Multipath Transport Redundancy for Network Outage Resilience
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Solution Overview
Problem
Broadband communication networks experience outages due to adverse weather conditions and congestion, leading to unreliable data transmission, particularly in wired broadband networks, which can affect critical services like voice communications and alarm monitoring.
Innovation Solution
Implementing enhanced multipath transport (MPT) systems that redundantly send data packets over both wireless and wired broadband networks, using a tunneling protocol with a unique identification field to ensure packet integrity and reliability across both channels, and configuring mobile operating systems to detect geofence crossings and notify backend systems.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If data is transmitted over wired broadband networks, then transmission bandwidth is high, but reliability deteriorates due to outages from weather and congestion
Solution Approach 1:
The patent combines wired and wireless broadband networks into a unified communication system, where data packets are simultaneously transmitted over both network types. This merging allows the system to leverage the high bandwidth of wired networks while using wireless networks as a reliable backup during outages, thereby resolving the contradiction between transmission capacity and reliability.
Solution Approach 2:
The system establishes redundant wireless communication paths in advance before outages occur. When wired network outages happen due to weather or congestion, the pre-configured wireless paths are already available to immediately take over data transmission, providing beforehand cushioning against reliability failures.
2Reliability
If redundant transmission over multiple networks is implemented, then reliability improves, but system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an MPT (Multipath Transport) protocol as an intermediary layer that manages the complexity of redundant transmission. This protocol handles packet encapsulation, path selection, and error correction automatically, shielding users from the underlying complexity while maintaining high reliability through multi-network transmission.
Solution Approach 2:
The MPT protocol is designed as a universal solution that can operate across different network types (wired and wireless) with a single unified interface. This multi-functionality allows the system to manage redundant transmission paths without requiring separate complex systems for each network type, thereby reducing overall system complexity while maintaining reliability.
3Reliability
If geofence detection is implemented in mobile operating systems, then service reliability improves through real-time notifications, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The geofence detection system operates autonomously within the mobile operating system, automatically monitoring location and triggering notifications when geofence boundaries are crossed. This self-service capability eliminates the need for continuous manual monitoring or complex external control systems, providing real-time service reliability while keeping the added complexity minimal and self-managing.
Data Source
AI summary
Methods and systems for enhanced multipath transport (MPT) are provided. Exemplary methods include: receiving by a hub a first data packet from a client; identifying a priority of the first data packet; encapsulating the first data packet based on the priority; redundantly sending a first encapsulated first data packet to an MPT server over a wired broadband network and a second encapsulated first data packet to the MPT server over a wireless broadband network; getting a second data packet responsive to the first encapsulated data packet, the second data packet being produced by a service; forwarding the second data packet to the client.