, the waveform transmitted by the first wireless device from the corresponding area to a pair of receiving elements of a second wireless device; obtaining a measured second phase difference of a second waveform having the second frequency, the second waveform transmitted by the first wireless device to the pair of receiving elements of the second wireless device; and determining a second time which of the second expected phase differences of the plurality of geographic areas matches the measured second phase difference, wherein the estimation of the location is further based on the second determination.

[0409] In Example 5, the subject matter of Example 4 optionally includes that the operation further includes: determining a difference between the first expected phase difference and the measured phase difference; generating a first probability for each of the geographic regions based on the difference; determining a second difference between the second expected phase difference and the measured second phase difference; generating a second probability for each of the geographic regions based on the second difference; and aggregating the first and second probabilities corresponding to a common area, wherein the estimate of the location of the first wireless device is based on the aggregated probabilities.

[0410] In Example 6, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 1-5 may optionally include the operations further comprising providing the determined location to an advertising network.

[0411] In Example 7, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 5-6 may optionally include the operations further comprising determining an area having a highest aggregated probability, wherein the estimating the location of the first wireless device is based on the determination.

[0412] In Example 8, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 5-7 optionally includes that the operation further includes: weighting each geographic area based on a respective probability of each geographic area in the plurality of geographic areas, wherein the estimate of the location of the first wireless device is based on the weighted plurality of areas.

[0413] In Example 9, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 1-8 may optionally include complementation of the desired phase difference.

[0414] In Example 10, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 1-9 may optionally include a supplementary angle in degrees.

[0415] Example 11 is a method comprising: obtaining, for each geographic area in a plurality of geographic areas, a corresponding plurality of first expected phase differences of a first waveform transmitted by a first wireless device from the corresponding area to a pair of receiving elements of a second wireless device; obtaining a measured phase difference of the first waveform transmitted by the first wireless device to the pair of receiving elements of the second wireless device; determining which of the plurality of expected phase differences matches the measured phase difference; conditionally marking each of the plurality of geographic areas as a possible location of the first wireless device if the expected phase difference for the corresponding geographic area is equal to the measured phase difference; and estimating the location of the first wireless device based on the marked geographic areas.

[0416] In Example 12, the subject matter of Example 11 optionally includes: obtaining, for each geographic area in a plurality of geographic areas, a corresponding plurality of second expected phase differences of a second waveform exchanged between a pair of receiving elements of a first wireless device and a third wireless device in the corresponding area; obtaining a measured second phase difference of the second waveform exchanged between the pair of receiving elements of the first wireless device and the third wireless device; determining which second expected phase differences of the plurality of second expected phase differences match the measured second phase difference; and conditionally marking each geographic area in the plurality of geographic areas as a possible location of the first wireless device for a second time if the second expected phase difference for the corresponding geographic area is equal to the measured second phase difference, wherein the estimate of the location of the first wireless device is based on the second marked geographic area.

[0417] In Example 13, the subject matter of Example 12 optionally includes: wherein the first waveform has a first frequency, the operations further comprising: obtaining, for each geographic area in a plurality of geographic areas, a corresponding plurality of second expected phase differences of a waveform having a second frequency, the waveform transmitted by the first wireless device from the corresponding area to a pair of receiving elements of a second wireless device; obtaining a measured second phase difference of a second waveform having the second frequency, the second waveform transmitted by the first wireless device to the pair of receiving elements of the second wireless device; and determining a second time which of the second expected phase differences for the plurality of geographic areas matches the measured second phase difference, wherein the estimation of the location is further based on the second determination.

[0418] In Example 14, the subject matter of Example 13 optionally includes: determining a difference between a first expected phase difference and a measured phase difference; generating a first probability for each of the geographic regions based on the difference; determining a second difference between a second expected phase difference and a measured second phase difference; generating a second probability for each of the geographic regions based on the second difference; and aggregating the first and second probabilities corresponding to a common area, wherein the estimate of the location of the first wireless device is based on the aggregated probabilities.

[0419] In Example 15, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 11-14 may optionally include providing the determined location to an advertising network.

[0420] In Example 16, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 14-15 may optionally include determining an area having a highest aggregated probability, wherein the estimating the location of the first wireless device is based on the determination.

[0421] In Example 17, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 14-16 may optionally include weighting each of the plurality of geographic regions based on a respective probability of each geographic region, wherein the estimate of the location of the first wireless device is based on the weighted plurality of regions.

[0422] In Example 18, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 11-17 may optionally include complementation of the desired phase difference.

[0423] In Example 19, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 11-18 may optionally include the degree supplementary angle.

[0424] Example 20 is a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions, the instructions comprising: obtaining, for each geographic area in a plurality of geographic areas, a corresponding plurality of first expected phase differences of a first waveform, the first waveform transmitted by a first wireless device from the corresponding area to a pair of receiving elements of a second wireless device; obtaining a measured phase difference of the first waveform transmitted by the first wireless device to the pair of receiving elements of the second wireless device; determining which of the plurality of expected phase differences matches the measured phase difference; conditionally marking each of the plurality of geographic areas as a possible location of the first wireless device if the expected phase difference for the corresponding geographic area is equal to the measured phase difference; and estimating the location of the first wireless device based on the marked geographic areas.

Claims

1. A location determination apparatus for determining a location of one or more wireless devices associated with a wireless network, the location determination apparatus comprising: Hardware processing circuit device; one or more hardware memories storing instructions that, when executed, configure the hardware processing circuitry to perform operations comprising: determining, for each of a plurality of geographic regions associated with the wireless network and based on first layout information defining relative positions of a plurality of pairs of receiving elements for each of a plurality of access points (APs) in the wireless network, a plurality of first expected phase differences of a first waveform, the first waveform being transmitted by a first wireless device of the one or more wireless devices associated with the wireless network from the corresponding geographic region to the plurality of pairs of receiving elements for each of the plurality of APs; obtaining a plurality of first measured phase differences of the first waveform transmitted by the first wireless device to each of the plurality of receiving element pairs for each of the plurality of APs; conditionally marking one or more geographic areas of the plurality of geographic areas as a possible location of the first wireless device when a first expected phase difference of the plurality of first expected phase differences for the respective geographic areas is equal to a corresponding first measured phase difference of the plurality of first measured phase differences; determining, for each of the conditionally marked geographic areas, an associated probability that the first waveform was transmitted from the conditionally marked geographic area; and The conditionally labeled geographic area having the highest associated probability is determined to be the location of the first wireless device.

2. The apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the operation further comprises: Determine a distance difference between each of the plurality of geographic areas and each of the plurality of receiving elements of the first AP, wherein the first expected phase difference for each of the plurality of geographic areas is based on a respective distance difference between the geographic area and each of the receiving elements of the first AP.

3. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the first waveform has a first frequency, the operations further comprising: determining, for each of the plurality of geographic areas associated with the wireless network and based on the first layout information defining relative positions of the plurality of pairs of receiving elements for each of the plurality of APs in the wireless network, a plurality of second expected phase differences for a second waveform having a second frequency, the second waveform being transmitted by the first wireless device from the corresponding geographic area to the plurality of pairs of receiving elements for each of the plurality of APs.

4. The apparatus according to claim 3, wherein the operation further comprises: One or more geographic areas of the plurality of geographic areas are conditionally marked as possible locations of the first wireless device when the second expected phase difference for the corresponding geographic area is equal to at least one phase difference of a plurality of second measured phase differences associated with the second waveform.

5. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the operations further comprise: The determined location of the first wireless device is provided to an advertising network.

6. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein estimating the location of the first wireless device comprises: A geographic area of ​​the plurality of geographic areas having a highest aggregation probability is determined.

7. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein estimating the location of the first wireless device comprises: Each of the plurality of geographic regions is weighted based on a respective probability of the plurality of geographic regions.

8. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the operations further comprise: A 360 degree complement of the desired phase difference is determined for each geographic area of ​​the plurality of geographic areas.

9. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the operations further comprise: A 360 degree complement of the measured phase difference is determined for each geographic area of ​​the plurality of geographic areas.

10. A method for position determination, comprising: determining, for each of a plurality of geographic regions associated with a wireless network and based on first layout information defining relative positions of a plurality of pairs of receiving elements for each of a plurality of access points (APs) in the wireless network, a plurality of first expected phase differences of a first waveform, the first waveform to be transmitted from the corresponding geographic region by a first wireless device of one or more wireless devices associated with the wireless network to the plurality of pairs of receiving elements for each of the plurality of APs; obtaining a plurality of first measured phase differences of the first waveform transmitted by the first wireless device to each of the plurality of receiving element pairs for each of the plurality of APs; conditionally marking one or more geographic areas of the plurality of geographic areas as a possible location of the first wireless device when a first expected phase difference of the plurality of first expected phase differences for the respective geographic areas is equal to a corresponding first measured phase difference of the plurality of first measured phase differences; determining, for each of the conditionally marked geographic areas, an associated probability that the first waveform was transmitted from the conditionally marked geographic area; as well as The conditionally labeled geographic area having the highest associated probability is determined to be the location of the first wireless device.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the first waveform has a first frequency, the method further comprising: determining, for each of the plurality of geographic areas associated with the wireless network and based on the first layout information defining relative positions of the plurality of pairs of receiving elements for each of the plurality of APs in the wireless network, a plurality of second expected phase differences for a second waveform having a second frequency, the second waveform being transmitted by the first wireless device from the corresponding geographic area to the plurality of pairs of receiving elements for each of the plurality of APs.

12. The method according to claim 11, further comprising: One or more geographic areas of the plurality of geographic areas are conditionally marked as possible locations of the first wireless device when the second expected phase difference for the corresponding geographic area is equal to at least one phase difference of a plurality of second measured phase differences associated with the second waveform.

13. The method according to claim 10, further comprising: The determined location of the first wireless device is provided to an advertising network.

14. The method of claim 10, wherein estimating the location of the first wireless device comprises: A geographic area of ​​the plurality of geographic areas having a highest aggregation probability is determined.

15. The method of claim 10, wherein estimating the location of the first wireless device comprises: Each of the plurality of geographic regions is weighted based on a respective probability of the plurality of geographic regions.

16. The method according to claim 10, further comprising: A 360 degree complement of the desired phase difference is determined for each geographic area of ​​the plurality of geographic areas.

17. The method according to claim 10, further comprising: A 360 degree complement of the measured phase difference is determined for each geographic area of ​​the plurality of geographic areas.

18. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions that, when executed by a hardware processing circuit device, configure the hardware processing circuit device to perform operations comprising: determining, for each of a plurality of geographic regions associated with a wireless network and based on first layout information defining relative positions of a plurality of pairs of receiving elements for each of a plurality of access points (APs) in the wireless network, a plurality of first expected phase differences of a first waveform, the first waveform to be transmitted from the corresponding geographic region by a first wireless device of one or more wireless devices associated with the wireless network to the plurality of pairs of receiving elements for each of the plurality of APs; obtaining a plurality of first measured phase differences of the first waveform transmitted by the first wireless device to each of the plurality of receiving element pairs for each of the plurality of APs; conditionally marking one or more geographic areas of the plurality of geographic areas as a possible location of the first wireless device when a first expected phase difference of the plurality of first expected phase differences for the respective geographic areas is equal to a corresponding first measured phase difference of the plurality of first measured phase differences; determining, for each of the conditionally marked geographic areas, an associated probability that the first waveform was transmitted from the conditionally marked geographic area; as well as The conditionally labeled geographic area having the highest associated probability is determined to be the location of the first wireless device.

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