Signaling Message Overhead Reduction via Differential Encoding

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Solution Overview

Problem

The overhead of frequently sent signaling messages in multi-carrier mobile communication systems is high due to the repetition of unchanged information, which can lead to inefficiencies and potential ambiguity if messages are missed by the receiver.

Innovation Solution

The method involves generating and transmitting lightweight signaling messages with flags indicating that certain fields or parameters are the same as in previous messages, reducing the size of the message and maintaining message sequence integrity, and using incremental message sequence numbers to detect missed messages.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Reliability

If full signaling messages are transmitted frequently to maintain communication, then communication reliability is improved, but message overhead increases

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvecommunication reliabilityVSAvoidmessage overhead
Core Design Contradiction:
ReliabilityVSQuantity of substance

Solution Approach 1:

The patent extracts only the changed portions of signaling messages and transmits them separately, while indicating which fields have changed using flag bits. This allows the receiver to reconstruct the complete message by combining the previous message with the extracted changes, thereby reducing overhead while maintaining reliability.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #2Taking out (Extraction)

Solution Approach 2:

The signaling message is segmented into individual fields, each with an associated flag bit indicating whether that field has changed. This segmentation allows selective transmission of only the changed fields rather than the entire message, reducing overhead while preserving the ability to maintain communication reliability.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #1Segmentation

2Productivity

If message size is reduced by omitting unchanged information, then transmission efficiency is improved, but message ambiguity increases

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvetransmission efficiencyVSAvoidmessage ambiguity
Core Design Contradiction:
ProductivityVSLoss of information

Solution Approach 1:

The patent uses flag bits as feedback indicators to tell the receiver which fields have changed and need to be updated. This feedback mechanism eliminates ambiguity by clearly indicating which portions of the message contain new information and which should be retained from the previous message.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #23Feedback

Solution Approach 2:

The patent performs preliminary action by maintaining the previous complete message at the receiver side before receiving the differential update. This allows the receiver to have a complete reference message ready, eliminating ambiguity when the reduced-size update message arrives.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #10Preliminary action

3Quantity of substance

If differential encoding is used to reduce overhead, then bandwidth utilization is improved, but implementation complexity increases

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvebandwidth utilizationVSAvoidimplementation complexity
Core Design Contradiction:
Quantity of substanceVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The patent applies partial action by implementing differential encoding only for specific fields that have changed, rather than encoding the entire message. The flag bits indicate which fields require differential processing, allowing the system to achieve bandwidth efficiency for changed portions while avoiding the complexity of fully differential encoding the entire message.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #16Partial or excessive action

Data Source

PatentEP1952602B1Method and apparatus for overhead reduction of signaling messages
Publication Date: 2012.07.18 LG ELECTRONICS INC
  • EP1952602B1 patent drawingFigure 1
  • EP1952602B1 patent drawingFigure 2A~2B
  • EP1952602B1 patent drawingFigure 3

AI summary

A method and apparatus to reduce the overhead of frequently sent signaling messages is provided. Various methods are presented which facilitate conveying information that is unchanged from information in the earlier part of the message, or in a previous signaling message, without sending the previous information in its entirety.