Cell measurement method, communication apparatus, storage medium and computer program product

Abstract

The present application belongs to the technical field of communications. Disclosed are a cell measurement method, a communication apparatus, a storage medium and a computer program product. In the present application, a target time offset may indicate a time offset between a measurement window of a neighbor cell measurement signal and a serving cell signal, so that a terminal may directly determine the measurement window of the neighbor cell measurement signal according to the target time offset, and then uses a low-power receiver to measure within the measurement window the neighbor cell measurement signal, thus implementing cell measurement when the terminal in a low-power state. In the embodiments of the present application, as the terminal may directly determine measurement timing of the neighbor cell measurement signal according to the target time offset, and determine the measurement timing without relying on frame number information, the neighbor cell measurement signal may not carry the frame number information. In this way, the present application may reduce the bit overhead of neighbor cell measurement signals, thus better supporting low-power receivers to perform cell measurement.

Description

Cell measurement method, communication device, storage medium and computer program product

[0001] This application claims priority to the Chinese patent application filed with the State Intellectual Property Office on June 14, 2023, with application number 202310708636.0 and application name “Cell Measurement Method, Communication Device, Storage Medium and Computer Program Product”, the entire contents of which are incorporated by reference into this application. Technical Field

[0002] The present application relates to the field of communication technology, and in particular to a cell measurement method, a communication device, a storage medium, and a computer program product. Background Art

[0003] In the fifth generation (5G) new radio (NR) technology, in order to reduce the power consumption of the terminal while taking into account the communication latency requirements, the terminal may include a main receiver and a low-power receiver. When the terminal has no business needs, the terminal can turn off the main receiver, turn on the low-power receiver, and use the low-power receiver to listen for the wake-up signal sent by the network device. After hearing the wake-up signal, the terminal turns on the main receiver again and uses the main receiver to transmit business data. During the period when the terminal turns on the low-power receiver to listen for the wake-up signal, the terminal may be in a stationary state or in a mobile state. In this case, how to implement cell measurement to support the mobility of the terminal is an urgent problem to be solved.

[0004] Summary of the Invention

[0005] The present application provides a cell measurement method, a communication device, a storage medium, and a computer program product for implementing cell measurement when a terminal is in a low-power state.

[0006] To achieve the above objectives, this application adopts the following technical solutions:

[0007] In a first aspect, a cell measurement method is provided, which can be applied to a terminal or a chip in the terminal. The method includes: determining a measurement window for a neighboring cell measurement signal based on a target time offset, where the target time offset indicates the time offset between the measurement window for the neighboring cell measurement signal and a serving cell signal; and measuring the neighboring cell measurement signal using a low-power receiver within the measurement window.

[0008] The neighboring cell measurement signal may include at least one of a low-power wake-up signal, a low-power synchronization signal, a low-power reference signal, a synchronization signal, and a reference signal. The serving cell signal may also include at least one of a low-power wake-up signal, a low-power synchronization signal, a low-power reference signal, a synchronization signal, and a reference signal.

[0009] In the present application, the target time offset can indicate the time offset between the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal and the serving cell signal. Therefore, the terminal can directly determine the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal according to the target time offset, and then use a low-power receiver to measure the neighboring cell measurement signal within the measurement window, thereby realizing cell measurement when the terminal is in a low-power state. Since the terminal in the embodiment of the present application can directly determine the measurement timing of the neighboring cell measurement signal according to the target time offset, there is no need to determine the measurement timing according to the frame number information, so the neighboring cell measurement signal may not carry the frame number information. In this way, the bit overhead of the neighboring cell measurement signal can be reduced, thereby better supporting the low-power receiver to perform cell measurement.

[0010] Optionally, the implementation process of determining the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal according to the target time offset may include: determining multiple measurement windows according to the target time offset, the measurement window length and the measurement period.

[0011] The target time offset may be configured by the network device. The measurement window length and / or measurement period may be configured by the network device or statically configured in the terminal. Furthermore, if the serving cell signal is periodic, the measurement period may be the same as or different from the period of the serving cell signal.

[0012] In this application, the terminal can determine multiple periodic measurement windows based on the target time offset, measurement window length, and measurement period. After initiating neighboring cell measurement, the terminal can first determine a measurement window, and then determine the next measurement window if the neighboring cell is not successfully reselected within the measurement window.

[0013] Optionally, the implementation process of measuring the neighboring cell measurement signal using a low-power receiver within the measurement window may include: measuring the measurement signal of at least one neighboring cell using the low-power receiver within each measurement window according to the cell identifier and frequency of at least one neighboring cell.

[0014] In this application, the terminal can use a low-power receiver to measure the measurement signals of neighboring cells on some of the frequency points supported by itself within the measurement window. In this way, the frequency of terminal switching frequency can be reduced, thereby reducing terminal power consumption.

[0015] Optionally, the method further includes: receiving a serving cell signal using a low-power receiver, where the serving cell signal carries first indication information; and determining the measurement period from a plurality of candidate periods according to the first indication information.

[0016] In this application, there may be multiple candidate periods pre-configured by the network device in the terminal. In this case, the terminal can select a candidate period indicated by the network device as the measurement period based on the indication information carried in the serving cell signal, so that flexible configuration of the measurement period can be achieved.

[0017] Optionally, there are multiple target time offsets, and each target time offset corresponds to a measurement window length; the implementation process of determining the measurement window of the neighboring area measurement signal based on the target time offset may include: determining multiple measurement windows based on multiple target time offsets and the measurement window length corresponding to each target time offset.

[0018] In the present application, the terminal may also be pre-configured with multiple different target time offsets, and each target time offset corresponds to a measurement window length. Different target time offsets may correspond to different measurement window lengths, or they may correspond to the same measurement window length. Based on this, the terminal may determine a measurement window based on each target time offset and the corresponding measurement window length. Thus, the time intervals between two adjacent measurement windows in the multiple measurement windows determined based on the multiple target time offsets may be different, and the window lengths may also be different.

[0019] Optionally, when multiple target time offsets are configured in the terminal, each target time offset can correspond to at least one frequency point, and each frequency point corresponds to at least one neighboring cell identifier; on this basis, the implementation process of measuring the neighboring cell measurement signal using a low-power receiver within the measurement window may include: determining at least one neighboring cell to be measured in each measurement window based on at least one frequency point corresponding to each target time offset and at least one neighboring cell identifier corresponding to each frequency point; and measuring the measurement signal of the at least one neighboring cell using the low-power receiver within each measurement window.

[0020] In this application, when there are multiple target time offsets, corresponding measurement windows can be determined based on different target time offsets. Furthermore, since different target time offsets may correspond to different frequencies and cells, the neighboring cells to be measured within the measurement windows corresponding to different target time offsets may also be different. This allows different neighboring cells to be measured within different measurement windows.

[0021] Optionally, the implementation method of using the low-power receiver to measure the measurement signal of the at least one neighboring cell in each measurement window may include: based on the measurement order of the at least one neighboring cell indicated by the measurement order indication information, using the low-power receiver to measure the measurement signal of the at least one neighboring cell in each measurement window.

[0022] In the present application, the measurement order indication information may be pre-configured by the network device. The measurement order indication information may include the sorting results of the cell identifiers of at least one neighboring cell. For example, the measurement order indication information may be a cell list. Alternatively, the measurement order indication information may include the priority of at least one neighboring cell. Alternatively, the measurement order indication information may be pre-negotiated between the terminal and the network device.

[0023] Optionally, the serving cell signal carries second indication information, and the method further includes: determining the target time offset from a plurality of candidate time offsets according to the second indication information.

[0024] In the present application, the network device may also pre-configure multiple candidate time offsets for the terminal. Based on this, the terminal can select one or more time offsets from the multiple candidate time offsets as the target time offset based on the second indication information carried in the received serving cell signal. This allows for flexible configuration of the target time offset.

[0025] Optionally, the method also includes: receiving measurement configuration information from a network device, the measurement configuration information including at least one item of the target time offset, the measurement window length, the measurement period, the cell identifier and frequency of at least one neighboring cell, and measurement sequence indication information, the measurement sequence indication information being used to indicate the measurement sequence of the at least one neighboring cell.

[0026] In the present application, the network device may pre-send measurement configuration information to the terminal to implement the configuration of at least one of the target time offset, measurement window length, measurement period, cell identifier and frequency of at least one neighboring cell, and measurement sequence indication information.

[0027] Optionally, the method also includes: using a low-power receiver to measure the signal quality of the serving cell signal; on this basis, if the signal quality of the serving cell signal is less than the first threshold and not less than the second threshold, the terminal executes the step of measuring the neighboring cell measurement signal using the low-power receiver within the measurement window.

[0028] In the present application, the terminal may compare the signal quality of the serving cell signal with a first threshold and a second threshold. If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is not less than the second threshold but less than the first threshold, the terminal may determine to initiate neighboring cell measurement. That is, although the signal quality of the serving cell has not yet reached the worst level, if it is already below the first threshold, the terminal may initiate neighboring cell measurement in advance. In this way, compared to initiating neighboring cell measurement when the signal quality of the serving cell is already very poor, the impact on the terminal's communication performance can be minimized.

[0029] Optionally, if the signal quality of the service cell signal is less than the first threshold and not less than the third threshold, the terminal can use the low-power receiver to measure the same-frequency measurement signal within the measurement window, where the same-frequency measurement signal refers to a neighboring area measurement signal with the same frequency as the service cell signal, and the third threshold is greater than the second threshold.

[0030] In the present application, if the signal quality of the serving cell signal is not lower than the second threshold, and the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the first threshold but not lower than the third threshold, then intra-frequency measurement can be initiated first, and inter-frequency measurement can be temporarily not initiated. In this way, the frequency of inter-frequency measurement can be reduced, that is, the number of frequency switching can be reduced, thereby reducing the energy consumption of the terminal.

[0031] Optionally, if the signal quality of the service cell signal is less than the third threshold and not less than the second threshold, or if the same-frequency measurement signal is not received within the first reference time length, or if the neighboring cell corresponding to the same-frequency measurement signal does not meet the cell reselection condition, the terminal can use the low-power receiver to measure the different-frequency measurement signal within the measurement window, and the different-frequency measurement signal refers to a neighboring cell measurement signal whose frequency is different from that of the service cell signal.

[0032] Optionally, the signal quality of the service cell signal is indicated by the number of the service cell signals detected continuously within a second reference time length, or by the sum of the number of the service cell signals detected within the second reference time length, or is equal to the ratio of the number of detected service cell signals to the number of received service cell signals.

[0033] Optionally, the method further includes: if the number of measurement signals of the target neighboring cell continuously detected within the third reference time length is greater than a fourth threshold, switching from the serving cell to the target neighboring cell, and the fourth threshold is not less than the first threshold.

[0034] The terminal can evaluate the signal quality by the number of signals from neighboring cells or serving cells that are continuously received or detected. This simplifies the signal quality evaluation method and reduces the measurement overhead of the terminal.

[0035] In a second aspect, a cell measurement method is provided, which can be applied to a terminal or a chip in the terminal. The method includes: measuring the signal quality of a serving cell signal using a low-power receiver; if the signal quality of the serving cell signal is less than a first threshold and not less than a second threshold, measuring a neighboring cell measurement signal using the low-power receiver within a measurement window, where the second threshold is a minimum signal quality threshold when the terminal is within the coverage of the serving cell signal.

[0036] The neighboring cell measurement signal and the serving cell signal may include at least one of a low-power wake-up signal, a low-power synchronization signal, a low-power reference signal, a synchronization signal, and a reference signal.

[0037] In the present application, the terminal may compare the signal quality of the serving cell signal with a first threshold and a second threshold. If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is not less than the second threshold but less than the first threshold, the terminal may determine to initiate neighboring cell measurement. That is, although the signal quality of the serving cell has not yet reached the worst level, if it is already below the first threshold, the terminal may initiate neighboring cell measurement in advance. In this way, compared to initiating neighboring cell measurement when the signal quality of the serving cell is already very poor, the impact on the terminal's communication performance can be minimized.

[0038] Optionally, if the signal quality of the service cell signal is less than the first threshold and not less than the third threshold, the low-power receiver is used to measure the co-frequency measurement signal within the measurement window, where the co-frequency measurement signal refers to a neighboring area measurement signal having the same frequency as the service cell signal, and the third threshold is greater than the second threshold.

[0039] In the present application, if the signal quality of the serving cell signal is not lower than the second threshold, and the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the first threshold but not lower than the third threshold, then intra-frequency measurement can be initiated first, and inter-frequency measurement can be temporarily not initiated. In this way, the frequency of inter-frequency measurement can be reduced, that is, the number of frequency switching can be reduced, thereby reducing the energy consumption of the terminal.

[0040] Optionally, if the signal quality of the service cell signal is less than the third threshold and not less than the second threshold, or if the same-frequency measurement signal is not received within the first reference time length, or if the neighboring cell corresponding to the same-frequency measurement signal does not meet the cell reselection condition, then the low-power receiver is used to measure the different-frequency measurement signal within the measurement window, and the different-frequency measurement signal refers to a neighboring cell measurement signal whose frequency is different from that of the service cell signal.

[0041] In the present application, even if the signal quality of the serving cell signal is not lower than the third threshold, if the same-frequency measurement signal is not received within a certain period of time or the neighboring cell corresponding to the same-frequency measurement signal does not meet the cell reselection conditions, the inter-frequency measurement can be triggered, and the start conditions of the inter-frequency measurement are relaxed to ensure that the terminal reselects to other cells as quickly as possible.

[0042] Optionally, the signal quality of the service cell signal is indicated by the number of the service cell signals detected continuously within a second reference time length, or by the sum of the number of the service cell signals detected within the second reference time length, or is equal to the ratio of the number of detected service cell signals to the number of received service cell signals.

[0043] Optionally, the method further includes: if the number of measurement signals of the target neighboring cell continuously detected within the third reference time length is greater than a fourth threshold, switching from the serving cell to the target neighboring cell, and the fourth threshold is not less than the first threshold.

[0044] The terminal can evaluate the signal quality by the number of signals from neighboring cells or serving cells that are continuously received or detected. This simplifies the signal quality evaluation method and reduces the measurement overhead of the terminal.

[0045] In a third aspect, a cell measurement method is provided, which is applied to a network device and can also be applied to a chip in the network device. The method includes: sending measurement configuration information, the measurement configuration information including a target time offset, the target time offset being used to indicate the time offset between a measurement window of a neighboring cell measurement signal and a serving cell signal of the terminal, the measurement window being a window in which the terminal measures the neighboring cell measurement signal using a low-power receiver.

[0046] In this application, the network device can configure a target time offset for the terminal. Since the target time offset can indicate the time offset between the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal and the serving cell signal, the terminal can directly determine the measurement timing of the neighboring cell measurement signal based on the target time offset, without having to determine the measurement timing based on the frame number information. On this basis, the neighboring cell measurement signal does not need to carry frame number information. In this way, the bit overhead of the neighboring cell measurement signal can be reduced, thereby better supporting low-power receivers for cell measurement.

[0047] Optionally, the measurement configuration information also includes at least one of a measurement window length, a measurement period, a cell identifier and a frequency of at least one neighboring cell, and measurement order indication information, where the measurement order indication information is used to indicate the measurement order of the at least one neighboring cell.

[0048] In the present application, in addition to configuring the target time offset for the terminal, the network device can also configure the terminal with at least one of the measurement window length, measurement period, cell identifier and frequency of at least one neighboring cell, and measurement sequence indication information, so as to instruct the terminal to determine the measurement window and perform cell measurement within the measurement window.

[0049] In a fourth aspect, a communication device is provided. The communication device may be a terminal or a network device, or a chip in the terminal or the network device. The communication device includes at least one module configured to execute the cell measurement method described in the first, second, or third aspect.

[0050] In a fifth aspect, a communication device is provided. The communication device may be a terminal or a network device, or a chip within a terminal or a network device. The communication device includes a processor configured to execute the cell measurement method described in the first, second, or third aspects above. The communication device may also include a transceiver, and the processor may control the transceiver to communicate with other devices or modules. When the communication device is a terminal or a network device, the transceiver may be a radio frequency module; when the communication device is a chip within a terminal or a network device, the transceiver may be an input / output interface, a pin, or a circuit. In addition, the communication device may include a memory, and the processor may execute at least one program instruction or code stored in the memory to implement the cell measurement method described in the first, second, or third aspects above.

[0051] In a sixth aspect, a communication system is provided, which includes a terminal and a network device, wherein the terminal is configured to execute the cell measurement method described in the first or second aspect above, and the network device is configured to execute the cell measurement method described in the third aspect above.

[0052] In a seventh aspect, a computer-readable storage medium is provided, wherein instructions are stored in the computer-readable storage medium. When the instructions are executed on a computer, the computer executes the cell measurement method described in the first aspect, the second aspect, or the third aspect.

[0053] In an eighth aspect, a computer program product comprising instructions is provided. When the computer program product is run on a computer, the computer is caused to execute the cell measurement method described in the first aspect, the second aspect, or the third aspect.

[0054] The technical effects obtained in the above-mentioned fourth to eighth aspects are similar to the technical effects obtained by the corresponding technical means in the first, second or third aspects, and will not be repeated here.

[0055] In an embodiment of the present application, the target time offset can indicate the time offset between the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal and the serving cell signal. Therefore, the terminal can directly determine the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal according to the target time offset, and then use a low-power receiver to measure the neighboring cell measurement signal within the measurement window, thereby realizing cell measurement when the terminal is in a low-power state. Since the terminal in the embodiment of the present application can directly determine the measurement timing of the neighboring cell measurement signal according to the target time offset, there is no need to determine the measurement timing according to the frame number information, so the neighboring cell measurement signal may not carry frame number information. In this way, the bit overhead of the neighboring cell measurement signal can be reduced, thereby better supporting low-power receivers to perform cell measurements. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0056] FIG1 is an architecture diagram of a wireless communication system involved in a cell measurement method provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0057] FIG2 is an architecture diagram of a wireless radio frequency identification system provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0058] FIG3 is an architecture diagram of another wireless radio frequency identification system provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0059] FIG4 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a terminal provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0060] FIG5 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a network device provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0061] FIG6 is a flowchart of a cell measurement method provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0062] FIG7 is a schematic diagram of a measurement window determined based on a target time offset, a measurement window length, and a measurement period according to an embodiment of the present application;

[0063] FIG8 is a schematic diagram of another measurement window determined based on a target time offset, a measurement window length, and a measurement period according to an embodiment of the present application;

[0064] FIG9 is a schematic diagram of a measurement window determined based on a target time offset indicated by indication information of a serving cell signal according to an embodiment of the present application;

[0065] FIG10 is a schematic diagram of multiple measurement windows determined based on multiple target time offsets according to an embodiment of the present application;

[0066] FIG11 is a schematic diagram of another embodiment of the present application, showing multiple measurement windows determined based on multiple target time offsets;

[0067] FIG12 is a schematic diagram of a measurement window and corresponding frequency points to be measured provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0068] FIG13 is a flowchart of another cell measurement method provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0069] FIG14 is a flowchart of another cell measurement method provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0070] FIG15 is a schematic structural diagram of a communication device provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0071] FIG16 is a schematic structural diagram of another communication device provided in an embodiment of the present application;

[0072] FIG17 is a schematic structural diagram of another communication device provided in an embodiment of the present application. DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0073] In order to make the objectives, technical solutions and advantages of the embodiments of the present application clearer, the implementation methods of the present application will be further described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

[0074] Before explaining the embodiments of the present application in detail, the application scenarios involved in the embodiments of the present application are first introduced.

[0075] One important application scenario for 5G NR technology is the Internet of Things (IoT). For example, industrial sensors, controllers, and actuators in the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) can all utilize 5G NR technology. Another example is wearable devices such as smartwatches, smart bands, fitness trackers, and medical monitoring equipment, as well as terminals in enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) scenarios such as smart glasses and smartphones. In these scenarios, terminals often require low power consumption and communication latency. To address this, terminals can utilize low-power wake-up technology for communication. In this low-power wake-up technology, the terminal includes a main receiver and a low-power receiver. Compared to the main receiver, the low-power receiver has lower hardware complexity and lower power consumption. This allows the terminal to shut down the main receiver or put it into a deep sleep state, then power on the low-power receiver and listen for wake-up signals from network devices. Thus, compared with the existing terminal power saving mechanism in Rel-15 / 16 / 17, the terminal power saving mechanism based on the low-power wake-up technology may meet the low power consumption requirement and / or low communication delay requirement of the terminal.

[0076] It should be noted that terminals using 5G NR technology often have good mobility. This requires the terminal to be able to perform cell measurement by receiving measurement signals, so as to support cell reselection, cell selection or cell switching. At present, for terminals using low-power wake-up technology, the neighboring cell measurement signal is usually received through the main receiver when the terminal turns on the main receiver. Specifically, the terminal can receive the measurement configuration information sent by the network device, which includes the synchronization signal block timing measurement configuration (SSB-based measurement timing configuration, SMTC) period, SMTC duration and SMTC offset. The terminal can determine the system frame number corresponding to the neighboring cell measurement signal based on the SMTC offset, and determine the starting subframe based on the SMTC period and SMTC offset. Afterwards, the terminal can start receiving the neighboring cell measurement signal from the corresponding starting subframe included in the system frame indicated by the determined system frame number to perform cell measurement.

[0077] It can be seen that when receiving the neighboring cell measurement signal through the main receiver, since the terminal locates the timing of receiving the neighboring cell measurement signal based on the system frame number, this requires the neighboring cell measurement signal to carry frame number information. However, for terminals using low-power wake-up technology, in order to ensure low power consumption when the terminal turns on the low-power receiver, the demodulation capability of the low-power receiver is often limited. In this way, the bit length of the measurement signal that the low-power receiver can receive is shorter. In this case, since the neighboring cell measurement signal in the cell measurement method introduced above carries frame number information and has a long bit length, the above method is not suitable for performing cell measurement when the terminal turns on the low-power receiver. Based on this, an embodiment of the present application provides a cell measurement method, in which the terminal can directly determine the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal based on the time offset of the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal indicated by the target time offset relative to the serving cell signal, without having to determine the measurement timing based on the frame number information. Therefore, the neighboring cell measurement signal may not carry frame number information. In this way, the bit overhead of the neighboring cell measurement signal can be reduced, thereby better supporting cell measurement when the low-power receiver is turned on.

[0078] In addition, ambient internet of things (A-IoT) terminals, such as tags, which are currently widely used in industries such as asset inventory, smart logistics, smart warehousing, smart energy, smart industry, smart electricity, and smart energy, do not support complex circuit design and complex measurement. For such low-capability terminals, when the signal quality of the serving cell where the terminal is located is poor, how to perform cell measurement to support cell reselection or cell selection or cell switching, there is currently no corresponding solution. Therefore, the cell measurement method provided in the embodiment of the present application can also be applied to terminals in A-IoT scenarios to achieve cell measurement of such low-capability terminals that do not have complex circuits.

[0079] Next, the system architecture involved in the cell measurement method provided in the embodiment of the present application is introduced.

[0080] The cell measurement method provided in the embodiment of the present application can be applied to various communication systems, such as 5G NR communication system, long term evolution (LTE) network, enhanced long term evolution (eLTE) network, universal mobile telecommunications system (UMTS) system, code division multiple access (CDMA) system, wireless local area network (WLAN), etc., and can also be a sixth generation (6G) communication system or other future-oriented communication systems. In addition, the cell measurement method provided in the embodiment of the present application can also be used in terrestrial networks (TN) and / or non-terrestrial networks (NTN), without limitation.

[0081] FIG1 is an architectural diagram of a wireless communication system involved in a cell measurement method provided in an embodiment of the present application. As shown in FIG1 , the wireless communication system includes at least one terminal (terminals 101a to 101j as shown in FIG1 ), at least one radio access network device (102a and 102b as shown in FIG1 ), and a core network device 103. The terminal is connected to the radio access network device wirelessly, and the radio access network device is connected to the core network device wirelessly or by wire. The core network device and the radio access network device can be independent and distinct physical devices, or the functions of the core network device and the logical functions of the radio access network device can be integrated into the same physical device, or a single physical device can integrate some of the functions of the core network device and some of the functions of the radio access network device. Terminals and radio access network devices can be connected to each other by wire or wirelessly. FIG1 is merely a schematic diagram, and the communication system can also include other network devices, such as wireless relay devices and wireless backhaul devices, which are not shown in FIG1 .

[0082] A radio access network device is a device or node used to connect a terminal to a wireless network. A radio access network device may be a base station in 5G, where a base station in 5G may also be referred to as a transmission reception point (TRP) or a next generation node B (gNB). Alternatively, a radio access network device may be an evolved node B (eNB), a radio network controller (RNC), a node B (NB), a base station controller (BSC), a base transceiver station (BTS), a home base station (e.g., home evolved NodeB, or home Node B, HNB), a base band unit (BBU), or a wireless fidelity (WIFI) access point (AP). In addition, in a network structure, a radio access network device may include a centralized unit (CU) and / or a distributed unit (DU). Among them, the RAN equipment including CU and DU splits the protocol layer of the eNB in ​​the LTE system, puts the functions of some protocol layers in the CU for centralized control, and distributes the functions of the remaining part or all of the protocol layers in the DU, which is centrally controlled by the CU. The wireless access network device can be a macro base station (such as 102a in Figure 1), a micro base station or an indoor station (such as 102b in Figure 1), or a relay node or a donor node. In the embodiment of the present application, the function of the base station can be performed by a module (such as a chip) in the base station, or by a control subsystem that includes the base station function. The control subsystem that includes the base station function here can be a control center in the above-mentioned application scenarios such as smart grid, industrial control, intelligent transportation, and smart city. The embodiments of the present application do not limit the specific technology and specific device form adopted by the wireless access network device. For the convenience of description, the following description takes the base station as an example of the wireless access network device.

[0083] The terminal is located within the signal coverage of one or more cells provided by the wireless access network equipment. The terminal can be deployed on land, including indoors or outdoors, handheld or vehicle-mounted, can also be deployed on the water surface (such as ships, etc.), and can also be deployed in the air (such as airplanes, balloons and satellites, etc.). The terminal can also be called terminal equipment, user equipment (UE), mobile station (MS), mobile terminal (MT), etc., which is a device with wireless transceiver function and provides voice and / or data connectivity to users. Exemplarily, the terminal can be a handheld device, vehicle-mounted device, wearable device or computing device with wireless communication function, such as a mobile phone, tablet computer, laptop computer, PDA, mobile internet device (MID), smart bracelet, smart glasses, etc. The terminal can also be a virtual reality (VR) terminal, augmented reality (AR) terminal, wireless terminal in industrial control, wireless terminal in unmanned driving, wireless terminal in telemedicine, wireless terminal in smart grid, wireless terminal in smart city, wireless terminal in smart home, etc. The terminals involved in the embodiments of this application mainly consider terminals with low-complexity and low-power low-power receivers and A-IoT terminals. In the embodiments of this application, the device used to implement the functions of the terminal can be called a terminal. Alternatively, a device that can support the terminal to implement the function can be installed in the terminal, for example, the device can be a chip system. Among them, the chip system can be composed of a chip, or it can include a chip and other discrete devices.

[0084] The roles of base stations and terminals can be relative. For example, terminal 101i in Figure 1 can be configured as a mobile base station. To terminal 101j accessing the wireless access network via 101i, terminal 101i is a base station. However, to base station 102a, 101i is a terminal, meaning that communication between 102a and 101i occurs via a wireless air interface protocol. Of course, communication between 102a and 101i can also occur via a base station-to-base station interface protocol. In this case, 101i is also a base station relative to 102a. Therefore, base stations and terminals can be collectively referred to as communication devices. 102a and 102b in Figure 1 can be referred to as communication devices with base station functionality, and 101a through 101j in Figure 1 can be referred to as communication devices with terminal functionality.

[0085] Communication between base stations and terminals, between base stations, and between terminals can be carried out through authorized spectrum, unauthorized spectrum, or both; communication can be carried out through spectrum below 6 gigahertz (GHz), spectrum above 6 GHz, or spectrum below 6 GHz and spectrum above 6 GHz. The embodiments of the present application do not limit the spectrum resources used for wireless communication.

[0086] Core network equipment is a general term for various functional entities on the network side used to manage users, data transmission, and base station configuration. Exemplarily, core network equipment may include access and mobility management function (AMF) entity, user plane function (UPF) entity and session management function (SMF) entity, unified data management function (UDM) entity, authentication server function (AUSF) entity, network slice selection function (NSSF) entity, operation administration and maintenance (OAM) entity, etc.

[0087] It's also worth noting that one application scenario of the present application's embodiments is A-IOT. A-IOT is based on cellular network communication infrastructure and consists of a reader / writer and passive / semi-passive / active tags. Its primary services include inventory management, positioning, and sensor reporting. Typical application scenarios include logistics, warehousing, industrial manufacturing, identity recognition, and environmental monitoring.

[0088] Among them, a typical technology for tags is radio frequency identification (RFID) technology. RFID systems usually include readers and tags. The reader can exchange information with the tag to manage the tag. The reader reads the information in the tag or writes the information that the tag needs to store into the tag. The reader and the tag communicate contactlessly. The function of the tag is simple, and it needs to rely on the stimulation of the reader to send information, that is, the tag converts the wireless signal sent by the reader into energy and uses the energy to drive itself to work. The tag supports microwatt or hundreds of microwatt power consumption and does not support complex designs.

[0089] If RFID is applied to a mobile communication system, such as a 5G system, the base station can act as a reader / writer, realizing the functions of the reader / writer; the tag acts as a terminal, located within the coverage provided by the reader / writer. In other words, the cell measurement method provided in the embodiments of the present application can be applied not only to the aforementioned communication systems, but also to other communication systems such as A-IoT or passive IoT (PIoT).

[0090] For example, as shown in Figure 2, which is a structural diagram of an RFID system provided in an embodiment of the present application, when the base station 201 acts as a reader or the base station performs the reader function, the base station 201 and the tag 202 are connected through Uu, that is, air interface communication. For example, the base station can be a micro base station (Micro BS), and the reader can provide a coverage range of 100m; as shown in Figure 3, which is a structural diagram of another RFID system provided in an embodiment of the present application, the tag 301 can be connected to the integrated access and backhaul (IAB) node (Node) 303 through Uu, and the IAB node 303 is then connected to the base station 302 through Uu. The IAB node 303 can provide a coverage range of 100m. For example, the base station 302 can be a macro base station (Macro BS).

[0091] FIG4 is a block diagram of a terminal provided in an embodiment of the present application. The terminal involved in the embodiment of the present application can be implemented by the terminal 400 shown in FIG4. As shown in FIG4, the terminal 400 includes a low-power receiver (LR) 410a, a memory 420, other input devices 430, a display screen 440, a sensor 450, an audio circuit 460, an I / O subsystem 470, a processor 480, and components such as a power supply 490. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that the terminal structure shown in FIG4 does not constitute a limitation on the terminal and may include more or fewer components than shown, or combine certain components, or split certain components, or arrange different components. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that the display screen 440 belongs to a user interface (UI), and the terminal 400 may include more or fewer user interfaces than shown.

[0092] The following is a detailed introduction to the various components of the terminal 400 with reference to FIG4 :

[0093] In an embodiment of the present application, the low-power receiver 410a may refer to a low-power wake-up receiver (LP-WUR) or a low-power wake-up circuit (LP-WUR) or a low-power receiver (LR), an auxiliary circuit, etc. Among them, the low-power receiver has low complexity and low power consumption. In an embodiment of the present application, the low-power receiver 410a may include a radio frequency (RF) circuit 411. The RF circuit 411 can be used to receive a low-power wake-up signal, a synchronization signal, a low-power reference signal, downlink information, etc. Among them, the synchronization signal may include a low-power synchronization signal (LP-SS) or a synchronization signal block (SSB). Generally, the RF circuit 411 includes but is not limited to an antenna, at least one amplifier, a transceiver, a coupler, a low noise amplifier (LNA), a duplexer, etc.

[0094] Optionally, in this embodiment of the present application, terminal 400 may further include a main receiver (MR) 410b. Main receiver 410b has higher complexity and higher power consumption than low-power receiver 410a. Main receiver 410b may be used to send and receive information or to receive and send signals during a call. For example, after receiving downlink information from a base station, main receiver 410b may transmit the downlink information to processor 480 for processing.

[0095] The memory 420 can be used to store software programs and modules, and the processor 480 executes various functional applications and data processing of the terminal 400 by running the software programs and modules stored in the memory 420. For example, the memory 420 may store a program for implementing the technical solution of the present application, and the processor 480 may implement the cell measurement method provided in the embodiment of the present application by executing the program. The memory 420 may mainly include a program storage area and a data storage area, wherein the program storage area may store an operating system, an application required for at least one function (such as a sound playback function, an image playback function, etc.), etc.; the data storage area may store data created according to the use of the terminal 400 (such as audio data, a phone book, etc.), etc. In addition, the memory 420 may include a high-speed random access memory, and may also include a non-volatile memory, such as at least one disk storage device, a flash memory device, or other volatile solid-state storage device.

[0096] Other input devices 430 may be used to receive input digital or character information and generate key signal input related to user settings and function control of terminal 400. Exemplarily, other input devices 430 may include, but are not limited to, one or more of a physical keyboard, function keys (such as volume control keys, on / off keys, etc.), a trackball, a mouse, a joystick, an optical mouse (an optical mouse is a touch-sensitive surface that does not display visual output, or is an extension of a touch-sensitive surface formed by a touch screen), etc. Other input devices 430 are connected to other input device controller 471 of I / O subsystem 470 and exchange signals with processor 480 under the control of other input device controller 471.

[0097] The display screen 440 can be used to display information input by the user or information provided to the user and various menus of the terminal 400, and can also receive user input. Exemplarily, the display screen 440 may include a display panel 441 and a touch panel 442. Among them, the display panel 441 can be configured in the form of a liquid crystal display (LCD), an organic light-emitting diode (OLED), etc. The touch panel 442, also known as a touch screen, a touch-sensitive screen, etc., can collect user contact or non-contact operations on or near it, for example, the user uses any suitable object or accessory such as a finger, a stylus, etc. on the touch panel 442 or near the touch panel 442, as well as somatosensory operations, and drives the corresponding connection device according to a pre-set program. Among them, the above-mentioned operations include single-point control operations, multi-point control operations, and other operation types. Optionally, the touch panel 442 may include two parts: a touch detection device and a touch controller. Among them, the touch detection device detects the user's touch direction and posture, and detects the signal brought by the touch operation, and transmits the signal to the touch controller; the touch controller receives the touch information from the touch detection device, and converts the touch information into information that can be processed by the processor 480, and then sends it to the processor 480. In addition, the touch controller can also receive commands sent by the processor 480 and execute them. In addition, the touch panel 442 can be implemented using various types such as resistive, capacitive, infrared and surface acoustic wave, and any technology developed in the future can also be used to implement the touch panel 442. Furthermore, the touch panel 442 can cover the display panel 441, and the user can operate on or near the touch panel 442 covered on the display panel 441 according to the content displayed on the display panel 441, wherein the content displayed on the display panel 441 includes but is not limited to a soft keyboard, a virtual mouse, virtual buttons, icons, etc. After the touch panel 442 detects an operation on or near it, it transmits the information to the processor 480 via the I / O subsystem 470 to determine the user input. The processor 480 then provides corresponding visual output on the display panel 441 via the I / O subsystem 470 based on the user input. Although in FIG4 , the touch panel 442 and the display panel 441 are two independent components to implement the input and output functions of the terminal 400, in some embodiments, the touch panel 442 and the display panel 441 can be integrated to implement the input and output functions of the terminal 400.

[0098] The terminal 400 may also include at least one sensor 450, such as a light sensor, a motion sensor, and other sensors. Specifically, the light sensor may include an ambient light sensor and a proximity sensor, wherein the ambient light sensor may adjust the brightness of the display panel 441 according to the brightness of the ambient light, and the proximity sensor may turn off the display panel 441 and / or the backlight when the terminal 400 is moved to the ear. As a type of motion sensor, the accelerometer sensor can detect the magnitude of acceleration in all directions (generally three axes), and can detect the magnitude and direction of gravity when stationary. It can be used for applications that identify the terminal posture, such as horizontal and vertical screen switching, related games, magnetometer posture calibration, etc. It can also be used for vibration recognition related functions, such as pedometer, tapping, etc.; as for other sensors that the terminal 400 can also be configured with, such as gyroscopes, barometers, hygrometers, thermometers, infrared sensors, etc., they will not be described here.

[0099] Audio circuit 460, speaker 461, and microphone 462 provide an audio interface between the user and terminal 400. Audio circuit 460 can convert received audio data into signals and transmit them to speaker 461, which converts them into sound signals for output. Microphone 462, on the other hand, converts collected sound signals and sends them to audio circuit 460, which converts the received signals into audio data. The audio circuit then outputs the audio data to low-power receiver 410a or main receiver 410b for transmission to, for example, another terminal, or to memory 420 for further processing.

[0100] The I / O subsystem 470 is used to control external input and output devices and may include an additional input device controller 471, a sensor controller 472, and a display controller 473. Optionally, one or more additional input device controllers 471 receive signals from and / or send signals to additional input devices 430. Additional input devices 430 may include physical buttons such as push buttons and rocker buttons, dials, slide switches, joysticks, click wheels, and optical mice. It is worth noting that the additional input device controller 471 can be connected to any one or more of the aforementioned input devices. The display controller 473 in the I / O subsystem 470 receives signals from and / or sends signals to the display screen 440. After the display screen 440 detects user input, the display controller 473 converts the detected user input into interaction with user interface objects displayed on the display screen 440, thereby achieving human-computer interaction. The sensor controller 472 can receive signals from and / or send signals to one or more sensors 450.

[0101] Processor 480 is the control center of terminal 400. It connects all components of the terminal using various interfaces and circuits. By running or executing software programs and / or modules stored in memory 420 and accessing data stored in memory 420, it executes various functions of terminal 400 and processes data, thereby providing overall terminal monitoring. Processor 480 may optionally include one or more processing units. Preferably, processor 480 integrates an application processor and a modem processor. The application processor primarily processes the operating system, user interface, and application programs, while the modem processor primarily handles wireless communications. It is understood that the modem processor may not be integrated into processor 480.

[0102] The terminal 400 may also include a power supply 490, such as a battery, for supplying power to various components. Optionally, the power supply may be logically connected to the processor 480 via a power management system, thereby managing charging, discharging, and power consumption through the power management system.

[0103] Although not shown, the terminal 400 may further include components such as a camera and a Bluetooth module, which will not be described in detail in this embodiment of the present application.

[0104] Figure 5 is a structural diagram of a network device shown in an embodiment of the present application. The base station or core network device shown in Figures 1 to 3 above can be implemented by the network device shown in Figure 5. As shown in Figure 5, the network device may include at least one processor 501, a communication bus 502, a memory 503 and at least one communication interface 504. It should be noted that the device structure shown in Figure 5 does not constitute a limitation on the network device. The network device may include more or fewer components than shown in the figure, or combine certain components, or arrange components differently, which is not limited in this embodiment of the present application. The following is a detailed introduction to the various components of the network device in conjunction with Figure 5:

[0105] The processor 501 is the control center of the network device, which can be a processor or a general term for multiple processing elements. For example, the processor 501 can be a general-purpose central processing unit (CPU), or an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC), or one or more integrated circuits for controlling the execution of the program of the present application, such as one or more microprocessors (digital signal processors, DSPs), or one or more field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs). Among them, the processor 501 can perform various functions of the network device by running or executing software programs stored in the memory 503, and calling data stored in the memory 503. For example, the actions of the network devices in the embodiments shown in Figures 6, 13 and 14 can be executed by calling data in the memory by the processor of the corresponding network device.

[0106] As an embodiment, the processor 501 may include one or more CPUs, such as CPU0 and CPU1 shown in FIG. 5 .

[0107] As an embodiment, the network device may include multiple processors, such as processor 501 and processor 505 shown in Figure 5. Each of these processors may be a single-core (single-CPU) processor or a multi-core (multi-CPU) processor. The processor herein may refer to one or more devices, circuits, and / or processing cores for processing data (e.g., computer program instructions).

[0108] Communication bus 502 may include a path for transmitting information between the aforementioned components. Communication bus 502 may be an Industry Standard Architecture (ISA) bus, a Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI) bus, or an Extended Industry Standard Architecture (EISA) bus. Such buses may be classified as address buses, data buses, or control buses. For ease of illustration, FIG5 shows a single thick line, but this does not necessarily indicate a single bus or a single type of bus.

[0109] The memory 503 can be a read-only memory (ROM) or other types of static storage devices that can store static information and instructions, a random access memory (RAM) or other types of dynamic storage devices that can store information and instructions, or an electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM), a compact disc read-only memory (CD-ROM) or other optical disc storage, optical disc storage (including compressed optical disc, laser disc, optical disc, digital versatile disc, Blu-ray disc, etc.), a magnetic disk storage medium or other magnetic storage device, or any other medium that can be used to carry or store the desired program code in the form of an instruction or data structure and can be accessed by a computer, but is not limited to this. The memory 503 can be independent and connected to the processor 501 via a communication bus 502. The memory 503 can also be integrated with the processor 501. Among them, the memory 503 is used to store the software program that executes the solution provided in the embodiment of the present application, and is controlled and executed by the processor 501.

[0110] The communication interface 504 is used to communicate with other devices or communication networks, such as Ethernet, RAN, wireless local area networks (WLAN), etc. The communication interface 504 may include a receiving unit to implement a receiving function, and a sending unit to implement a sending function.

[0111] As an embodiment, the processor 501 may include one or more CPUs, such as CPU0 and CPU1 shown in FIG. 5 .

[0112] As an embodiment, the network device may include multiple processors, such as processor 501 and processor 505 shown in Figure 5. Each of these processors may be a single-core (single-CPU) processor or a multi-core (multi-CPU) processor. The processor herein may refer to one or more devices, circuits, and / or processing cores for processing data (e.g., computer program instructions).

[0113] The network device may be a general-purpose network device or a dedicated network device, for example, a desktop computer, a portable computer, a network server, etc., which is not limited in the present embodiment.

[0114] Next, the cell measurement method provided in the embodiment of the present application is introduced. The processing performed by the single execution subject (e.g., terminal or network device) shown in the embodiment of the present application can also be divided into multiple execution subjects, which can be logically and / or physically separated. For example, the processing performed by the network device can be divided into at least one of a central unit (CU), a distributed unit (DU), and a radio unit (RU).

[0115] FIG6 is a flow chart of a cell measurement method according to an embodiment of the present application. As shown in FIG6 , the method includes the following steps:

[0116] Step 601: The network device sends measurement configuration information, which includes a target time offset. The target time offset is used to indicate the time offset between the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal and the serving cell signal.

[0117] In this embodiment of the present application, in addition to the target time offset, the measurement configuration information may also include at least one of a measurement window length, a measurement period, a cell identifier and frequency of at least one neighboring cell, and measurement order indication information. The measurement window length indicates the duration of the measurement window for neighboring cell measurement signals. The measurement period indicates the repetition period of the measurement window for neighboring cell measurement signals. The measurement order indication indicates the measurement order of at least one neighboring cell.

[0118] For example, in an embodiment of the present application, the network device may include a base station and a core network device. Based on this, in one possible implementation, the core network device may send measurement configuration information to the base station corresponding to the serving cell of the terminal, and the base station may then send the measurement configuration information to the terminal. The core network device may be an operation administration and maintenance (OAM) entity.

[0119] It should be noted that the base station may send a first message to the terminal, where the first message includes the measurement configuration information. The first message may be a broadcast message, such as a system information (SI), a master information block (MIB), a system information block (SIB), etc. The first message may also be an RRC message, such as a radio resource control (RCC) connection release message, an RRC reconfiguration message, etc. The first message may also be a low-power wake-up signal (LP-WUS), a low-power synchronization signal (LP-SS), a low-power reference signal (LP-RS), an SSB, a synchronization signal and a physical broadcast channel block (SS / PBCH block), a downlink control information (DCI), a listening signal, a beacon frame, a channel state information reference signal (CSI-RS), a primary synchronization signal (PSS), a secondary synchronization signal (SSS), etc. Accordingly, the terminal may receive the first message through the low-power receiver and / or the main receiver.

[0120] In another possible implementation, the base station corresponding to the neighboring cell may send its own measurement configuration information to the base station corresponding to the serving cell of the terminal. After receiving the measurement configuration information, the base station corresponding to the serving cell of the terminal sends the measurement configuration information to the terminal.

[0121] The base station corresponding to the neighboring cell may send its own measurement configuration information to the base station corresponding to the serving cell of the terminal via the Xn interface. For example, the measurement configuration information may be carried in an Xn setup request or an Xn setup response.

[0122] After receiving the measurement configuration information, the base station corresponding to the serving cell of the terminal may send the measurement configuration information to the terminal with reference to the implementation method described above, which will not be described in detail in the embodiment of the present application.

[0123] Optionally, in some possible situations, the base station corresponding to the serving cell of the terminal may also be statically configured with measurement configuration information. In this case, the base station may directly send the measurement configuration information to the terminal with reference to the method described above.

[0124] It should be noted that step 601 is optional. That is, in some possible scenarios, the terminal may be statically configured with a target time offset or the target time offset may be set to a default value, such as 0. In addition, the terminal may also be statically configured with at least one of the following: a measurement window length, a measurement period, a cell identifier and frequency of at least one neighboring cell, and a measurement order indication. Alternatively, the terminal may obtain the above information through other means, which is not limited in this embodiment of the present application.

[0125] Step 602: The terminal determines a measurement window for measuring neighboring cell signals according to the target time offset.

[0126] After receiving the measurement configuration information, the terminal may obtain the target time offset from the measurement configuration information in the following three ways, and then determine the measurement window according to the target time offset.

[0127] (1) The measurement configuration information includes a target time offset. In this case, the terminal can directly obtain the target time offset and then determine the measurement window for the neighboring cell measurement signal based on the target time offset.

[0128] The target time offset may be a time offset value between the start time or end time of the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal and the reception time of the serving cell signal. The serving cell signal may be the first serving cell signal received after the terminal determines to start the neighboring cell measurement, or the first serving cell signal received after the terminal turns on the low-power receiver, or the serving cell signal received most recently by the terminal. The serving cell signal may include at least one of LP-WUS, LP-SS, LP-RS, SSB, SS / PBCH, SI, SIB, DCI, Beacon, RRC reconfiguration message, CSI-RS, PSS, SSS, paging message, selection message, downlink data, measurement signal sequence, waveform sequence of LP-WUS, PSS / SSS PBCH demodulation reference signal (DMRS). The reception time of the serving cell signal may refer to the reception start time or the reception end time.

[0129] In an example, the terminal may obtain a measurement window length and a measurement period, and determine a plurality of measurement windows according to the measurement window length, the measurement period, and the target time offset.

[0130] The measurement window length is used to indicate the duration of the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal. For example, the measurement window length may be 3 milliseconds.

[0131] In an embodiment of the present application, the measurement configuration information may include a measurement window length. In this case, the terminal can obtain the measurement window length from the measurement configuration information. Alternatively, the measurement window length may also be carried by a broadcast message, such as a serving cell signal. In this case, the terminal can obtain the measurement window length from the received broadcast message. Alternatively, the measurement window length may be specified by a protocol or determined by the terminal itself, such as depending on terminal implementation. Alternatively, the measurement window length may also be calculated by the terminal through a target time offset, such as the measurement window length may be an integer multiple of the target time offset, wherein the specific calculation rule may be carried by the measurement configuration information, may be obtained through a broadcast message, may be specified by a protocol, or may be determined by the terminal itself, such as depending on terminal implementation.

[0132] The measurement period is used to indicate the repetition period of the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal. For example, if the measurement period is T, it means that the time interval between each two adjacent measurement windows is T. The time interval between two measurement windows can refer to the interval between the start times or the end times of the two measurement windows.

[0133] In the embodiment of the present application, the measurement configuration information may include a fixed measurement period. In this case, the terminal may directly obtain the measurement period from the measurement configuration information.

[0134] Optionally, the measurement configuration information may also include multiple candidate periods. In this case, the terminal may select one period from the multiple candidate periods as the measurement period.

[0135] Exemplarily, after receiving the measurement configuration information, the terminal may use a low-power receiver to receive a serving cell signal. The serving cell signal may carry first indication information, where the first indication information is used to indicate a measurement period to be used by the terminal. Based on this, the terminal may select the period indicated by the first indication information from multiple candidate periods as the measurement period.

[0136] For example, the multiple candidate periods included in the measurement configuration information are [T1, T2, T3]. When the first indication information carried in the serving cell signal is 1, the terminal can select T1 as the measurement period; when the first indication information is 2, select T2 as the measurement period; when the first indication information is 3, select T3 as the measurement period.

[0137] Optionally, the measurement period may also be carried by a broadcast message, such as a serving cell signal. In this case, the terminal may obtain the measurement period from the received broadcast message. Alternatively, the measurement period may be specified by the protocol or determined by the terminal itself, such as depending on the terminal implementation. Alternatively, the measurement period may also be calculated by the terminal using the period of the serving cell signal. For example, the measurement period may be an integer multiple of the period of the serving cell signal. In this case, the specific calculation rules and multiple information may be carried by the measurement configuration information or obtained through a broadcast message, such as a serving cell signal. Alternatively, the measurement period may be specified by the protocol or determined by the terminal itself, such as depending on the terminal implementation.

[0138] It is worth noting that in the embodiment of the present application, when the serving cell signal is a periodic signal, the measurement period may be the same as or different from the period of the serving cell signal. When the measurement period is the same as the period of the serving cell signal, the terminal may not configure the measurement period.

[0139] After obtaining the measurement window length, measurement period and target time offset, the terminal can determine the start time of multiple measurement windows according to the target time offset and measurement period, and determine multiple measurement windows according to the start time and measurement window length of each measurement window.

[0140] For example, taking the target time offset as the time offset value between the start time of the measurement window and the reception time of the serving cell signal as an example, the terminal can add the target time offset to the reception time of the serving cell signal to obtain the start time of the first measurement window. Add the start time of the i-th measurement window to the measurement period to obtain the start time of the i+1-th measurement window, where i is an integer greater than 0. After determining the start time of each measurement window, add the start time of each measurement window to the measurement window length to obtain the end time of the corresponding measurement window. In this way, each measurement window can be located based on the start time and end time of each measurement window.

[0141] For example, assuming that the target time offset is Δt, the reception end time of the serving cell signal is t1, the measurement window length is ΔL, and the measurement period is the same as the period of the serving cell signal, both T, then the determined measurement windows are shown in Figure 7.

[0142] For another example, assuming that the target time offset is Δt, the reception end time of the serving cell signal is t1, the measurement window length is ΔL, and the measurement period is different from the period of the serving cell signal, where the measurement period is T1 and the period of the serving cell signal is T2, then the determined measurement windows are shown in Figure 8.

[0143] Optionally, the terminal may also determine a first measurement window according to the target time offset and the measurement window length, and then determine other measurement windows according to the start time or end time of the first measurement window and the measurement period.

[0144] In another example, when the target time offset is used to indicate the time offset between the measurement window and the most recently received serving cell signal, the terminal may not be configured with a measurement period. In this case, each time the terminal receives a serving cell signal, a measurement window may be determined based on the reception time of the serving cell signal, the target time offset, and the measurement window length. In this way, if the serving cell signal is periodic, the period of the determined measurement window (i.e., the measurement period) will be the same as the period of the serving cell signal.

[0145] (2) The measurement configuration information includes multiple candidate time offsets. The terminal can select a time offset from the multiple candidate time offsets as a target time offset and determine the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal according to the target time offset.

[0146] Exemplarily, after receiving the measurement configuration information, the terminal may use a low-power receiver to receive a serving cell signal. The serving cell signal may carry second indication information, and the second indication information is used to indicate the time offset to be used by the terminal. Based on this, the terminal may select the time offset indicated by the second indication information from the multiple candidate time offsets included in the measurement configuration information as the target time offset. In this case, the target time offset can be used to indicate the time offset between the measurement window and the serving cell signal carrying the second indication information. For example, the target time offset can be the time offset value between the start time or end time of the measurement window and the reception time of the serving cell signal carrying the second indication information.

[0147] For example, the measurement configuration information includes three candidate time offsets, namely [t1, t2, t3]. When the second indication information carried in the serving cell signal is 1, the terminal can select t1 as the target time offset. When the second indication information is 2, t2 is selected as the target time offset. When the second indication information is 3, t3 is selected as the target time offset.

[0148] Optionally, when the serving cell signal carries the second indication information, the serving cell signal may also carry the first indication information. In this case, the terminal may also obtain the measurement period according to the first indication information with reference to the aforementioned method.

[0149] It should be noted that when the serving cell signal carries both the first indication information and the second indication information, the serving cell signal may include an indication field, wherein the indication field may include multiple indication bits, some of which are used to carry the first indication information, and the remaining indication bits are used to carry the second indication information. For example, the indication field may include 4 indication bits, wherein the upper two bits are used to carry the first indication information, and the lower two bits are used to carry the second indication information. For example, if the value of the indication field is 1001, it means that the first indication information is 2 and the second indication information is 1.

[0150] Whenever the terminal determines a target time offset based on the second indication information in the received serving cell signal, the terminal can determine the measurement window according to the determined target time offset, referring to the method introduced in the above (1), until the terminal determines a new target time offset through the second indication information in the next serving cell signal.

[0151] For example, assuming that the period of the serving cell signal is 10 milliseconds, when the serving cell signal carries the second indication information 1, it indicates a target time offset of 5 milliseconds, and when it carries the second indication information 2, it indicates a target time offset of 15 milliseconds. As shown in FIG9 , if the serving cell signal S1 carries the second indication information 1, the terminal can determine the measurement window W1 based on the second indication information carried in S1; if the serving cell signal S2 carries the second indication information 2, the terminal can determine the measurement window W2 based on the second indication information carried in S2; if the serving cell signal S3 carries the second indication information 1, the terminal still determines the measurement window W2 based on the second indication information carried in S3; the serving cell signal S4 may continue to carry the second indication information 2, and the terminal determines the measurement window W3 based on the second indication information carried in S4; and so on. By analogy, based on the time offset indicated by the indication information carried in each serving cell signal, the terminal can determine a measurement window with a measurement period of 20 milliseconds.

[0152] (3) The measurement configuration information includes multiple target time offsets. The terminal can obtain the multiple target time offsets and determine multiple measurement windows according to the multiple target time offsets.

[0153] In some examples, the multiple target time offsets may be time offset values ​​between the start time or end time of the multiple measurement windows and the reception time of the serving cell signal. The serving cell signal may be the first serving cell signal received by the terminal after determining to initiate neighboring cell measurement, the first serving cell signal received by the terminal after turning on a low-power receiver, or the most recently received serving cell signal by the terminal.

[0154] For example, multiple target time offsets are 3 milliseconds, 7 milliseconds, and 14 milliseconds, respectively, and these three target time offsets can indicate three measurement windows, wherein the time intervals between the start time of the three measurement windows and the reception time of the serving cell signal are 3 milliseconds, 7 milliseconds, and 14 milliseconds, respectively.

[0155] In other examples, the first time offset among the multiple target time offsets may be a time offset value between the start time of the first measurement window and the reception time of the serving cell signal, and the j-th time offset may be a time offset value between the j-th measurement window and the j-1-th measurement window, where j is an integer greater than 1. Furthermore, the time interval between two measurement windows may refer to the interval between the start times of the two measurement windows, or the interval between the end times of the two measurement windows, or the interval between the end time of the previous measurement window and the start time of the next measurement window.

[0156] For example, multiple target time offsets are 5 milliseconds, 4 milliseconds, and 7 milliseconds, respectively. This means that the time interval between the start time of the first measurement window and the reception time of the serving cell signal is 5 milliseconds, the time interval between the second measurement window and the first measurement window is 4 milliseconds, and the time interval between the third measurement window and the second measurement window is 7 milliseconds.

[0157] After acquiring multiple target time offsets, the terminal may acquire a measurement window length corresponding to each target time offset, and determine multiple measurement windows according to the multiple target time offsets and the measurement window length corresponding to each target time offset.

[0158] In a possible implementation, the terminal may obtain a fixed measurement window length by referring to the method for obtaining the measurement window length in (1) above. In this case, the measurement window length corresponding to each target time offset is the same.

[0159] In another possible implementation, when the measurement configuration information includes a measurement window length, the measurement configuration information may include multiple measurement window lengths and a mapping relationship between target time offsets and measurement window lengths. Based on this, the terminal may obtain the measurement window length corresponding to each target time offset based on the mapping relationship between the target time offsets and the measurement window lengths. In this case, the measurement window lengths corresponding to different target time offsets may be the same or different.

[0160] After obtaining the measurement window length corresponding to each target time offset, the terminal can determine the start time or end time of the corresponding measurement window based on each target time offset, and then determine the corresponding measurement window based on the start time or end time of each measurement window and the measurement window length corresponding to the target time offset used to determine the corresponding measurement window.

[0161] Exemplarily, when each target time offset is the time offset value between the start time of the measurement window and the reception time of the serving cell signal, taking any target time offset as an example, the terminal can add the target time offset to the reception time of the serving cell signal to obtain the start time of the measurement window corresponding to the target time offset. Afterwards, the terminal can add the corresponding measurement window length to the start time of the measurement window corresponding to the target time offset to obtain the end time of the measurement window corresponding to the target time offset. In this way, a measurement window can be obtained by determining the start time and end time.

[0162] For example, assuming that multiple target time offsets are 3 milliseconds, 10 milliseconds, and 24 milliseconds respectively, the measurement window length corresponding to the first target time offset is 5 milliseconds, the measurement window length corresponding to the second target time offset is 10 milliseconds, and the measurement window length corresponding to the third target time offset is 5 milliseconds, then measurement windows W1 to W3 as shown in Figure 10 can be determined.

[0163] Optionally, when the first time offset among multiple target time offsets is the time offset value between the start time of the first measurement window and the reception time of the serving cell signal, and the jth time offset is the time offset value between the jth measurement window and the j-1th measurement window, the terminal may first determine the start time of the first measurement window based on the first target time offset, and determine the end time of the first measurement window based on the start time and the measurement window length corresponding to the first target time offset. Thereafter, the terminal may determine the start time or end time of the j-1th measurement window based on the start time or end time and the jth target time offset, and determine the jth measurement window based on the start time or end time of the j-1th measurement window and the corresponding measurement window length.

[0164] For example, assuming that multiple target time offsets are 3 milliseconds, 5 milliseconds, and 4 milliseconds, respectively, the measurement window length corresponding to the first target time offset is 5 milliseconds, the measurement window length corresponding to the second target time offset is 10 milliseconds, and the measurement window length corresponding to the third target time offset is 5 milliseconds. Furthermore, the first target time offset is the time offset between the start time of the first measurement window and the end time of receiving the serving cell signal, and the subsequent target time offsets are the time offset between the start time of the subsequent measurement window and the end time of the previous measurement window. Based on this, the terminal can determine the measurement windows W1, W2, and W3 shown in Figure 11.

[0165] Optionally, in some possible situations, when the network device does not send down measurement configuration information, for example, the terminal is statically configured with a target time offset or the target time offset is a default value. In this case, the terminal can also refer to the implementation method introduced in the previous article to determine the measurement window based on the target time offset, and the embodiments of the present application will not be repeated here.

[0166] In addition, it is worth noting that in this embodiment of the present application, after each measurement window is determined based on the target time offset, the terminal may perform measurements in the measurement window using the method described in step 603 below. After the measurement window ends, the next measurement window is determined. Alternatively, the terminal may determine multiple measurement windows at once and then perform measurements in each measurement window sequentially using the method described in step 603 below.

[0167] Step 603: The terminal uses a low-power receiver to measure neighboring cell measurement signals within the measurement window.

[0168] After determining a measurement window for a neighboring cell measurement signal, the terminal may use a low-power receiver to measure the measurement signal of at least one neighboring cell within the measurement window. The measurement signal may include at least one of: LP-WUS, LP-SS, LP-RS, SSB, SS / PBCH, SI, SIB, DCI, Beacon, RRC reconfiguration message, CSI-RS, PSS, SSS, paging message, selection message, downlink data, measurement signal sequence, LP-WUS waveform sequence, and PSS / SSS PBCH DMRS.

[0169] It should be noted that, in a possible implementation, the terminal may be statically configured with signal type indication information, or the measurement configuration information may include signal type indication information. The signal type indication information is used to indicate the type of the measurement signal, and the signal type indication information may be configured according to the reception and decoding capability of the terminal's low-power receiver. Based on this, the terminal may use a low-power receiver to measure the measurement signal indicated by the signal type indication information within the measurement window. For example, when the reception and decoding capability of the terminal's low-power receiver is strong, the signal type indication information may indicate that the measurement signal is a broadcast message, an RRC message, etc. For example, it may indicate that the measurement signal is an SSB. In this case, the terminal may use a low-power receiver to measure the SSB of at least one neighboring cell within the measurement window. For another example, when the reception and decoding capability of the terminal's low-power receiver is weak, the signal type indication information may indicate that the measurement signal is a low-power signal. In this case, the terminal may use a low-power receiver to measure at least one of LP-WUS, LP-SS, and LP-RS of at least one neighboring cell within the measurement window.

[0170] Illustratively, the terminal may use a low-power receiver to measure the neighboring cell measurement signal on each frequency point supported by itself within each measurement window, or may measure the neighboring cell measurement signal on some of the frequency points supported by itself.

[0171] When a terminal measures neighboring cell measurement signals on some frequency points within a measurement window, these frequency points can be high-priority frequency points selected by the terminal based on the priority of its supported frequencies. Alternatively, these frequency points can be frequencies indicated by a network device. The following describes two implementations of how a terminal measures some frequency points indicated by a network device within a measurement window.

[0172] Method 1: The measurement configuration information sent by the network device may include the cell identifier and frequency of at least one neighboring cell. Based on this, the terminal can use a low-power receiver to measure the measurement signal of the at least one neighboring cell within each determined measurement window based on the cell identifier and frequency of the at least one neighboring cell included in the measurement configuration information. In this case, the neighboring cell measured in each measurement window is the same.

[0173] It should be noted that the frequency points included in the measurement configuration information may be high-priority frequency points selected by the network device from the frequency points supported by the terminal. For example, the frequency points supported by the terminal are sorted in descending order of priority, and then the frequency points ranked in the top 50% are selected as high-priority frequency points. In addition, the cell identifier of each neighboring area may correspond to a frequency point, and different cell identifiers may correspond to the same frequency point or different frequency points. In addition, the frequency point corresponding to the cell identifier of each neighboring area may be the same as the frequency point of the terminal's service cell, or may be different from the frequency point of the terminal's service cell. That is, the measurement configuration information may include the cell identifier and frequency point of the same-frequency cell and the cell identifier and frequency point of the different-frequency cell.

[0174] In a possible scenario, the terminal may measure the measurement signal of at least one neighboring cell using a low-power receiver within the measurement window according to a default order and based on the cell identifier and frequency of at least one neighboring cell.

[0175] Among them, the default order can be the order from low to high frequency, or the order from high to low; or, the default order can be to listen at the same frequency first, and then listen at the different frequency, wherein the same frequency refers to the same frequency as the service cell of the terminal, and the different frequency refers to the frequency different from the service cell of the terminal.

[0176] In addition, when performing measurement, for any frequency point, the terminal may listen to a measurement signal containing a cell identifier of a neighboring cell corresponding to the frequency point at the frequency point, and determine a measurement result of the corresponding neighboring cell based on the received measurement signal.

[0177] The terminal may determine the signal quality according to the received measurement signal, and then use the determined signal quality as the measurement result of the neighboring cell corresponding to the measurement signal.

[0178] It should be noted that, in the embodiments of the present application, signal quality can be indicated by different signal quality indicators. For example, in one implementation, the signal quality can be indicated by at least one of reference signal received power (RSRP), reference signal received quality (RSRQ), received signal strength indicator (RSSI), low-power reference signal received power (LP-RSRP), low-power reference signal received quality (LP-RSRQ), low-power received signal strength indicator (LP-RSSI), signal plus interference to noise ratio (SINR), low-power signal plus interference to noise ratio (LP-SINR), signal to noise ratio (SNR), and energy detection. In one implementation, RSRP is the power value of the cell-common reference signal within the measurement bandwidth received by the terminal. This value is the linear average of the power of individual resource elements (REs) within the measurement bandwidth, reflecting the strength of the desired signal in the cell. RSSI is the linear average of the power of all signals received by the terminal (including co-frequency desired signals and interference, adjacent channel interference, thermal noise, etc.), reflecting the load intensity on the resource. RSRQ is the ratio of RSRP times N to RSSI: RSRQ = N*RSRP / RSSI, where N represents the number of REs within the RSSI measurement bandwidth, reflecting the relative strength of the signal and interference. SINR is the ratio of the desired signal power to the sum of the interference and noise powers, directly reflecting the quality of the received signal. LP-RSSI, or energy detection, can be defined as the linear average of the total received power on the RSSI resource. LP-RSRP can be defined as the linear average of the received power on the reference signal or signal-part resource. LP-SINR is equal to the ratio of LP-RSRP to the sum of interference and noise power, that is, LP-SINR=LP-RSRP / (sum of interference and noise power).LP-RSRQ = N*LP-RSRP / LP-RSSI, where N is the resource size difference factor used to evaluate LP-RSRP and LP-RSSI, reflecting the relative size between LP-RSRP and LP-RSSI.

[0179] Optionally, considering the limited measurement performance of a low-power receiver, in an embodiment of the present application, the signal quality of a measurement signal of a certain neighboring cell may also be evaluated by the number of measurement signals.

[0180] For example, the terminal may indicate the signal quality of the measurement signal of the neighboring cell by the number of measurement signals of the neighboring cell continuously received or detected within a reference time length.

[0181] Specifically, the terminal may start counting from the first measurement signal of the neighboring cell received or detected within the measurement window, and count the number of measurement signals of the neighboring cell continuously received or detected within the reference duration.

[0182] In the embodiments of the present application, receiving the measurement signal by the terminal may also be referred to as the terminal detecting the measurement signal. The terminal detecting the measurement signal may mean that the terminal successfully decodes the measurement signal after receiving the measurement signal. Therefore, the terminal detecting the measurement signal may also be referred to as the terminal successfully decoding the measurement signal or successfully detecting the measurement signal.

[0183] In addition, in the embodiment of the present application, the terminal can determine whether the measurement signal of a neighboring cell is continuously received or detected through the following examples.

[0184] In one example, the terminal can determine whether the measurement signal of the neighboring cell is continuously received or detected by determining the time interval for receiving or detecting the measurement signal of the neighboring cell. For example, if the interval time for receiving the measurement signal of the neighboring cell is greater than a time threshold, it is determined to be discontinuous reception, that is, the measurement signal of the neighboring cell is not continuously received; if the interval time for receiving the measurement signal of the neighboring cell is less than or equal to the time threshold, it is determined to be continuous reception of the measurement signal of the neighboring cell. The time threshold can be a preset time parameter and is not limited here.

[0185] In another example, each measurement signal of the neighboring cell may carry a number. The terminal determines whether the measurement signals of the neighboring cell are continuously received or detected by determining whether the numbers of the measurement signals received or detected from the neighboring cell are continuous. For example, if the numbers of the measurement signals received from the neighboring cell are continuous, it is determined that the measurement signals of the neighboring cell are continuously received.

[0186] Optionally, the terminal may also indicate the quality of the measurement signal of the neighboring area by the sum of the number of measurement signals of the neighboring area received or detected within a reference duration. That is, the terminal may start counting from the first measurement signal received or detected within the measurement window, and count the sum of the number of measurement signals of the neighboring area received or detected within the reference duration. At this time, the measurement signals of the neighboring area counted include the measurement signals of the neighboring area that are continuously received or detected and the measurement signals of the neighboring area that are discontinuously received or detected.

[0187] Optionally, the terminal may further indicate the signal quality of the measurement signal of the neighboring cell by using a ratio of the number of measurement signals of the neighboring cell successfully detected within the measurement window to the number of measurement signals of the neighboring cell received.

[0188] It should be noted that, in one implementation of the embodiment of the present application, the terminal may be statically configured with quality indicator indication information or the measurement configuration information may include quality indicator indication information, and the quality indicator indication information may be used to indicate which of the above-mentioned signal quality indicators is used to indicate the signal quality. Accordingly, the terminal can obtain the corresponding indicator based on the quality indicator indication information to evaluate the signal quality. For example, if the signal quality indicator indicated by the quality indicator indication information is RSRP, the terminal can evaluate the quality of the measurement signal by measuring the RSRP of the measurement signal of the neighboring area. For another example, if the signal quality indicator indicated by the quality indicator indication information is the number of successfully received signals continuously, the terminal can indicate the quality of the neighboring area measurement signal by counting the number of successfully received neighboring area measurement signals continuously.

[0189] In another possible scenario, the terminal may also measure the measurement signal of at least one neighboring cell according to the measurement order indicated by the network device. For example, the measurement configuration information from the network device may include measurement order indication information, which may indicate the measurement order of at least one neighboring cell. In this case, the terminal may measure the measurement signal of at least one neighboring cell using a low-power receiver within the measurement window according to the measurement order of at least one neighboring cell indicated by the measurement order indication information.

[0190] Specifically, the measurement order indication information may include the cell identifier of at least one neighboring cell arranged in sequence, wherein the arrangement order may be determined by the network device or determined in advance by negotiation between the network device and the terminal. For example, the measurement order indication information includes a cell identifier list, and the cell identifier list includes the cell identifier of at least one neighboring cell arranged in sequence. In this case, within the measurement window, the terminal may listen to the measurement signal containing the cell identifier of the corresponding neighboring cell at the frequency point of at least one neighboring cell in the arrangement order of the cell identifier of at least one neighboring cell, and determine the measurement result of the corresponding neighboring cell based on the received measurement signal.

[0191] Optionally, the measurement order indication information may also include the priority of at least one neighboring cell. In this case, within the measurement window, the terminal may sequentially listen for measurement signals containing cell identifiers of the corresponding neighboring cells at the frequencies of the at least one neighboring cell in descending order of priority, and determine the measurement results of the corresponding neighboring cells based on the received measurement signals.

[0192] Among them, when measuring in the order indicated by the measurement order indication information, for any frequency point of a neighboring cell, the terminal can refer to the method described above to listen to the measurement signal containing the cell identifier of the neighboring cell corresponding to the frequency point at the frequency point, and determine the measurement result of the neighboring cell based on the received measurement signal. The embodiments of this application are not further described here.

[0193] Method 2: When the measurement configuration information sent by the network device includes multiple target time offsets, the measurement configuration information may also include at least one frequency corresponding to each target time offset and the cell identifier of at least one neighboring cell corresponding to each frequency. In this case, the terminal can determine at least one neighboring cell to be measured in each measurement window based on the at least one frequency corresponding to each target time offset and the cell identifier of at least one neighboring cell corresponding to each frequency. Within each measurement window, the terminal can use a low-power receiver to measure the measurement signal of at least one neighboring cell.

[0194] It can be seen from the third implementation method in step 602 that when there are multiple target time offsets, the terminal can determine a measurement window based on each target time offset. Based on this, for any target time offset, the terminal can use at least one neighboring area corresponding to the frequency point corresponding to the target time offset as the at least one neighboring area to be measured within the measurement window corresponding to the target time offset. Among them, different target time offsets may correspond to different frequency points, and different frequency points correspond to different neighboring areas. Therefore, the at least one neighboring area corresponding to different target time offsets may be different. In this case, the at least one neighboring area to be measured within the measurement window corresponding to different target time offsets may also be different.

[0195] For example, referring to Figure 12 , assuming multiple target time offsets of 3 milliseconds, 10 milliseconds, and 24 milliseconds, the corresponding measurement windows are measurement windows W1 through W3. Assuming the frequency points corresponding to the target time offset of 3 milliseconds are (F1, F2), the frequency points corresponding to the target time offset of 10 milliseconds are (F3, F4, F5), and the frequency points corresponding to the target time offset of 24 milliseconds are (F6, F7), then as shown in Figure 12 , the frequencies to be measured within measurement window W1 are (F1, F2), the frequencies to be measured within measurement window W2 are (F3, F4, F5), and the frequencies to be measured within measurement window W3 are (F6, F7).

[0196] In addition, in this implementation, within a measurement window corresponding to any target time offset, the terminal may utilize a low-power receiver to measure at least one neighboring cell to be measured within the measurement window in accordance with a default order or a measurement order indicated by the measurement order indication information. For specific implementations, reference may be made to the aforementioned related descriptions, and the embodiments of this application will not be further described herein.

[0197] After the terminal measures the neighboring cell measurement signal using a low-power receiver within the measurement window in any of the above methods, the terminal may also perform cell reselection, cell selection, or cell handover according to the measurement result within the measurement window.

[0198] Among them, when the measurement result includes at least one of RSRP, RSRQ, RSSI, LP-RSRP, LP-RSRQ, LP-RSSI, SINR, SNR, LP-RSSI, LP-SINR, and energy detection of the measurement signal, the terminal can sort the signal quality of the serving cell signal and the neighboring cell measurement signal according to the above-mentioned signal quality indicators of the measurement signals of each neighboring cell in the measurement window and the signal quality indicator of the serving cell signal, and select the cell with the best signal quality as the reselected cell or cell selection or switching cell.

[0199] Optionally, when the measurement result includes a signal quality indicated by the number of measured signals, the terminal may further determine, for any neighboring cell, whether the signal quality of the neighboring cell is greater than a reference threshold. If the signal quality of the neighboring cell is greater than the reference threshold, the neighboring cell may be selected as a reselected cell, a cell selection cell, or a handover cell. The reference threshold may be a preset threshold.

[0200] For example, when the measurement result includes the number of measurement signals continuously received or detected within a reference duration, the terminal may determine whether the number of measurement signals of the neighboring cell continuously received or detected within the reference duration is greater than a reference threshold. If greater than the reference threshold, the neighboring cell may be selected as a reselected cell, a cell selection cell, or a handover cell. In this case, the reference threshold is not less than the number of serving cell signals continuously received or detected within the reference duration.

[0201] Optionally, in some possible situations, the measurement configuration information may further include a measurement result reporting condition, which is a condition for the terminal to report the cell measurement result to the network device. For example, the measurement result reporting condition may include at least one quality threshold, wherein the at least one quality threshold may include a neighboring cell signal quality threshold and / or a serving cell signal quality threshold. In this case, when the signal quality of the neighboring cell measurement signal is greater than the neighboring cell signal quality threshold, and / or when the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the serving cell signal quality threshold, the terminal may report the aforementioned cell measurement result.

[0202] Optionally, the measurement result reporting condition may also include a first time threshold. In this case, if within the first time threshold, the signal quality of the neighboring cell measurement signal is always greater than the neighboring cell signal quality threshold, and / or the signal quality of the serving cell signal is always lower than the serving cell signal quality threshold, the terminal may report the aforementioned cell measurement result.

[0203] Optionally, the measurement configuration information may further include a second time threshold, which is a time threshold required to perform cell reselection, cell selection, or handover. That is, if a neighboring cell continuously meets the cell reselection condition or cell selection condition within the second time threshold, the terminal may perform cell reselection, cell selection, or handover. The cell reselection condition may also be referred to as a cell reselection criterion, and the cell selection condition may also be referred to as a cell selection criterion.

[0204] Optionally, the above-mentioned measurement result reporting condition and the second time threshold may also be statically configured in the terminal.

[0205] In an embodiment of the present application, the target time offset can indicate the time offset between the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal and the serving cell signal. Therefore, the terminal can directly determine the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal according to the target time offset, and then use a low-power receiver to measure the neighboring cell measurement signal within the measurement window, thereby realizing cell measurement when the terminal is in a low-power state. Since the terminal in the embodiment of the present application can directly determine the measurement timing of the neighboring cell measurement signal according to the target time offset, there is no need to determine the measurement timing according to the frame number information, so the neighboring cell measurement signal may not carry frame number information. In this way, the bit overhead of the neighboring cell measurement signal can be reduced, thereby better supporting low-power receivers to perform cell measurements.

[0206] In addition, in the embodiment of the present application, the terminal can use a low-power receiver to measure some frequency points within the measurement window. In this way, the frequency switching within the measurement window can be reduced, thereby reducing the measurement overhead.

[0207] Finally, in an embodiment of the present application, when the terminal uses a low-power receiver to measure the neighboring cell measurement signal, the signal quality of the measurement signal can be evaluated by the number of measurement signals of the neighboring cell continuously received or detected, and this can be used as the measurement result of the neighboring cell. In this way, the signal quality evaluation method is simplified, thereby reducing the measurement overhead of the terminal.

[0208] The above embodiment mainly introduces the implementation process of the terminal determining the measurement window and using a low-power receiver to measure the neighboring cell measurement signal within the measurement window. In addition, the embodiment of the present application also designs the conditions for the terminal to start the neighboring cell measurement when it is in a low-power state. Based on this, the embodiment of the present application also provides another cell measurement method, as shown in Figure 13, which includes the following steps:

[0209] Step 1301: The network device sends measurement configuration information, where the measurement configuration information is used to configure a measurement window for neighboring cell measurement signals.

[0210] In one possible implementation, the measurement configuration information may include a target time offset. In addition, the measurement configuration information may also include at least one of a measurement window length, a measurement period, a cell identifier and frequency of at least one neighboring cell, and measurement order indication information. The measurement window length is used to indicate the duration of the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal. The measurement period is used to indicate the repetition period of the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal. The measurement order indication information is used to indicate the measurement order of at least one neighboring cell. In this case, the implementation method for the network device to send the measurement configuration information can refer to the introduction in step 601, and the embodiments of the present application will not be repeated here.

[0211] In another possible implementation, the measurement configuration information may include a synchronization signal block timing measurement configuration (SSB-based measurement timing configuration, SMTC). In this case, the implementation of this step can refer to the implementation of the network device sending SMTC in the related art, which is not repeated here.

[0212] It should be noted that step 1301 is an optional step. In some possible situations, the measurement configuration information may also be statically configured in the terminal, or the terminal may obtain the measurement configuration information through other means.

[0213] Step 1302: The terminal uses a low-power receiver to measure the signal quality of the serving cell signal.

[0214] In an embodiment of the present application, when the terminal is in a low-power state, the terminal may use a low-power receiver to listen to the serving cell signal and determine the signal quality of the serving cell signal based on the received serving cell signal. The serving cell signal may include at least one of LP-WUS, LP-SS, LP-RS, SSB, SS / PBCH, SI, SIB, DCI, Beacon, RRC reconfiguration message, CSI-RS, PSS, SSS, paging message, selection message, downlink data, measurement signal sequence, LP-WUS waveform sequence, and PSS / SSS PBCH DMRS.

[0215] Exemplarily, in a possible implementation, the terminal may evaluate the signal quality of the serving cell signal by the number of serving cell signals.

[0216] For example, the terminal may indicate the signal quality of the serving cell signal by the number of serving cell signals continuously received or detected by the terminal using a low-power receiver within the second reference time period.

[0217] The second reference duration is a preset time parameter. For example, the second reference duration may be a time parameter statically configured in the terminal, or may be a parameter configured by a network device for the terminal.

[0218] In addition, in the embodiments of the present application, the serving cell signal received by the terminal may also be referred to as the serving cell signal detected by the terminal, or the serving cell signal received by the terminal may also refer to the sequence of serving cell signals detected by the terminal, or may also refer to the energy of the serving cell signal detected by the terminal. The serving cell signal detected by the terminal may refer to the serving cell signal received and successfully decoded by the terminal, and therefore, the serving cell signal detected by the terminal may also be referred to as the serving cell signal successfully decoded by the terminal or the serving cell signal successfully detected.

[0219] Specifically, the terminal may start counting from the first serving cell signal received or detected, and count the number of serving cell signals continuously received or detected within the second reference time duration. Alternatively, the terminal may also start counting from the serving cell signal received or detected that carries a measurement indication message, where the measurement indication message may be 1-bit indication information, used to indicate that the corresponding serving cell signal is a signal for starting measurement.

[0220] In the embodiment of the present application, the terminal can determine whether the serving cell signal is continuously received or detected through the following examples.

[0221] In one example, a terminal can determine whether a serving cell signal is continuously received or detected by determining the time interval between receiving or detecting the serving cell signal. For example, if the interval between receiving the serving cell signal is greater than a time threshold, discontinuous reception is determined, meaning that the serving cell signal is not continuously received. If the interval between receiving the serving cell signal is less than or equal to the time threshold, continuous reception is determined. The time threshold may be a preset time parameter, which is not limited here.

[0222] In another example, the serving cell signal may carry a number, and the terminal may determine whether the serving cell signal is continuously received or detected by determining whether the numbers of the received or detected serving cell signals are continuous. For example, if the numbers of the received serving cell signals are continuous, it is determined that the serving cell signals are continuously received.

[0223] Optionally, the terminal may also indicate the signal quality of the serving cell signal by the sum of the number of serving cell signals received or detected within the second reference duration. That is, the terminal may start counting from the first serving cell signal received or detected and count the number of serving cell signals received or detected within the second reference duration. In this case, the received or detected serving cell signals may include those received or detected discontinuously and those received or detected continuously.

[0224] Optionally, the terminal may also indicate the signal quality of the serving cell signal by the ratio of the number of successfully detected serving cell signals to the number of received serving cell signals. For example, the signal quality may be indicated by the ratio of the number of serving cell signals detected to the number of received serving cell signals within the second reference duration. Alternatively, the signal quality may be indicated by the ratio of the number of serving cell signals detected to the current moment to the number of received serving cell signals.

[0225] In another possible implementation, the terminal may also calculate at least one of RSRP, RSRQ, RSSI, LP-RSRP, LP-RSRQ, LP-RSSI, SINR, LP-SINR, energy detection, and SNR of the serving cell signal received using a low-power receiver, and indicate the signal quality of the serving cell signal by at least one of the above indicators obtained by calculation.

[0226] Step 1303: If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is less than the first threshold and not less than the second threshold, the terminal uses a low-power receiver to measure the neighboring cell measurement signal within the measurement window, and the second threshold is the minimum signal quality threshold when the terminal is within the coverage range of the serving cell signal.

[0227] In an embodiment of the present application, the terminal may compare the signal quality of the serving cell signal with a first threshold and a second threshold. If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is not less than the second threshold but less than the first threshold, the terminal may determine to initiate neighboring cell measurement. The second threshold is the minimum signal quality threshold when the terminal is within the coverage range of the serving cell signal. That is, although the signal quality of the serving cell has not yet reached the worst level, if it is already lower than the first threshold, the terminal may initiate neighboring cell measurement in advance. In this way, compared to initiating neighboring cell measurement when the signal quality of the serving cell is already very poor, the impact on the communication performance of the terminal can be minimized as much as possible.

[0228] Optionally, in one possible scenario, the terminal may also compare the signal quality of the serving cell signal within a third time threshold with the first threshold and the second threshold. If the signal quality of the serving cell signal remains above the second threshold but below the first threshold within the third time threshold, the terminal may initiate neighboring cell measurement. The third time threshold may be a time threshold statically configured in the terminal or a time threshold included in measurement configuration information.

[0229] For example, in one possible implementation, if the signal quality of the serving cell signal is less than the first threshold but not less than the second threshold, the terminal may determine to initiate neighboring cell measurements including intra-frequency measurement and inter-frequency measurement. In this case, the terminal may use a low-power receiver to measure intra-frequency measurement signals and inter-frequency measurement signals within the measurement window. The intra-frequency measurement signal refers to a neighboring cell measurement signal having the same frequency as the serving cell signal. The inter-frequency measurement signal refers to a neighboring cell measurement signal having a different frequency from the serving cell signal.

[0230] Optionally, if the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the first threshold and not lower than the second threshold, the terminal may further determine whether the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than a third threshold, where the third threshold is greater than the second threshold. If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the first threshold but not lower than the third threshold, the terminal may determine to start intra-frequency measurement without starting inter-frequency measurement. That is, in this case, the terminal may use a low-power receiver to measure the intra-frequency measurement signal within the measurement window, and temporarily not measure the inter-frequency measurement signal. If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the third threshold but still not lower than the second threshold, the terminal may determine to start inter-frequency measurement. That is, in this case, the terminal may use a low-power receiver to measure the inter-frequency measurement signal within the measurement window.

[0231] It can be seen that in an embodiment of the present application, when the signal quality of the serving cell signal is not lower than the second threshold, if the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the first threshold but not lower than the third threshold, the same-frequency measurement can be started first. If the signal quality continues to deteriorate and is lower than the third threshold, the different-frequency measurement can be started again. In this way, the frequency of different-frequency measurements can be reduced, that is, the frequency of frequency switching can be reduced, thereby reducing terminal energy consumption.

[0232] Optionally, after the terminal starts the same-frequency measurement when the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the first threshold but not lower than the third threshold, if the terminal does not receive the same-frequency measurement signal within the first reference time length, or the neighboring area corresponding to the same-frequency measurement signal received by the terminal does not meet the cell reselection condition, the terminal can also start the different-frequency measurement, that is, the terminal can start to measure the different-frequency measurement signal using a low-power receiver within the measurement window.

[0233] The first reference duration may be a pre-configured time parameter, and the first reference duration may be smaller than or larger than the measurement window length.

[0234] When the first reference duration is less than the measurement window length, if the terminal does not receive an intra-frequency measurement signal within the first reference duration within a certain measurement window, the terminal may initiate inter-frequency measurement. The terminal may start measuring the inter-frequency measurement signal from the measurement window or from the measurement window following the measurement window.

[0235] When the first reference duration is greater than the measurement window length, for example, the first reference duration is greater than the sum of the durations of multiple consecutive measurement windows and the time intervals between the windows. In this case, if the terminal does not receive the same-frequency measurement signal in multiple consecutive measurement windows corresponding to the first reference duration starting from a certain measurement window, the terminal can start different-frequency measurement.

[0236] In addition, the cell reselection condition refers to the condition used to select the cell to be switched. Among them, the neighboring cell corresponding to the same-frequency measurement signal meeting the cell reselection condition may mean that the signal quality of the measurement signal of the neighboring cell meets certain conditions. For example, when the signal quality of the measurement signal is indicated by the number of measurement signals continuously received or detected within a certain period of time, a neighboring cell meeting the cell reselection condition may mean that the number of measurement signals continuously received or detected from the neighboring cell within a certain period of time is greater than a certain threshold.

[0237] It should be noted that in the above, when the terminal determines whether the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the third threshold, it can determine whether the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the third threshold within the fourth time threshold, wherein the fourth time threshold and the third time threshold can be equal or different, and the fourth time threshold can also be statically configured or included in the measurement configuration information.

[0238] After the terminal determines to start co-frequency measurement and / or inter-frequency measurement based on the above-mentioned startup conditions, the terminal can first determine the measurement window according to the target time offset, and then use a low-power receiver to measure the neighboring cell measurement signal within the measurement window, wherein the neighboring cell measurement signal includes the co-frequency measurement signal and / or the inter-frequency measurement signal.

[0239] The terminal may determine the measurement window by the method described in step 602 of the embodiment shown in FIG6 , and measure the neighboring cell measurement signal using a low-power receiver within the measurement window with reference to the method described in step 603 of the embodiment. This embodiment of the present application will not be described in detail here.

[0240] Optionally, in some possible implementations, when the network device configures SMTC for the terminal, the terminal may also determine the measurement window using SMTC, and then measure the neighboring cell measurement signal within the measurement window. The implementation method of using SMTC to determine the measurement window can refer to related technologies, and the embodiments of this application will not be repeated here.

[0241] After the terminal measures the neighboring cell measurement signal using a low-power receiver in any measurement window, the terminal may also perform cell reselection, cell selection, or handover based on the signal quality of the neighboring cell measurement signal in the measurement window.

[0242] When the signal quality is indicated by the number of signals, for example, when the signal quality of the serving cell signal is indicated by the number of serving cell signals continuously received or detected within the second reference time duration, the signal quality of the measurement signal of a neighboring cell can be indicated by the number of measurement signals of the neighboring cell continuously received or detected within the third reference time duration. In this case, the terminal can determine whether the number of measurement signals of the neighboring cell continuously received or detected within the third reference time duration is greater than a fourth threshold. If it is greater than the fourth threshold, the neighboring cell can be used as a reselected cell. The third reference time duration may be equal to the second reference time duration, or may not be equal to the second reference time duration. For example, the third reference time duration may be less than the second reference time duration. In addition, the fourth threshold may be a pre-set threshold, and the fourth threshold is not less than the first threshold. That is, if the signal quality of the measurement signal of a neighboring cell measured by the terminal within the measurement window is not less than the signal quality threshold of the serving cell that triggers the terminal to initiate neighboring cell measurement, the terminal can use the neighboring cell as a reselected cell.

[0243] Optionally, when the signal quality of the serving cell signal is indicated by at least one of RSRP, RSRQ, RSSI, LP-RSRP, LP-RSRQ, LP-RSSI, SINR, SNR, LP-RSSI, LP-SINR, and energy detection, the signal quality of the measured signal of a neighboring cell is also indicated by a corresponding indicator. In this case, the terminal may rank the signal quality of the serving cell signal and the neighboring cell measured signal based on the signal quality indicators of the measured signals of each neighboring cell within the measurement window and the signal quality indicator of the serving cell signal, and select the cell with the best signal quality as the reselected cell.

[0244] The above mainly introduces the implementation process of the terminal starting neighboring cell measurement in a low-power state when the signal quality of the serving cell signal is not lower than the second threshold, and using the low-power receiver to measure the neighboring cell measurement signal within the measurement window. Optionally, when the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the second threshold, since the second threshold is the minimum signal quality threshold when the terminal is within the coverage of the serving cell signal, it can be seen that at this time, the signal quality of the serving cell is already very poor, and the terminal may have moved out of the coverage of the serving cell signal. In this case, if the terminal includes a main receiver, the terminal can turn on the main receiver and use the main receiver to perform cell measurement. Among them, while turning on the main receiver, the low-power receiver can continue to be turned on or kept on for a specified period of time or directly turned off.

[0245] Optionally, in one possible scenario, when determining whether the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the second threshold, the terminal may also determine whether the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the second threshold within a fifth time threshold, wherein the fifth time threshold may be equal to or different from the third time threshold, and the fifth time threshold may also be statically configured or included in the measurement configuration information. If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the second threshold within the fifth time threshold, the terminal may turn on the primary receiver and use the primary receiver to perform cell measurements. In this way, the number of times the primary receiver is turned on or the low-power receiver is turned off in certain special scenarios can be reduced. For example, in situations where the serving cell signal quality temporarily deteriorates due to the terminal moving at the edge of the serving cell signal coverage area or being blocked, the above method can avoid frequent turning on of the primary receiver or frequent turning off of the low-power receiver, thereby reducing terminal energy consumption. While the primary receiver is turned on, the low-power receiver may continue to be turned on, remain on for a specified period of time, or be directly turned off.

[0246] In an embodiment of the present application, the terminal may compare the signal quality of the serving cell signal with a first threshold and a second threshold. If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is not less than the second threshold but less than the first threshold, the terminal may initiate neighboring cell measurement. The second threshold is the minimum signal quality threshold when the terminal is within the coverage of the serving cell signal. That is, the terminal may initiate neighboring cell measurement before the signal quality of the serving cell reaches the worst level. In this way, compared to initiating neighboring cell measurement when the signal quality of the serving cell is already very poor, the impact on the communication performance of the terminal can be minimized as much as possible.

[0247] In addition, in an embodiment of the present application, when the terminal uses a low-power receiver to measure the neighboring cell measurement signal, the signal quality can be evaluated by the number of received or detected signals. In this way, the signal quality evaluation method is simplified, thereby reducing the measurement overhead of the terminal.

[0248] Finally, in an embodiment of the present application, when the signal quality of the serving cell signal is not lower than the second threshold, if the signal quality of the serving cell signal is lower than the first threshold but not lower than the third threshold, intra-frequency measurement can be initiated first, and inter-frequency measurement is temporarily not initiated. If the signal quality of the serving cell signal further deteriorates or the intra-frequency measurement is unsuccessful, the inter-frequency measurement is initiated again. In this way, the frequency of inter-frequency measurement can be reduced, that is, the number of frequency switching is reduced, thereby reducing the energy consumption of the terminal.

[0249] In combination with the cell measurement methods described in FIG. 6 and FIG. 13 , an embodiment of the present application further provides a cell measurement method, as shown in FIG. 14 . The method may include the following steps:

[0250] Step 1401: The network device sends measurement configuration information, which includes a target time offset. The target time offset is used to indicate the time offset between the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal and the serving cell signal.

[0251] The implementation of this step may refer to the implementation of the network device sending the measurement configuration information introduced in the aforementioned step 601, and will not be repeated here.

[0252] Step 1402: The terminal measures the signal quality of the serving cell signal using a low-power receiver.

[0253] The implementation of this step can refer to the implementation of the aforementioned step 1302, which will not be repeated here.

[0254] Step 1403: If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is less than the first threshold and not less than the second threshold, the terminal determines a measurement window for the neighboring cell measurement signal according to the target time offset, and measures the neighboring cell measurement signal using a low-power receiver within the measurement window.

[0255] Specifically, if the signal quality of the serving cell signal is less than the first threshold and not less than the third threshold, the terminal determines a measurement window according to the target time offset, and uses a low-power receiver to measure the same-frequency measurement signal within the measurement window.

[0256] If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is less than the third threshold and not less than the second threshold, or the same-frequency measurement signal is not received within the first reference time length, or if the neighboring cell corresponding to the same-frequency measurement signal does not meet the cell reselection condition, the terminal determines the measurement window according to the target time offset and uses a low-power receiver to measure the different-frequency measurement signal within the measurement window.

[0257] For an explanation of the signal quality evaluation method and the aforementioned conditions for starting the measurement, reference may be made to the relevant description in the aforementioned step 1302. Furthermore, for an implementation method in which the terminal determines the measurement window based on the target time offset, reference may be made to the relevant implementation method in step 602. For an implementation method in which the terminal uses a low-power receiver to measure the same-frequency measurement signal and / or the different-frequency measurement signal within the measurement window, reference may be made to the implementation method in the aforementioned step 603, which will not be further described herein.

[0258] Step 1404: If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is less than the second threshold, the terminal turns on the primary receiver and uses the primary receiver to measure the neighboring cell measurement signal.

[0259] In an embodiment of the present application, when in a low-power state, the terminal can use a low-power receiver to measure the signal quality of the serving cell signal, and start the neighboring cell measurement when the signal quality of the serving cell signal has not reached the worst level, so as to minimize the impact on the communication performance of the terminal. After starting the neighboring cell measurement, the terminal can directly determine the measurement timing of the neighboring cell measurement signal based on the time offset between the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal indicated by the target time offset and the serving cell signal to achieve cell measurement, without the need to determine the measurement timing based on the frame number information. In this way, the neighboring cell measurement signal may not carry the frame number information. In this way, the bit overhead of the neighboring cell measurement signal can be reduced, thereby better supporting the low-power receiver to perform cell measurement.

[0260] It should be noted that in the various embodiments above, when the terminal is an A-IoT terminal or a P-IoT terminal, the terminal may use a low-power receiver to receive a neighboring area measurement signal or a serving cell signal, or the terminal may use an A-IoT terminal or a P-IoT terminal to receive a neighboring area measurement signal or a serving cell signal, and the terminal may use a low-power receiver to measure a neighboring area measurement signal or a serving cell signal, or the terminal may use an A-IoT terminal or a P-IoT terminal to measure a neighboring area measurement signal or a serving cell signal.

[0261] Next, the communication device provided in the embodiment of the present application is introduced.

[0262] FIG15 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a communication device 1500 provided in an embodiment of the present application, which can be deployed in a terminal in the aforementioned embodiment. As shown in FIG15 , the communication device 1500 includes a determination module 1501 and a measurement module 1502 .

[0263] The determining module 1501 is configured to execute step 602 in the aforementioned embodiment;

[0264] The measurement module 1502 is configured to execute step 603 in the aforementioned embodiment.

[0265] Optionally, the determining module 1501 is specifically configured to determine a plurality of measurement windows according to a target time offset, a measurement window length, and a measurement period.

[0266] Optionally, the measurement module 1502 is specifically configured to: measure a measurement signal of at least one neighboring cell using a low-power receiver within each measurement window according to a cell identifier and a frequency of at least one neighboring cell.

[0267] Optionally, the apparatus 1500 further includes: a receiving module 1503, configured to receive a serving cell signal using a low-power receiver, where the serving cell signal carries first indication information; and the determining module 1501 is further configured to determine a measurement period from a plurality of candidate periods according to the first indication information.

[0268] Optionally, there are multiple target time offsets, each of which corresponds to a measurement window length; the determination module 1501 is specifically configured to determine multiple measurement windows according to the multiple target time offsets and the measurement window length corresponding to each target time offset.

[0269] Optionally, each target time offset corresponds to at least one frequency point, and each frequency point corresponds to a cell identifier of at least one neighboring area; the measurement module 1502 is specifically used to: determine at least one neighboring area to be measured in each measurement window based on at least one frequency point corresponding to each target time offset and at least one neighboring area cell identifier corresponding to each frequency point; and use a low-power receiver to measure the measurement signal of at least one neighboring area in each measurement window.

[0270] Optionally, the measurement module 1502 is specifically configured to: measure the measurement signal of at least one neighboring cell using a low-power receiver within each measurement window based on the measurement order of at least one neighboring cell indicated by the measurement order indication information.

[0271] Optionally, the serving cell signal carries second indication information, and the determination module 1501 is further configured to: determine the target time offset from a plurality of candidate time offsets according to the second indication information.

[0272] Optionally, the neighboring cell measurement signal and the serving cell signal both include at least one of a low-power wake-up signal, a low-power synchronization signal, and a low-power reference signal.

[0273] Optionally, the receiving module 1503 is also used to: receive measurement configuration information from the network device, the measurement configuration information including a target time offset, a measurement window length, a measurement period, a cell identifier and frequency of at least one neighboring area, and at least one item of measurement sequence indication information, the measurement sequence indication information is used to indicate the measurement sequence of at least one neighboring area.

[0274] In the present application, the target time offset can indicate the time offset between the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal and the serving cell signal. Therefore, the terminal can directly determine the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal according to the target time offset, and then use a low-power receiver to measure the neighboring cell measurement signal within the measurement window, thereby realizing cell measurement when the terminal is in a low-power state. Since the terminal in the embodiment of the present application can directly determine the measurement timing of the neighboring cell measurement signal according to the target time offset, there is no need to determine the measurement timing according to the frame number information, so the neighboring cell measurement signal may not carry the frame number information. In this way, the bit overhead of the neighboring cell measurement signal can be reduced, thereby better supporting the low-power receiver to perform cell measurement.

[0275] FIG16 is a schematic diagram of the structure of another communication device 1600 provided in an embodiment of the present application, which can be deployed in the terminal in the aforementioned embodiment. As shown in FIG16 , the communication device 1600 includes a first measurement module 1601 and a second measurement module 1602 .

[0276] The first measurement module 1601 is used to perform step 1302 in the above embodiment;

[0277] The second measurement module 1602 is used in step 1303 in the aforementioned embodiment.

[0278] Optionally, the second measurement module 1602 is specifically used to: if the signal quality of the serving cell signal is less than the first threshold and not less than the third threshold, then use a low-power receiver to measure the same-frequency measurement signal within the measurement window, the same-frequency measurement signal refers to the neighboring area measurement signal with the same frequency as the serving cell signal, and the third threshold is greater than the second threshold.

[0279] Optionally, the second measurement module 1602 is specifically used to: if the signal quality of the serving cell signal is less than the third threshold and not less than the second threshold, or if the same-frequency measurement signal is not received within the first reference time length, or if the neighboring area corresponding to the same-frequency measurement signal does not meet the cell reselection condition, then use a low-power receiver to measure the different-frequency measurement signal within the measurement window, where the different-frequency measurement signal refers to a neighboring area measurement signal whose frequency is different from that of the serving cell signal.

[0280] Optionally, the signal quality of the serving cell signal is indicated by the number of serving cell signals detected continuously within the second reference time length, or is indicated by the sum of the number of serving cell signals detected within the second reference time length, or is equal to the ratio of the number of detected serving cell signals to the number of received serving cell signals.

[0281] Optionally, the device 1600 is further configured to: switch from the serving cell to the target neighboring cell if the number of measurement signals of the target neighboring cell continuously detected within a third reference time period is greater than a fourth threshold, and the fourth threshold is not less than the first threshold.

[0282] Optionally, the neighboring cell measurement signal and the serving cell signal both include at least one of a low-power wake-up signal, a low-power synchronization signal, and a low-power reference signal.

[0283] In this embodiment of the present application, the signal quality of the serving cell signal is compared with a first threshold and a second threshold. If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is not less than the second threshold but less than the first threshold, neighboring cell measurement can be initiated. In other words, the terminal can initiate neighboring cell measurement before the signal quality of the serving cell reaches its worst level. In this way, compared to initiating neighboring cell measurement only when the signal quality of the serving cell is already very poor, the impact on the terminal's communication performance can be minimized.

[0284] FIG17 is a schematic structural diagram of another communication device 1700 provided in an embodiment of the present application. The device 1700 can be deployed in the network device in the aforementioned embodiment.

[0285] The communication device 1700 may include a sending module 1701, and the sending module 1701 is used to execute step 601, step 1301, or step 1401 in the aforementioned embodiment.

[0286] Optionally, the measurement configuration information sent by the sending module 1701 may also include at least one of the measurement window length, the measurement period, the cell identifier and frequency of at least one neighboring cell, and measurement order indication information, where the measurement order indication information is used to indicate the measurement order of the at least one neighboring cell.

[0287] It should be noted that the division of modules in the various communication devices provided in the above embodiments is schematic and is only a logical functional division. In actual implementation, there may be other division methods. In addition, the functional modules in the various embodiments of the present application may be integrated into a processor, or may exist separately physically, or two or more modules may be integrated into one module. The above-mentioned integrated modules may be implemented in the form of hardware or software functional modules.

[0288] If the integrated module is implemented in the form of a software function module and sold or used as an independent product, it can be stored in a computer-readable storage medium. Based on this understanding, the technical solution of the embodiment of the present application is essentially or the part that contributes to the prior art or all or part of the technical solution can be embodied in the form of a software product, and the computer software product is stored in a storage medium, including a number of instructions for enabling a network device (which may be a router or switch, etc.) or a processor (processor) to execute all or part of the steps of the method of each embodiment of the present application. The aforementioned storage medium includes: various media that can store program codes, such as a USB flash drive, a mobile hard disk, a read-only memory (ROM), a random access memory (RAM), a magnetic disk or an optical disk.

[0289] In addition, the communication device and the cell measurement method provided in the above embodiments belong to the same concept, and their specific implementation processes are detailed in the method embodiments, which will not be repeated here.

[0290] In the above embodiments, all or part of the embodiments can be implemented by software, hardware, firmware, or any combination thereof. When implemented using software, all or part of the embodiments can be implemented in the form of a computer program product. The computer program product includes one or more computer instructions. When the computer instructions are loaded and executed on a computer, the process or function according to the embodiment of the present application is generated in whole or in part. The computer can be a general-purpose computer, a special-purpose computer, a computer network, or other programmable device. The computer instructions can be stored in a computer-readable storage medium or transmitted from one computer-readable storage medium to another computer-readable storage medium. For example, the computer instructions can be transmitted from one website, computer, server, or data center to another website, computer, server, or data center via wired (e.g., coaxial cable, optical fiber, digital subscriber line (DSL)) or wireless (e.g., infrared, wireless, microwave, etc.) means. The computer-readable storage medium can be any available medium that can be accessed by a computer or a data storage device such as a server or data center that includes one or more available media integrated therein. The available medium may be a magnetic medium (eg, a floppy disk, a hard disk, a magnetic tape), an optical medium (eg, a digital versatile disc (DVD)), or a semiconductor medium (eg, a solid state disk (SSD)).

Claims

1. A cell measurement method, It is characterized in that The method comprises: Determine a measurement window of a neighboring cell measurement signal according to a target time offset, where the target time offset is used to indicate a time offset between the measurement window of the neighboring cell measurement signal and a serving cell signal; The neighboring cell measurement signal is measured using a low-power receiver within the measurement window.

2. The method according to claim 1, It is characterized in that The determining, according to the target time offset, a measurement window for a neighboring cell measurement signal includes: A plurality of measurement windows are determined according to the target time offset, the measurement window length and the measurement period.

3. The method according to claim 2, It is characterized in that The measuring the neighboring cell measurement signal by using a low-power receiver within the measurement window includes: According to the cell identifier and frequency of at least one neighboring cell, the measurement signal of the at least one neighboring cell is measured by using the low-power receiver in each measurement window.

4. The method according to claim 2 or 3, It is characterized in that The method further comprises: Receiving the serving cell signal using the low-power receiver, where the serving cell signal carries first indication information; The measurement period is determined from a plurality of candidate periods according to the first indication information.

5. The method according to claim 1, It is characterized in that There are multiple target time offsets, and each target time offset corresponds to a measurement window length; The determining, according to the target time offset, a measurement window for a neighboring cell measurement signal includes: A plurality of measurement windows are determined according to the plurality of target time offsets and a measurement window length corresponding to each target time offset.

6. The method according to claim 5, It is characterized in that Each target time offset corresponds to at least one frequency point, and each frequency point corresponds to at least one cell identifier of a neighboring cell; The measuring the neighboring cell measurement signal by using a low-power receiver within the measurement window includes: Determine at least one neighboring cell to be measured in each measurement window according to at least one frequency point corresponding to each target time offset and a cell identifier of at least one neighboring cell corresponding to each frequency point; The low-power receiver is used to measure the measurement signal of the at least one neighboring cell in each measurement window.

7. The method according to claim 3 or 6, It is characterized in that The measuring the measurement signal of the at least one neighboring cell by using the low-power receiver in each measurement window includes: Based on the measurement order of the at least one neighboring cell indicated by the measurement order indication information, the measurement signal of the at least one neighboring cell is measured by using the low-power receiver in each measurement window.

8. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 7, It is characterized in that The serving cell signal carries second indication information, and the method further includes: The target time offset is determined from a plurality of candidate time offsets according to the second indication information.

9. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 8, It is characterized in that The neighboring cell measurement signal and the serving cell signal both include at least one of a low-power wake-up signal, a low-power synchronization signal and a low-power reference signal.

10. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 9, It is characterized in that The method further comprises: receiving measurement configuration information, the measurement configuration information including at least one of the target time offset, the measurement window length, the measurement period, the cell identifier and the frequency of at least one neighboring cell, and the measurement sequence indication information; the measurement sequence indication information Used to indicate the measurement order of the at least one neighboring cell.

11. A cell measurement method, It is characterized in that The method comprises: Measuring the signal quality of the serving cell signal using a low power receiver; If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is less than a first threshold and not less than a second threshold, the neighboring cell measurement signal is measured using the low-power receiver within the measurement window, and the second threshold is the minimum signal quality threshold when the terminal is within the coverage range of the serving cell signal.

12. The method according to claim 11, It is characterized in that If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is less than a first threshold and not less than a second threshold, measuring the neighboring cell measurement signal by using the low-power receiver within the measurement window includes: If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is less than the first threshold and not less than the third threshold, the low-power receiver is used to measure the co-frequency measurement signal within the measurement window, where the co-frequency measurement signal refers to a neighboring area measurement signal having the same frequency as the serving cell signal, and the third threshold is greater than the second threshold.

13. The method according to claim 12, It is characterized in that The method further comprises: If the signal quality of the serving cell signal is less than the third threshold and not less than the second threshold, or if the co-frequency measurement signal is not received within the first reference time length, or if the neighboring cell corresponding to the co-frequency measurement signal does not meet the cell reselection condition, then the low-power receiver is used to measure the hetero-frequency measurement signal within the measurement window, where the hetero-frequency measurement signal refers to a neighboring cell measurement signal having a frequency different from that of the serving cell signal.

14. The method according to any one of claims 11 to 13, It is characterized in that The signal quality of the serving cell signal is indicated by the number of the serving cell signals detected continuously within a second reference time duration, or is indicated by the sum of the number of the serving cell signals detected within the second reference time duration, or is equal to the ratio of the number of the serving cell signals detected to the number of the serving cell signals received.

15. The method according to any one of claims 11 to 14, It is characterized in that The method further comprises: If the number of measurement signals of the target neighboring cell continuously detected within the third reference time length is greater than a fourth threshold, switching from the serving cell to the target neighboring cell, the fourth threshold is not less than the first threshold.

16. The method according to any one of claims 11 to 15, It is characterized in that The neighboring cell measurement signal and the serving cell signal both include at least one of a low-power wake-up signal, a low-power synchronization signal and a low-power reference signal.

17. A cell measurement method, It is characterized in that The method comprises: Send measurement configuration information, where the measurement configuration information includes a target time offset, where the target time offset is used to indicate a time offset between a measurement window of a neighboring cell measurement signal and a serving cell signal, where the measurement window is a window in which the terminal measures the neighboring cell measurement signal using a low-power receiver.

18. The method according to claim 17, It is characterized in that The measurement configuration information also includes at least one of a measurement window length, a measurement period, a cell identifier and a frequency of at least one neighboring cell, and measurement order indication information, where the measurement order indication information is used to indicate a measurement order of the at least one neighboring cell.

19. A communication device, It is characterized in that The communication device comprises a module for executing the method according to any one of claims 1 to 10, or comprises a module for executing the method according to any one of claims 11 to 16, or comprises a module for executing the method according to claim 17 or 18.

20. A communication device, It is characterized in that The communication device comprises a processor, wherein the processor is configured to execute the method according to any one of claims 1 to 10, or configured to execute the method according to any one of claims 11 to 16, or configured to execute the method according to claim 17 or 18.

21. A computer-readable storage medium, It is characterized in that The computer-readable storage medium comprises instructions, which, when executed by a processor, enable the method according to any one of claims 1 to 10 to be implemented, or enable the method according to any one of claims 11 to 16 to be implemented, or enable the method according to claim 17 or 18 to be implemented.

22. A computer program product, It is characterized in that The computer program product comprises instructions, and when the instructions are executed by a processor, the method according to any one of claims 1 to 10 is implemented, or the method according to any one of claims 11 to 16 is implemented, or the method according to claim 17 or 18 is implemented.

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