CN101772101B

CN101772101B - Method for terminal to scan sub-base stations, wireless communication system, terminal and base station

Info

Publication number: CN101772101B
Application number: CN200910171730.7A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 谢峰; 鲁照华; 刘扬; 张磊; 王利; 夏薇; 刘颖
Original assignee: ZTE Corp
Current assignee: ZTE Corp
Priority date: 2009-01-05
Filing date: 2009-08-28
Publication date: 2015-07-22
Anticipated expiration: 2029-08-28
Also published as: CN101772101A

Abstract

The invention discloses a method for a terminal to scan sub-base stations, a wireless communication system, the terminal and a base station, wherein the method comprises that: the terminal scans the sub-base stations to determine one or more adjacent sub-base stations and/or acquires adjacent area information; and/or the terminal scans the sub-base stations to determine the sub-base stations which carry out switching or network access. By carrying out distributed hierarchical management on the adjacent area information, the invention avoids the process of scanning and accessing the dedicated sub-base stations which does not belong to the invention, or the sub-base stations which cannot support more users to access, or the nonadjacent substations, solves the problems of large scanning cost and long scanning time in the related technology, improves the switching performance of the wireless communication system and reduces the cost of the communication and the system.

Description

Method for terminal to scan sub-base station, wireless communication system, terminal and base station

Technical Field

The present invention relates to the field of communications, and in particular, to a method for a terminal to scan a sub-base station, a wireless communication system, a terminal, and a base station.

Background

In a wireless communication system, a base station refers to a device that provides a service to a terminal, and can perform wireless communication with the terminal through electromagnetic waves. By using a base station, radio coverage can be provided for terminals within a geographic area, which may be referred to as a cell, in a wireless communication system.

In general, in order to provide wireless communication to users in a wide range, a wireless communication system needs to deploy a base station with a large coverage area, such a base station is generally called a Macro base station (Macro bs), and a Cell covered by the base station is generally called a Macro Cell.

Meanwhile, in consideration of different requirements and different use environments of users in a wireless communication system, a higher-quality wireless communication service needs to be provided for the users in certain environments or scenes, and some base stations with small coverage and low transmission power are adopted for the requirements. Typically, these small base stations include a small base station (Micro BS), a Micro base station (Pico BS), and a Femto base station (Femto BS, Femtocell BS, or WiMAX Femtocell Access Point, WFAP for short) (which may also be referred to as a home base station, a personal base station, a Pico base station, a Femto base station). High-speed and/or proprietary wireless communication services may be provided for indoor or hot zone (hot zone) areas by deploying sub-base stations in a wireless communication system. The Cell served by a sub-base station is called a sub-Cell (Femto Cell), and the terminals served within a sub-Cell are usually stationary or moving only at a low speed (e.g. moving at walking speed).

In general, the sub-base stations can be divided into two types (or called access type subscription type) of Open (Open Subscriber Group, OSG for short) and private (CSG for short), and a third type of access between the two types of access, called semi-private (CSG-Open), can be defined, in which case the private (CSG) sub-base stations include completely private (CSG-Closed) and semi-private (CSG-Open). Usually, the maximum number of users allowed to access the sub-base station at the same time is 6 to 8. On the premise that the maximum number of users is not exceeded, the open sub-base station can be accessed to any user; the private sub-base station (when the two network types are distinguished) or the completely private sub-base station (when the three network types are distinguished) is only opened for the private user (CSG-member), and other users (non-CSG-member) except the private user cannot be allowed to access the private sub-base station (when the two network types are distinguished) or the completely private sub-base station (except for the emergency access emergency call situation) even in the coverage area of the private sub-base station; when the network access types are divided into three types, the semi-proprietary sub-base station preferentially serves the proprietary user, and when the residual resources exist, the non-proprietary user can be served.

In order to ensure the quality of service, the wireless communication system is required to provide uninterrupted and seamless communication services for the mobile terminal. That is, when the terminal moves between the macro cell and the sub-cell, and between the sub-cells, the wireless communication system needs to provide the user with seamless handover between the macro cell and the sub-cell, and between the sub-cells. To ensure that the handover is not noticeable to the user, the base station serving the terminal needs to be provided with information of neighboring cells (which may be referred to as neighbor information) to the terminal before the handover, so that the terminal scans neighboring base stations to find the chance of handover.

Since a large number of tens or even hundreds of sub-cells may exist in a macro cell, if the macro base station notifies all sub-cell information to the terminal, the macro base station may cause problems of large amount of transmission information, long terminal scanning time, and large scanning overhead. For the terminal, not only the base stations allowed to access but also the private base stations to which the non-terminal belongs and the base stations which cannot support more terminals to access are scanned during scanning, thereby increasing unnecessary scanning overhead. In addition, in the initial network access or network re-access of the terminal, since the terminal does not know which accessible sub-base stations exist around, the time for the terminal to detect the sub-base stations may be too long; also, when the terminal is in an emergency call situation, since all sub-base stations are accessible to the terminal, the terminal also needs to quickly detect the sub-base stations existing around to access the network and/or allow the network to locate the terminal.

Aiming at the problems of long scanning time and high cost of a base station in the related technology, an effective solution is not provided at present.

Disclosure of Invention

The present invention is made in view of the problems of long base station scanning time and high overhead in the related art, and therefore, a main object of the present invention is to provide a method for a terminal to scan a sub-base station, a wireless communication system, a terminal, and a base station.

To achieve the above object, according to an aspect of the present invention, a method for a terminal to scan a sub-base station is provided.

The method for scanning the sub-base station by the terminal comprises the following steps: the terminal scans the sub-base stations to determine one or more adjacent sub-base stations and/or obtain adjacent area information; and/or the terminal scans the sub-base stations to determine the sub-base stations for switching or network access.

Preferably, before the terminal scans the sub-base stations, the method further includes: the base station sends the adjacent cell information to the terminal so that the terminal can scan the sub-base station according to the adjacent cell information, wherein the adjacent cell information comprises the general adjacent cell information and/or the specific adjacent cell information, and the general adjacent cell information comprises the appointed information and/or the public information.

Preferably, the appointment information includes carrier frequency division information and/or preamble division information, where the division information is the correspondence between various types of base stations and/or various types of base stations accessing the network and the carrier frequency and/or the preamble.

Preferably, the partitioning information of the preamble includes partitioning information of the secondary preamble sequence, where the partitioning information of the secondary preamble sequence indicates a correspondence between base stations of different types and/or network access types and the secondary preamble sequence.

Preferably, determining the correspondence between the various types of base stations and/or the various types of network entry base stations and the secondary preamble sequence includes: allocating all auxiliary leader sequences in advance according to various types of base stations and/or various network access types of base stations; or, allocating part of the secondary preamble sequence in advance according to various types of base stations and/or various network access types of base stations.

Preferably, in the case that a part of the secondary preamble sequence is pre-allocated according to various types of base stations and/or various network access types of base stations, the method further includes: the terminal obtains the corresponding relation between all the auxiliary leader sequences and the base stations of various types and/or the base stations of various network access types by the corresponding relation between the base stations of various types and/or the base stations of various network access types and the auxiliary leader sequences obtained from the base stations and combining the auxiliary leader sequences distributed in advance.

In order to achieve the above object, according to another aspect of the present invention, there is also provided a terminal.

The terminal according to the present invention includes: the first scanning module is used for scanning the sub-base stations according to the summarized adjacent area information to determine one or more adjacent sub-base stations and/or obtain adjacent area information; and the second scanning module is used for scanning the sub-base stations according to the specific adjacent cell information to determine the sub-base stations of which the terminals are switched or accessed to the network.

Preferably, further comprising: and the switching or network access initiating module is used for initiating a switching or network access process under the condition that the second scanning module determines the sub-base station which needs to be switched or network accessed.

In order to achieve the above object, according to another aspect of the present invention, there is also provided a base station.

The base station according to the present invention comprises: the neighbor cell information sending module is used for actively sending the neighbor cell information to the terminal or responding to a request message of the terminal or triggering and sending the neighbor cell information to the terminal based on a network; and the switching or network access initiating module is used for determining the sub base station which needs to be switched or network accessed by the terminal according to the result report of the sub base station which is determined by the terminal scanning sub base station and is switched or network accessed, and initiating a switching or network access process.

Preferably, the neighboring cell information sent by the neighboring cell information sending module includes summarized neighboring cell information and/or specific neighboring cell information, and the summarized neighboring cell information includes appointment information and/or common information.

To achieve the above object, according to another aspect of the present invention, there is also provided a wireless communication system.

The wireless communication system according to the present invention comprises: the system comprises at least one large-coverage base station and at least one micro base station, wherein the large-coverage base station is used for sending the summary and/or specific neighbor cell information of sub base stations in the coverage area of each large-coverage base station, and comprises at least one of a macro base station, a small base station and a micro base station; and the sub-base stations are used for sending respective specific adjacent area information.

By means of the technical scheme of the invention, through the distributed hierarchical management of the adjacent region information, the processing of scanning and accessing a special sub-base station which is not the sub-base station of the adjacent region information, or a sub-base station which can not support more users to access, or a non-adjacent sub-base station is avoided, the problems of large scanning overhead and long time in the related technology are solved, the switching performance of a wireless communication system is improved, and the communication and system overhead is reduced.

Drawings

The accompanying drawings, which are included to provide a further understanding of the invention and are incorporated in and constitute a part of this application, illustrate embodiment(s) of the invention and together with the description serve to explain the invention without limiting the invention. In the drawings:

fig. 1 is a block diagram of a wireless communication system in accordance with an embodiment of the present system;

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of an example of the structure of the system shown in FIG. 1;

fig. 3 is a simplified flowchart of a terminal scanning method according to a first embodiment of the method of the present invention;

fig. 4 is a simplified flowchart of a method for processing neighbor cell information in a terminal scanning method according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 5 is a flowchart of a first mechanism for sending neighbor cell information in a method for processing neighbor cell information in a terminal scanning method according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 6 is a flowchart of a second mechanism for sending neighbor cell information in a method for processing neighbor cell information in a terminal scanning method according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 7 is a flowchart of a third mechanism for sending neighbor cell information in a method for processing neighbor cell information in a terminal scanning method according to an embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 8 is a diagram illustrating a first partition type of a secondary synchronization sequence according to an embodiment of the method of the present invention;

FIG. 9 is a diagram illustrating a second partition type of a secondary synchronization sequence according to an embodiment of the method of the present invention;

FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating a third partition type of a secondary synchronization sequence according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 11 is a flowchart of a method for a terminal to scan a sub-base station according to a second embodiment of the method of the present invention;

fig. 12 is a flowchart of a method for a terminal to scan a sub-base station according to a second embodiment of the present invention, where the terminal in a sub-zone scans neighboring sub-base stations;

fig. 13 is a flowchart of a method for a terminal to scan a sub-base station in a macro cell according to a second embodiment of the method of the present invention;

fig. 14 is a flowchart of a method for a terminal to scan a sub-base station in a macro cell and seek base station assistance according to a second embodiment of the method of the present invention;

fig. 15 is a flowchart of the terminal seeking assistance from the base station and directly responding to the base station in the method for the terminal to scan sub-base stations according to the second embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 16 is a flowchart of a method for a terminal to scan sub-base stations according to a second embodiment of the present invention, in which the terminal seeks base station assistance, base station forwarding, and responses from neighboring sub-base stations;

fig. 17 is a flowchart of a method for a terminal to scan a sub-base station according to a second embodiment of the present invention, where the terminal seeks base station assistance, base station forwarding, transmission from an adjacent sub-base station, and base station re-forwarding;

fig. 18 is a block diagram of a terminal according to a first embodiment of the apparatus of the present invention;

fig. 19 is a block diagram of a preferred structure of the terminal shown in fig. 18;

fig. 20 is a block diagram of a base station according to a second embodiment of the apparatus of the present invention.

Detailed Description

Overview of the function

In consideration of the problems of long scanning time and high cost of the base stations in the related technology, the invention provides a scheme for the terminal to scan by processing the layered adjacent area information by a plurality of base stations in the system, and the invention can reduce the information amount of each scanning when the terminal scans the base stations, thereby reducing the scanning delay and the scanning cost.

System embodiment

In this embodiment, a wireless communication system is provided, which includes at least one large coverage base station and at least one sub-base station, wherein the large coverage base station described herein includes at least one of a macro base station, a small base station, and a micro base station. In the system according to this embodiment, the large-coverage base station may process the summarized neighbor cell information of the sub-base stations in its respective coverage area; the sub-base stations can process their respective specific neighbor cell information.

Fig. 1 is a specific example of the structure of a wireless communication system according to the present embodiment.

As shown in fig. 1, the wireless communication system according to the present embodiment may include large-coverage base stations 1 and 2, and sub-base stations 3, 4, 5, and 6, wherein the sub-base stations 3 and 4 are located within the coverage of the large-coverage base station 1, and the sub-base stations 5 and 6 are located within the coverage of the large-coverage base station 2. In the system shown in fig. 1, the sub-base stations 3, 4, 5, and 6 may process their respective specific neighbor information, the large-coverage base station 1 processes the general neighbor information of the sub-base stations 3 and 4, and the large-coverage base station 2 processes the general neighbor information of the sub-base stations 5 and 6.

When a terminal scans a base station, the terminal may first obtain summarized neighbor cell information from a large-coverage base station 1 or 2, then perform initialization scanning to discover all and/or some types (Subscription types) of sub base stations by using the summarized neighbor cell information, or first determine an adjacent sub base station, such as the sub base station 3 or the sub base station 5, and then perform targeted scanning on the sub base stations 3, 4 or the sub base stations 5, 6, so that the scanning accumulated information overhead and time overhead can be limited to acceptable levels no matter how many sub base stations exist under the large-coverage base station, and particularly, the scanning accumulated information overhead and time overhead can be greatly reduced when many sub base stations exist under the large-coverage base station.

In this description, initializing a scanning of a sub-base station (i.e., scanning a sub-base station to determine one or more neighboring sub-base stations) is equivalent to probing a sub-base station, i.e., discovering the presence of surrounding sub-base stations, which may include measurements of the sub-base station. We may also refer to the initialization scan as a blind scan. When performing the femto cell detection, the terminal performs the femto cell detection based on limited information (for example, the general neighbor cell information in the present specification).

Fig. 2 is a schematic diagram of a wireless communication system according to the present embodiment. In fig. 2, it can be seen that the coverage area of the large base station that processes the common information of the sub-base stations includes a plurality of sub-base stations that process the respective neighboring information (adjacent sub-base station information).

The method for the system to process the neighbor cell information for terminal scanning will be described in detail below. Also, the large coverage base stations appearing hereinafter may include macro base stations, small base stations, and micro base stations.

Method embodiment one

In this embodiment, a method for processing neighbor cell information for terminal scanning is provided, which is used to process neighbor cell information of a sub-base station in a wireless communication system for terminal scanning.

The method for processing the neighbor cell information according to the embodiment comprises the following steps: each base station in the system processes the neighbor information corresponding to each coverage area for the terminal or other base stations to use, wherein the neighbor information processed by each base station in each base station is information of the neighboring sub-base station of the base station (i.e., information related to the neighboring sub-base station of the base station). The neighbor information processed by each base station may be provided to other base stations or terminals performing base station scanning, and the neighbor information is related to the used terminals in the coverage area, and may be neighbor information required by the terminals or neighbor information useful for the terminals.

The neighborhood information processed by each base station may be related to the movement pattern and/or usage pattern of the terminal in the coverage area of the base station, for example, the neighborhood information of each sub-base station may be determined according to a relatively fixed action route of a user in an office area.

Specifically, each large-coverage base station in each base station may process summarized neighbor cell information within its coverage area (including within the coverage area margin), and each sub-base station in each base station may process specific neighbor cell information near its coverage area.

The summarized neighbor cell information processed by each large-coverage base station includes at least one of the following: the information may include, for example, information about the contract between the large-coverage base station and its sub-coverage base stations, information common to the sub-coverage base stations, and/or information about the vicinity of the terminals in its coverage (i.e., information most frequently used by or most useful to the terminals served by the base station) related to the behavior patterns (including movement patterns and/or usage patterns) of the terminals in its coverage.

The common information or the agreed information includes communication characteristic information used by the sub-base stations in the coverage area of the large-coverage base station, where the communication characteristic information may include at least one of: carrier frequency information, preamble (or synchronization, SCH) characteristic information, carrier frequency distribution condition information, preamble or synchronization distribution characteristic information. The usage pattern of the terminal may include at least one of: the authorization corresponding relation information of the terminal and the special sub-base station, a terminal list (namely a white list of the sub-base station or Femto-AAA) which can be accessed by the authorization of the special sub-base station, and a special sub-base station list which can be accessed by the authorization of the terminal.

For the femto, the specific neighboring cell information processed by the femto includes at least one of the following: the specific information of each adjacent sub-base station includes a carrier frequency used by the sub-base station, an identification number (BS ID and/or CSG ID) of the sub-base station, Preamble information (including PA-Preamble Index main Preamble information and/or SA-Preamble Index auxiliary Preamble information) of the sub-base station, Type information (base station Type and/or Access Type subscription Type) of the sub-base station, state information of the sub-base station, Physical (PHY for short) layer configuration information of the sub-base station, Media Access Control (MAC for short) layer configuration information (MAC layer version) of the sub-base station, TDD/FDD identification, multi-carrier capability and configuration, and a base station name (name readable in manual selection mode by a user), Base station location indications (e.g., geographic location, and/or overlapping and/or neighboring base station identities, and/or location reference information using RSSI). The type information may include a private identifier or an open identifier (in the case of two network access types) or a completely private/semi-private/open identifier (in the case of three network access types). Optionally, the type information may or may not be included in the base station identification number and/or the preamble (i.e., the base station identification number and/or the preamble corresponds to the type). The state information includes an accessible identity or an inaccessible identity (cell barring identity), and may further include a Low-power state identity (Low-duty operational Mode, which may be used to identify whether the current base station is in a Low-power operation Mode or a normal operation Mode).

Preferably, each base station may rank the processed neighbor cell information according to a scanning priority of the base station corresponding to the neighbor cell information processed by the base station, so that the terminal can scan the base station conveniently, and preferably, the scanning priority may be determined according to a type of the base station, a behavior pattern of a user (for example, a user's network access user's subscription and/or a possibility/probability that the base station is used by the user), and/or an operator policy.

Preferably, when each base Station performs the neighbor cell information processing, the neighbor cell information may be collected and generated through a backbone (backbone) network, and/or a backhaul (backhaul), and/or an air interface (air interface), and/or a Relay base Station (Relay Station), and/or other channels at the time of network initialization.

Optionally, the manner of generating the neighbor cell information may be one of the following or a combination thereof: generating neighborhood information based on a Positioning System (e.g., Global Positioning System (GPS) for short); generating neighborhood information based on a positioning function of a Cable (e.g., a Digital Subscriber Line (DSL)); generating neighbor cell information based on scanning and/or measurement between base stations; generating neighbor cell information based on information interaction between the terminal and the base station and/or information interaction between the base station and the base station (for example, information interaction in the base station switching process); generating neighbor cell information based on the measurement of the terminal; and acquiring the neighbor cell information from the core network and/or other base stations and/or terminals.

On the basis of collecting and generating the neighbor cell information, part of base stations or all base stations actively or in response to neighbor cell information requests from terminals or terminal groups or other base stations transmit and/or forward the neighbor cell information through a backbone network, and/or a backhaul, and/or an air interface, and/or a relay base station. When sending the neighbor cell information, one or a combination of broadcast, multicast and unicast may be adopted.

After the sending of the neighbor cell information is performed, the neighbor cell information to be sent and/or the scanning indication corresponding to the neighbor cell information are optimally configured according to the final receiver of the neighbor cell information (including the geographical location, and/or the moving mode, and/or the using mode of the final receiver).

When the base station responds to the neighbor cell information request to send the neighbor cell information, the neighbor cell information to be sent needs to be optimally configured (i.e., customized) according to request content and/or a request source (including a geographical position, a mobile mode and/or a use mode) included in the neighbor cell information request, and then the configured neighbor cell information is sent, so that the sent neighbor cell information can best meet the requirement of a requesting party, and transmission overhead and overhead when a receiving party uses the information are reduced. Specifically, when the base station broadcasts the neighboring cell information of the sub-base station to all terminals in the coverage area, only the summarized neighboring cell information and/or the neighboring cell information of the open sub-base station is sent (for example, the macro base station broadcasts the summarized information and/or the specific information of all or part of the open sub-base stations); when the base station faces the terminal or the terminal group in the coverage area to unicast or multicast the neighbor cell information of the sub-base station, only the neighbor cell information of the sub-base station which can be accessed by the terminal or the terminal group is sent, wherein the neighbor cell information of the open sub-base station and the neighbor cell information of the sub-base station authorized for the terminal or the terminal group are included (for example, the macro base station unicasts the specific information of the special sub-base station to the terminal).

The neighbor cell information request from the terminal can be forwarded through other base stations, and the neighbor cell information sent to the terminal by the base station can also be forwarded through other base stations; and, the neighbor information sent by the base station may be customized for the terminal or base station/base station group that is ultimately received.

When sending the neighbor cell information, the base station may send the neighbor cell information at one time or in multiple times according to a predetermined priority (for example, the priority may be a type of the base station) of the neighbor cell information that the base station needs to send, where the neighbor cell information with a high priority may be sent preferentially when being sent in multiple times.

The neighboring cell information sent by the base station may be different according to different sending manners, for example, when the base station broadcasts the neighboring cell information to a plurality of terminals, the broadcasted neighboring cell information may be the neighboring cell information that is required by all the terminals (for example, the neighboring cell information may be common information that a plurality of sub base stations have and that all the terminals request to acquire); when the base station transmits the neighbor cell information to a single terminal, the transmitted neighbor cell information may be the neighbor cell information of the sub base station that the terminal requests to acquire, and the transmitted neighbor cell information may be more specific.

Preferably, the neighbor information sent by the base station for the terminal does not include information of the sub-base station whose state identifier is not accessible, nor information of the sub-base station whose type identifier that the terminal is not authorized to access is a proprietary sub-base station, that is, for the sub-base station that has no capability to continue accepting the terminal (possibly due to backhaul disconnection, system error, capacity/load limitation, etc.), or is not allowed to accept the terminal, the neighbor information will not be sent, thereby further saving overhead.

Through the processing, the problems of long base station scanning time and high cost in the related technology can be solved, and the information amount of each scanning when the terminal scans the base station is effectively reduced, so that the scanning delay and the scanning cost are reduced.

The method for processing the neighbor cell information for terminal scanning according to the present embodiment will be described below with reference to specific examples. Specifically, although the terminal scanning method is mainly described in the context of handover in the following methods, the terminal scanning method is similar in initial network entry and/or network re-entry, and the main difference is that the terminal performs scanning according to previously stored neighbor cell information (e.g., partition information of a secondary synchronization sequence) in the initial network entry, and can perform scanning using various information (including summary and/or specific neighbor cell information) acquired from the base station when reselecting the base station in the Idle state or performing network re-entry when exiting the Idle state.

Fig. 3 is a flowchart of a terminal scanning method according to the present embodiment. As shown in fig. 3, the following steps may be included:

step 301, the terminal obtains the summary and/or specific neighbor information sent by the base station.

Step 302, the terminal scans the sub-base station according to the summarized and/or specific neighbor cell information.

The process shown in fig. 3 is described below in conjunction with examples 1 to 8.

Fig. 4 is a flowchart of processing neighbor cell information in the method according to the first embodiment. As shown in fig. 4, the following steps may be included:

step 401, the base station collects and generates neighbor cell information.

Step 402, the base station sends the neighbor cell information and/or the scanning indication corresponding to the neighbor cell information to the terminal or other base stations.

The processing shown in fig. 4 is described below in conjunction with examples 1 to 8.

Example 1

The macro base station collects the public information of the sub base stations in the macro area through a core network (backbone network) or other modes, wherein the public information comprises carrier frequency information and leading information used by the sub base stations.

The macro base station collects the information from the sub base stations to generate public information, namely the distribution characteristics of the carrier frequency used by the sub base stations and the distribution characteristics of the preamble. For example, the distribution characteristic of the carrier frequencies used by the sub-base stations may be represented as whether the sub-base stations exist on all or a certain carrier frequency (e.g., on the same carrier frequency as or a different carrier frequency from the carrier frequency used by the macro base station) and/or the number of sub-base stations using a certain carrier frequency; the distribution characteristics of the preambles used by the femto base stations may be expressed as the number of femto base stations distributed in a certain preamble interval (which may correspond to a certain preamble type, such as fully-proprietary/semi-proprietary/open or proprietary/open), and/or the range of intervals in which the preambles of the femto base stations are distributed (e.g. the interval of preambles used by all or a certain type and/or by femto base stations on a certain carrier frequency, which may be expressed by different methods, such as by at least two of a minimum preamble index, a maximum preamble index difference). The macro base station transmits neighbor information (which may be via a neighbor message AAI _ NBR-ADV or a dedicated FEMTO base station message such as AAI _ FEMTO-ADV) to the terminal periodically or based on a terminal request (the request message may be via a neighbor request message AAI _ NBR-REQ, and/or a scan request message AAI _ SCN-REQ, and/or a scan report message AAI _ SCN-REP, and/or a dedicated FEMTO base station information request message AAI _ FEMTO-REQ). The flows of the three mechanisms for the base station to send the neighbor cell information will be described in detail in example 2 (fig. 5), example 3 (fig. 6), and example 4 (fig. 7) below. After receiving the common information sent by the macro base station, the terminal in the macro cell may perform subsequent operations using the obtained information, such as performing initial scanning (i.e., scanning the sub-base stations to determine one or more adjacent sub-base stations and/or obtaining information of neighboring cells) according to the information to discover adjacent sub-base stations (i.e., scanning for discovering adjacent sub-base stations, i.e., probing the sub-base stations).

Fig. 5 is a flowchart of sending neighbor cell information by a base station based on a terminal request in the neighbor cell information processing method according to this embodiment. As shown in fig. 5, the following steps are specifically included:

step 501, the terminal sends a neighbor information request to the base station.

In step 502, the base station may customize the neighbor cell information and/or the scanning indication corresponding to the neighbor cell information for the terminal.

Step 503, the base station sends the neighboring cell information and/or the scanning indication corresponding to the neighboring cell information to the terminal.

The process shown in FIG. 5 is further described below in connection with example 2.

Example 2

In this example, the terminal may send a neighbor information request (e.g., carrying a corresponding indication via a neighbor information request message AAI _ NBR-REQ, or via a child base station information request message AAI _ FEMTO-REQ, or via other messages such as an AAI _ SCN-REP message) to a serving base station (possibly a large coverage base station such as a macro base station, or possibly a child base station) when accessing (including handover into, initial network entry, network re-entry) the macro base station or other base stations, or when needed. For example, the terminal may request the macro base station to unicast the common information of the sub-base stations within the macro cell to the terminal in preparation for finding a neighboring sub-base station (e.g., the macro base station responds to the terminal's request via an AAI _ NBR-ADV, or AAI _ NBR-RSP, or AAI _ FEMTO-ADV, or AAI _ SCN-RSP message). The neighbor cell information request may carry a requested neighbor cell information type, may be a request common information, may be a request specific neighbor cell information, may be a request specific and/or open information of the sub-base station (when two or three sub-base station access types are divided) or a request specific and/or semi-specific and/or open information of the sub-base station (when three sub-base station access types are divided). The serving base station customizes (i.e., optimally configures) the neighbor information for the terminal based on the indications of these requests. The serving base station may also generate customized neighbor information for a specific terminal (e.g., based on the geographic location of the terminal and/or its affiliated femto base stations or a proprietary member group), e.g., using a GPS positioning system to generate its neighbor femto base station list for the terminal. In addition, the geographical location information of the terminal may be indicated in the request message, or indicated in the LBS report message or directly obtained through the LBS location function.

Fig. 6 is a flowchart of a base station periodically transmitting neighbor cell information in the neighbor cell information processing method according to the present embodiment. As shown in fig. 6, the method may specifically include the following steps:

step 601, the base station sets the time for sending the neighbor information.

At step 602, the base station may customize neighbor information for the terminal.

Step 603, the base station sends the neighboring cell information to the terminal.

The process shown in FIG. 6 is further described below in connection with example 3.

Example 3

The base station may periodically or aperiodically transmit the neighbor information, and for this reason, the base station needs to set a time for transmitting the neighbor information in advance. The base station may be a large coverage base station such as a macro base station, or may be a sub base station. For example, the macro base station may periodically broadcast the summary information of the sub-base stations (e.g., transmit soft partition information of the secondary synchronization sequence through S-SFH IE or Extended system information (Extended system configuration, or AAI _ SCD system configuration description message), and/or transmit common information of the sub-base stations through AAI _ NBR-ADV and/or AAI _ ferto-ADV), the base station may periodically broadcast specific information of neighboring sub-base stations (i.e., sub-base station neighbor information) (e.g., broadcast system information of neighboring macro base stations and/or open sub-base stations through AAI _ NBR-ADV messages), and the macro base station may also periodically broadcast specific information of some or all of the overlapping/neighboring (possibly depending on the number of open sub-base stations) open sub-base stations (e.g., through AAI _ NBR-ADV messages). The base station may also customize the neighbor information for the terminal based on an indication in an earlier request by the terminal. For example, if the information previously requested by the terminal is public information, the base station may customize the public information for the terminal. The base station may also generate customized neighbor information for a specific receiving end (e.g., according to the geographic location of the terminal and/or its affiliated femto base station or proprietary member group), for example, generate its neighbor femto base station list for the terminal by using a GPS positioning system. In addition, the geographical location information of the terminal may be indicated in the request message, or indicated in the LBS report message or directly obtained through the LBS location function.

Fig. 7 is a flowchart of sending neighbor cell information by a base station based on network trigger in the neighbor cell information processing method according to this embodiment. As shown in fig. 7, the following processing is specifically included:

step 701, the network triggers the sending of the neighbor cell information.

In step 702, the base station may customize the neighbor cell information and/or the scan indication corresponding to the neighbor cell information for the terminal.

Step 703, the base station sends the neighbor cell information and/or the scanning indication corresponding to the neighbor cell information to the terminal.

The process shown in FIG. 5 is further described below in connection with example 4.

Example 4

The base station (large coverage base station such as macro base station and femto base station) may trigger to send the neighbor cell information based on the network, for example, after the terminal enters the service area of the base station, the base station may provide the terminal with summarized and/or customized and/or open neighbor cell information, where the summarized neighbor cell information includes agreed and/or common information, and where the customized neighbor cell information includes neighbor cell information of all and/or some open femto base stations and/or dedicated femto base stations. The appointment information may be correspondence information between base stations of various types and/or access network (Subscription) types and carrier frequencies and/or Preamble intervals, or Preamble division information (for example, SA-Preamble partial information or SA-Preamble soft partial information), which may be referred to in example 6. The public information can refer to example 1. The customized neighbor information refers to neighbor information generated by a base station for a specific terminal (e.g., the affiliation and/or the geographic location and/or the terminal configuration), such as information of a private sub-base station (including completely private and/or semi-private) to which the terminal belongs according to the affiliation of the terminal, information of a sub-base station (including open and/or private) adjacent to the geographic location according to the geographic location of the terminal, information of a sub-base station suitable for the terminal according to the terminal configuration (e.g., information of a base station supporting 16e and a base station supporting 16m according to whether the terminal is 16e or 16m, respectively), information of an LZone of a neighboring 16e base station and/or 16m base station to the 16m terminal, and information of an MZone of a neighboring 16e base station and/or 16m base station to the 16e terminal, and whether the terminal supports multi-carrier capability is determined, for example, according to whether the terminal supports multi-carrier capability Whether to provide it with the neighboring base station's multi-carrier capabilities and/or configuration information). The network trigger may also be triggered by other reasons, such as 1) the terminal joins or exits a new private member group (CSG), i.e., the private member group adds or deletes a member, and/or 2) the neighbor cell information is updated, and/or 3) the neighbor cell information is changed due to the joining or leaving of a base station, and/or 4) the base station receives a message and/or a signaling of other network elements (e.g., a neighbor base station, a self-organizing SON server, an access network gateway ASN-GW, a Femto-GW, an authentication server AAA, a Femto authentication server WFAP-AAA, a Femto management server WFAP-Mgmt, etc.).

After the terminal obtains the summarized and/or customized and/or open neighbor information sent by the base station, it may initiate scanning according to the information to detect and/or measure the sub-base stations, so as to prepare for handover/network reentry.

Example 5

In this example, the sub-base station may collect specific information of the sub-base stations in the adjacent areas through backhaul (backhaul), air interface, or other manners, where the specific information includes carrier frequencies, base station identification numbers, preambles, and other characteristics of the adjacent sub-base stations, and in addition, includes types and state information of the adjacent sub-base stations. For example, the sub-base station may actively scan signals of neighboring sub-base stations to generate neighboring cell information when the network enters after being powered on.

The femto may optimize the neighbor cell information according to a behavior pattern (a moving pattern and/or a usage pattern) of a user, so as to improve the efficiency of the neighbor cell information. Assuming that some sub-base stations are installed in each office of a building of a commercial area, due to the geographical location of the sub-base stations and the limitation of their geographical environment, for example, the sub-base stations can only go from office a to office B, the user of FBS _ a installed in office a can only switch to FBS _ B installed in office B when leaving office a, that is, the information of the adjacent sub-base stations of FBS _ a only needs to include the specific information of FBS _ B, so that the space of the stored adjacent area information can be reduced, the transmission overhead of the adjacent area information can be reduced, and the terminal can be prevented from scanning invalid sub-base stations to save the scanning time and the scanning overhead. For office C and office a adjacent to each other, even if office C has FBS _ C installed, since there is no direct channel connection between the two offices and it is impossible for the user to directly switch from FBS _ a to FBS _ C, the adjacent sub base station information of FBS _ a does not need to include the specific information of FBS _ C.

The sub-base station may send the neighbor information to the terminal periodically and/or based on a terminal request and/or based on a network trigger. The flow of three mechanisms in which the base station sends neighbor information has been described in detail in example 2, example 3, and example 4. The terminal may use the obtained information to perform subsequent operations after receiving the specific femto cell information, for example, the terminal may specifically scan the neighboring femto cells to find a potential handover opportunity, and a specific scanning method will be described in detail below.

Example 6

In this example, the femto base stations within the coverage area of the macro base station may be distributed over an agreed carrier frequency or employ an agreed preamble or group of preambles by way of pre-planning (e.g., planning by a standard organization and/or operator) and/or negotiating with the macro base station and/or based on monitoring of macro base station signals. For example, proprietary sub-base stations and open sub-base stations (when classified into two or three sub-base station network access types) or completely proprietary, semi-proprietary and open sub-base stations (when classified into three sub-base station network access types) may be distributed on different carrier frequencies, and different preamble (synchronization) features may be employed. The sub-base stations in the macro area can also be distributed on different carrier frequencies or different leading feature areas according to geographic information or a certain strategy. The purpose of this distribution may be to allow the terminal to find at least one neighboring femto cell faster when scanning the femto cells, to improve the communication quality of the system, for example, to reduce interference of neighboring femto cells, to facilitate planning or to integrate factors, etc. In this case, the agreed information of the femto base station is collected and/or set by the macro base station in advance. From the system perspective, the carrier frequency and/or the preamble are divided by the standard organization and/or the operator, for example, a certain carrier frequency is used by the macro base station, a certain carrier frequency is used by the sub base station, and for example, a part of the secondary preamble sequence (i.e., the preamble group or the preamble characteristic region) is divided by the sub base station, and a part of the secondary preamble sequence is divided by the macro base station. The preambles used by the sub-base stations can be further subdivided, namely, the preambles are divided into proprietary and open sub-base stations (when the sub-base stations are classified into two or three types of network access types) or completely proprietary, semi-proprietary and open sub-base stations (when the sub-base stations are classified into three types of network access types). A certain secondary preamble sequence may also be fixed in the standard in advance for a certain class or a certain class of base stations to use, for example, a part of the secondary preamble sequence is reserved for the macro base station to use, and the remaining secondary preamble sequences are further divided by the operator, which is described in detail later. The macro base station may notify terminals in the macro cell of the agreed carrier frequency characteristics and/or the agreed preamble characteristics (i.e., the partitioning information of the secondary preamble sequences) used by the secondary base station through broadcasting or in other manners (see examples 2, 3, and 4 for the manner in which the base station sends the agreed information, which is not described herein). For example, when the terminal is handed over to the macro base station, the macro base station may unicast the provisioning information of the femto base station to the terminal. The secondary preamble sequence division information indicates the correspondence between base stations of different types and/or access types and the secondary preamble sequence. When a part of the auxiliary Preamble sequences has been fixedly allocated in advance, the partition Information of the broadcast and/or unicast auxiliary Preamble sequences only needs to include the partition Information of the remaining auxiliary Preamble sequences, i.e., Soft partition Information (SA-Preamble Soft Partitioning Information), as described later. The terminal may then perform subsequent operations upon receiving the appointment information, such as scanning according to the information to discover all and/or some types of neighboring femto base stations, and the information may also be used to identify the type of base station (i.e., whether the femto base station is a femto base station) and/or the access type of the femto base station (fully-private/semi-private/open).

Generally, the division information such as the secondary synchronization sequence and/or the division information (distribution information) of the carrier frequency are unified in the network of the same operator, that is, the agreed information provided by the base station is both the summarized neighbor cell information and the summarized information of the entire access network. Moreover, as a result of network planning of an operator, the appointment information is not usually changed frequently, and thus the validity period of the appointment information is usually longer (for example, more than 1 day), so that the terminal does not need to update the appointment information frequently after acquiring the appointment information, and can use the appointment information acquired in advance (for example, stored before power-off) for scanning (probing) and/or identifying the base station for a longer time.

In an emergency access situation, all base stations, regardless of their type and/or type of access to the network, are accessible to the terminal. In this case, since the number of the sub-base stations may be too large, the sub-base stations may perform sub-base station initialization scanning (i.e., sounding) using the predetermined information (e.g., soft partition information of the secondary preamble sequence) to find neighboring sub-base stations, while saving air interface overhead and/or time.

In the manual base station selection mode of the terminal, the terminal may detect the sub-base stations by using appointed information (e.g., soft partition information of the secondary preamble sequence) to discover all and/or specific network access types of the sub-base stations, and the terminal may identify whether the detected base station belongs to or does not belong to (i.e., whether the detected base station is a corresponding CSG member) by combining a white list, and then display information of the detected base station on a user interface for a user to select a base station for network entry/reentry/location update/handover.

When the terminal is in a critical condition of maintaining the connection (for example, the terminal does not find a candidate base station after searching the dedicated sub-base station, the open sub-base station, and the macro base station to which the terminal belongs), the semi-dedicated sub-base station to which the terminal belongs may also be accessible. Thus, the terminal can probe (scan) for this type of base station: the terminal scans the class of base stations using the appointment information, for example, according to the partition information of the secondary synchronization sequence (such as the soft partition information SA-Preamble partitioning information), the terminal knows the interval range of the secondary synchronization sequence partitioned to the semi-dedicated sub-base station (for example, the secondary synchronization sequence index is from 225 to 240), so that the terminal can detect a signal in the interval range to find the semi-dedicated sub-base station. If the semi-proprietary sub-base station is detected, the terminal can be switched to the semi-proprietary sub-base station under the key condition that the connection needs to be maintained.

In the initial network entry, if the terminal does not have the soft partition information of the available secondary synchronization sequences, the terminal can use only some partition information reserved/set in the standard and/or the terminal, and according to the information, the terminal can identify some base station types reserved/set in the standard and/or the terminal. For example, if a continuous secondary synchronization sequence is specified in the standard and/or the terminal for the macro base station or other base stations except the sub base station, the terminal may recognize that the sequence is used by the macro base station or other base stations except the sub base station if detecting the sequence falling in the secondary synchronization sequence interval, and then the terminal (preferentially) selects these base stations (possibly because the coverage of the reserved base station types is large and/or the positions of the super frame headers of the reserved base station types are known (considering the case that the position of the super frame header relative to the main synchronization sequence is related to the base station type, for example, the super frame header of the macro base station is in the frame before the main synchronization sequence and the super frame header of the sub base station is in the first or second frame after the frame of the main synchronization sequence)). In other words, in case of initial network entry and terminal does not have soft partitioning information of available secondary synchronization sequences, the terminal (preferentially) selects a known base station type (reserved/set in the standard and/or in the terminal), which can optimize the initial access procedure and reduce overhead.

The secondary synchronization sequence partitioning information may be hard partitioning information or soft partitioning information, wherein the hard partitioning information and the soft partitioning information are different in that the hard partitioning information provides partitioning information of the entire/complete secondary synchronization sequence, and the soft partitioning information is combined with the partitioning information of the secondary synchronization sequence specified/reserved in the standard and/or the terminal to form the partitioning information of the entire/complete secondary synchronization sequence. That is, the hard partition information (or the entire partition information) does not reserve/set the secondary synchronization sequence in the standard and/or in the terminal, and the terminal knows how the entire secondary synchronization sequence is partitioned by acquiring the hard partition information; the soft partition information (or partial partition information) reserves/sets partial or all auxiliary synchronization sequences in the standard and/or the terminal, and the terminal can obtain the corresponding relation between all auxiliary synchronization sequences and the type of the base station by combining the preset partition information and the soft partition information acquired from the base station.

There are three types of soft partition information, the first type (2 examples shown in fig. 6): a part of auxiliary synchronization sequences are reserved in a standard and/or a terminal for a certain type (including an access type description type) base station to use, and the corresponding relation of the part of auxiliary synchronization sequences does not need to be represented in an air interface message; second type (4 examples as shown in fig. 7): all or a part of the secondary synchronization sequences are reserved in the standard and/or the terminal for some types (including network access type) of base stations, and the refined correspondence of all the secondary synchronization sequences needs to be further represented in an air interface message (for example, a section of continuous sequences is specified in the standard to be used by a macro base station, a completely proprietary/semi-proprietary/open sub-base station, and 2 bits are needed in the air interface message to further represent the section of continuous sequences to be specifically divided into the above four base stations); the third type (8 examples shown in fig. 8) is a combination of the first type and the second type, that is, a part of the secondary synchronization sequences are preset and need not to be represented by an air interface, while all or a part of the remaining secondary synchronization sequences are reserved in a standard and/or a terminal for some types (including an access type) of base stations, and a refined correspondence of all the remaining secondary synchronization sequences needs to be further represented in an air interface message.

The partition information (whether the hard partition information or various soft partition information) may be represented in the form of a secondary synchronization sequence unit block, for example, for 256 secondary synchronization sequences (whose index is from 0 to 255), it may be specified that n (e.g., n is 4, 8, 16, 32, etc.) consecutive or equally spaced secondary synchronization sequences are the minimum unit of the secondary synchronization sequence unit block, based on which 256 secondary synchronization sequences may be converted into 256/n (when n is 4, 8, 16, 32, 256/n is respectively equal to 64, 32, 16, 8) unit blocks, and then the partition information represents the mapping relationship between 256/n unit blocks and the base station type. For the soft partition information, the m reserved/set cell blocks which are not required to be represented are planed, and then the soft partition information represents the mapping relation between the (256/n-m) cell blocks and the base station types.

The mapping relationship between K (K: 256/n-m, m: 0 for hard partition information, and m > -0 for soft partition information) cell blocks and base station types is represented in the following two ways. Assume that the base station types include macro, micro, pico, femto (CSG-Closed/CSG-Open/OSG), relay. In a first expression, the partition information indicates a base station type corresponding to each cell block of the K cell blocks, and when the partition information indicates a mapping relationship between each cell block and the base station type, the partition information may be in a one-to-one and/or one-to-many relationship: one-to-one is a cell block or a bit value corresponding to a base station type (e.g., a cell block or a bit value such as 0b00 corresponding to a macro base station, a cell block or a bit value such as 0b01 corresponding to a fully proprietary sub-base station, a cell block or a bit value such as 0b10 corresponding to a semi-proprietary sub-base station, a cell block or bit value such as 0b11 corresponding to an open sub-base station), and one-to-many is a cell block or a bit value corresponding to more than one base station type (e.g., a cell block or a bit value such as 0b00 corresponding to a macro base station/small base station/micro base station, a cell block or a bit value such as 0b01 corresponding to a proprietary (fully proprietary and semi-. The overhead required for dividing the information may be obtained by calculation, for example, if the base station type needs 3 bits, the overhead of 3K bits is required for the first mode of dividing the information, and if the base station type needs 2 bits, the overhead of 2K bits is required for the first mode of dividing the information; in the second expression, the partition information represents a cell block (section) corresponding to each base station type, and there are three expression methods for the cell block section, namely, the minimum cell block (starting cell block), the maximum cell block (ending cell block), and the cell block length. Specifically, when the cell block section is represented by the cell block length plus the minimum cell block (or the maximum cell block), when the cell block length is 0, the minimum cell block (or the maximum cell block) may not be represented, thereby saving overhead.

Example 7

In this example, the terminal obtains the common information (see example 1) and the appointment information (see example 6) related to the sub-base stations from one or more base stations, and then scans (detects) and/or identifies the sub-base stations according to the two information, which is not described in detail again.

Example 8

In this example, the macro base station collects, through a core network (backhaul) or in other manners, common information (representative or typical information) of the sub-base stations in the macro area, for example, specific information of the typical sub-base station, including carrier frequency, preamble and other characteristics used by the sub-base station, and may further include type and state information of the sub-base stations. The terminal can request the macro base station to unicast representative or typical information of the sub base stations in the macro area to the terminal when accessing the macro base station or when needed. The macro base station may generate and send customized delegate or delegate information when unicasting or multicasting delegate or delegate information for a terminal or group of terminals. These representative or typical information may be prioritized by the macro base station. The macro base station may also periodically broadcast representative or typical information for the sub-base stations within the macro area. After receiving the representative or typical information sent by the macro base station, the terminal may perform subsequent operations using the obtained information, for example, may scan typical femto base stations according to the representative or typical information.

Example 9

In this example, the sub-base station may collect, through interaction with the terminal and/or a nearby sub-base station, specific information of a next and/or subsequent sub-base station most frequently used by the terminal, including carrier frequency, base station identification number, preamble, and other characteristics of an adjacent sub-base station, and further including type and state information of the adjacent sub-base station. The adjacent sub-base stations may be in the same macro-area or in different adjacent macro-areas. The femto may optimize neighbor information. For example, the sub-base stations may prioritize the next sub-base station according to the most frequently used likelihood. The femto may also optimize the neighbor cell information according to the behavior pattern of the user as in example 4, so as to improve the efficiency of the neighbor cell information.

The terminal or the terminal group may request the sub-base stations to send the most common specific information of the next sub-base station in a unicast or multicast manner. The sub-base stations can also customize and send the specific information of the most frequently used next sub-base station for the terminal or the terminal group. In addition, the sub-base station may also notify the terminal in the coverage area of the information of the most frequently used next sub-base station in a broadcasting manner. After receiving the femto information sent by the femto, the terminal may use the obtained information to perform subsequent operations, for example, specifically scan the neighboring femto to find a potential handover opportunity.

Example 10

In this example, the macro base station may collect information of neighboring sub-base stations most frequently used by the terminal, such as carrier frequencies, preambles and other characteristics used by the macro base station, and may further include type and state information of the sub-base stations, by interacting with the terminal and other base stations. The adjacent sub-base station may be in the macro area or in the coverage area of the adjacent macro area. The macro base station may optimize the neighbor information periodically or based on messages. For example, the macro base station may prioritize the next sub-base station according to the most frequently used likelihood. The macro base station may also adopt the scheme described in example 4, that is, the neighbor cell information is optimized according to the behavior pattern of the user, so as to improve the efficiency of the neighbor cell information.

The terminal or the terminal group can request the macro base station to unicast or multicast the information of the most common sub base station in the macro area when accessing the macro base station or when needed. The macro base station may also customize and send information for the most commonly used femto base stations for the terminal or group of terminals. The information of these most common femto base stations is prioritized by the macro base station. After receiving the information of the most common sub-base station sent by the macro base station, the terminal may perform subsequent operations using the acquired information, for example, scanning the sub-base stations according to the information.

Method embodiment two

In this embodiment, a method for a terminal to scan a sub-base station is provided, which is used to scan neighboring cell information processed by the method described above, that is, to perform layered (step-by-step) scanning on a base station based on the system shown in fig. 1.

Fig. 11 is a flow chart of a method for a terminal to scan for femto base stations according to an embodiment of the present invention, it should be noted that the steps described in the method may be executed in a computer system such as a set of computer executable instructions, and although a logical order is shown in fig. 11, in some cases, the steps shown or described may be executed in an order different from that shown. As shown in fig. 11, the method may include the following steps 1102 and 1104.

The processing steps shown in fig. 11 are specifically as follows:

step 1102, the terminal scans the sub-base stations to determine one or more adjacent sub-base stations as alternative sub-base stations, and/or obtains neighbor cell information (this step may be called initial scanning); and/or

In step 1104, the terminal scans the sub-base stations to determine the sub-base stations for handover or network access (this step may be referred to as targeted scanning).

The terminal can also determine the adjacent alternative sub-base stations according to the adjacent area information which is acquired from the service base station in advance.

It can be seen that, through the above-described process, the terminal can perform scanning in a hierarchical (step) manner and can prepare for scanning of a subsequent stage through scanning of a previous stage. In the implementation of the scanning process described above, it is possible to selectively or purposefully scan, i.e. to select either an initialization scan or a targeted scan depending on the current state. For example, in the case that the candidate sub-base station is a predetermined sub-base station (i.e., a known adjacent sub-base station), or the terminal has determined the candidate base station, the initialization scanning of step S602 may not be performed. After the terminal performs the initialization scanning or without performing the initialization scanning, when the terminal needs to search for a chance to switch to an adjacent sub base station, the terminal can select to perform the targeted scanning.

When a terminal performs initialization scanning and/or targeted scanning, the terminal performs initialization scanning (unless a macro base station can provide specific neighbor cell information customized for the terminal based on a positioning system or a function) first under the condition that the terminal is located in a macro cell, and performs targeted scanning after the initialization scanning is successful, wherein the neighbor cell information provided by the macro base station in the macro cell can be summary neighbor cell information; and under the condition that the terminal is positioned in the sub-district, the terminal directly carries out targeted scanning, wherein the neighbor cell information provided by the macro base station in the sub-district can be specific neighbor cell information.

That is, in the case that the serving base station is a macro base station, the serving base station may broadcast the summarized neighbor cell information (or may broadcast some specific information of the open femto base station, for example), and/or unicast or multicast specific neighbor cell information; when the serving base station is the femto base station, the femto base station may broadcast, multicast, or unicast specific neighbor cell information.

Preferably, the operation of the base station sending the neighbor cell information of the sub-base station for the terminal includes at least one of the following: the base station collects and generates neighbor cell information through a backbone network, and/or a backhaul, and/or an air interface, and/or a relay base station when the network is initialized; the base station generates neighbor cell information based on a positioning system and/or a positioning function of a cable; the base station generates neighbor cell information based on scanning and/or measurement between the base stations; the base station generates neighbor cell information based on information interaction between the terminal and the base station and/or information interaction between the base station and the base station; the base station acquires and generates the neighbor cell information from the core network and/or other base stations and/or terminals.

Moreover, when the terminal scans the sub-base stations, the terminal may scan the large-coverage base station during and/or intermittently during the scanning of the sub-base stations, where the large-coverage base station may include a macro base station, a small base station, and a micro base station.

Specifically, the operation of the terminal scanning the sub-base stations to determine the sub-base station performing handover or network access may include: and the terminal scans the sub-base station according to the specific adjacent cell information to determine the sub-base station for switching or network access, wherein the specific adjacent cell information comprises the specific adjacent cell information obtained by scanning in the previous stage or the specific adjacent cell information of a preset adjacent sub-base station.

The summarized neighbor cell information may include at least one of the following: the information of the agreement between the serving base station and all or part of the sub base stations in the coverage area thereof (for example, the division information of the secondary synchronization sequence, see example 6), the common information of all or part of the sub base stations in the coverage area of the serving base station (see example 1), and the common information of all or part of the sub base stations in the coverage area of the serving base station, wherein the part of the sub base stations includes the sub base stations adjacent to the terminal. Here, the common information or the appointment information may include communication characteristic information used by the sub-base stations within the coverage area of the serving base station, wherein the communication characteristic information includes at least one of: carrier frequency information, leading information, carrier frequency distribution condition information, leading distribution characteristic information and reserved cell identification numbers; the neighbor information related to the behavior pattern of the terminal within the coverage of the serving base station may include authorization correspondence information between the terminal and a dedicated femto base station.

Preferably, the base station may further send the neighbor cell information according to a behavior pattern of the terminal and/or a neighborhood of the geographic location, where the behavior pattern of the terminal includes a moving pattern and/or a usage pattern. Specifically, in the case where the serving base station is a large coverage base station, the movement pattern of the terminal includes: the probability of the terminal moving/handing over from the serving base station to each adjacent sub-base station, and/or the probability of the terminal moving/handing over from the serving base station to an adjacent open sub-base station, and/or the probability of the terminal obtaining access authorization moving/handing over from the serving base station to an adjacent proprietary sub-base station.

Before the base station sends the optimally configured neighbor information according to the behavior pattern of one or more terminals and/or the adjacency of the geographical locations of the terminals, the base station may collect history information of terminal movement and/or handover from the terminals and/or the neighbor base stations and/or the core network to generate the behavior pattern information of the terminals.

In addition, the specific neighbor information may include at least one of the following: information of the number of neighboring sub-base stations of the serving base station, specific information of a certain number of neighboring sub-base stations (for example, may be in a list format, that is, referred to as a neighbor list), where the specific information of each neighboring sub-base station includes a carrier frequency used by the sub-base station, an identification number (BS ID and/or CSG ID) of the sub-base station, Preamble information (including PA-Preamble Index main Preamble information and/or SA-Preamble Index auxiliary Preamble information) of the sub-base station, Type information (that is, base station Type BS Type and/or Access Type subscription Type) of the sub-base station, state information of the sub-base station, Physical (PHY) layer configuration information of the sub-base station, Media Access Control (MAC) layer configuration information (MAC layer version) of the sub-base station, TDD/FDD identification, multi-carrier capability and configuration, and a Physical layer configuration information of the sub-base station, Base station name (a name that can be read by the user in the manual selection mode), base station location indication (e.g., geographic location, and/or overlapping and/or adjacent base station identification, and/or location reference information using RSSI). The type information includes a special identifier or an open identifier (in the case of two network access types) or a complete special/semi-special/open identifier (in the case of three network access types), or the identifier is contained in a base station identifier and/or a preamble (i.e., the base station identifier and/or the preamble corresponds to the type); the status information includes an accessible identifier or an inaccessible identifier (cell bar information), and/or includes a Low-power operation Mode (Low-Duty Operational Mode, which can be used to identify whether the current base station is in a Low-power operation Mode or a normal operation Mode). Preferably, the specific format of the neighbor information may be as shown in table 1, table 2, table 3, table 4, and table 5.

TABLE 1

Syntax (construction)	Notes (Note)
		Type	Indicating the type of the message
...
		N_NEIGHBORS	Indicating how many neighboring base stations the update message carries
For(j＝0；j＜

N_NEIGHBORS；j++){
		...
BS Type	Indicating the type of the base station, wherein 0 represents a macro base station, a small base station or a micro base station, and 1 represents a sub base station
		BS_ID	Base station identification
PHY Profile ID	Physical layer configuration information of base station
		MAC Version ID	MAC layer version number of protocol used by base station
FAIndex	Carrier frequency information used by base station
		Preamble Index	Preamble sequence (synchronization sequence) index
...
		If(BS Type＝＝1){
CSG_Type	Sub-base station proprietary/open identification
		Status	Sub-base station status
BCH Offset	The sub-base station broadcast channel offset information takes the sub-frame or the orthogonal frequency division multiplexing symbol length specified in the IEEE 802.16m standard as a unit, and the terminal calculates and obtains the position of the cell broadcast channel based on the value
		}
...
		}
...

TABLE 2

Syntax (construction)	Notes (Note)
		Type	Indicates the type of the message
BS Type	Indication ofBase station type, wherein 0 represents macro base station, small base station or micro base station, and 1 represents sub base station
		...
N_NEIGHBORS	Indicating how many neighboring base stations the update message carries
		For(j＝0；j＜N_NEIGHBORS；j++){
...
		BS_ID	Base station identification
PHY Profile ID	Physical layer configuration information of base station
		MAC Version ID	MAC layer version number of protocol used by base station
FAIndex	Carrier frequency information used by base station
		Preamble Index	Preamble sequence (synchronization sequence) index
...
		If(BS Type＝＝1){
CSG_Type	Sub-base station proprietary/open identification
		Status	Sub-base station status
BCH Offset	The sub-base station broadcasts channel offset information in accordance with IEEE

	The terminal calculates the position of the cell broadcast channel based on the length of the subframe or the OFDM symbol specified in the 802.16m standard as a unit
		}
...
		}
...

TABLE 3

Syntax (construction)	Notes (Note)
		...
N_FAs	Indicating how many base station contents on carrier frequencies the message carries
		For(i＝0；i＜N_FAs；i++){
...
		FAIndex	Carrier frequency information used by base station
N_NEIGHBORS	Indicating how many base stations on the carrier frequency the message carries
		For(j＝0；j＜N_NEIGHBORS；j++){
...
		BS_INFO	Specific information for each base station
}
		...
}
		...

TABLE 4

Syntax (construction)	Notes (Note)
		BS Type	Indicating base station type
FA_Index	Carrier frequency information
		...
N_NEIGHBORS	Indicating how many neighbor base stations of this BS Type on the carrier frequency indicated by FA _ Index the update message carries
		For(j＝0；j＜N_NEIGHBORS；j++){
...
		BS_INFO	Specific information of each base station

}
		...

TABLE 5

Syntax (construction)	N0tes (Note)
		BS Type	Indicating base station type
N_FAs	Indicating how many base station contents on carrier frequencies the message carries
		For(i＝0；i＜N_FAs；i++){
...
		FA_Index	Carrier frequency information
...
		N_NEIGHBORS	Indicating how many neighbor base stations of this BS Type on the carrier frequency indicated by FA _ Index the update message carries
For(j＝0；j＜N_NEIGHBORS；j++){
		...
BS_INFO	Specific information of each base station
		}
...
		}
...

When the terminal scans, under the condition that the terminal is positioned in the macro area and has no specific adjacent area information, the terminal scans the sub base stations firstly to determine one or more adjacent sub base stations and acquire the specific adjacent area information, and scans the sub base stations after the scanning is successful to determine the sub base stations for switching or network access; and under the condition that the terminal is positioned in the sub-district and/or grasps the specific adjacent district information, the terminal directly scans the sub-base station to determine the sub-base station for switching or network access.

The processing of the terminal acquiring the neighboring cell information may include: and the base station actively sends the neighbor cell information of the sub-base station and/or the neighbor cell information of the large-coverage base station to the terminal based on the terminal request and/or the network trigger.

Specifically, the processing that the base station sends the neighbor cell information of the sub-base station to the terminal may include: the base station sends and/or forwards the neighbor cell information through a backbone network, and/or a backhaul, and/or an air interface, and/or a relay base station, and/or other base stations. And when the base station sends the neighbor cell information of the sub-base station for the terminal, the base station may send the optimally configured neighbor cell information according to the behavior patterns of one or more terminals and/or the adjacency of the geographic locations of the terminals, where the behavior patterns of one or more terminals include a moving pattern and/or a using pattern.

Optionally, the neighbor information obtained from the serving base station when performing the initialization scanning may be requested to be obtained from the serving base station by the terminal in advance, or may be actively sent to the terminal by the serving base station, and in addition, the serving base station may also send the neighbor information of the sub base station to the terminal based on network triggering. The method for the base station to send the neighbor cell information may include at least one of the following: broadcast, multicast, unicast. And, the pre-obtained neighbor cell information may include the summarized neighbor cell information provided by the macro base station for the terminal.

The operation of the base station for sending the neighbor information of the sub-base station to the terminal further comprises: and the base station sends the adjacent area information of the sub-base station which can be accessed by the terminal for the terminal, wherein the adjacent area information of the sub-base station which can be accessed by the terminal or the terminal group comprises the adjacent area information of the opened sub-base station and the adjacent area information of the special sub-base station authorized by the terminal or the terminal group.

Specifically, the operation of the base station sending the neighbor information of the sub-base station for the terminal further includes at least one of the following: the base station broadcasts the adjacent area information of the opened sub base station; and the base station unicasts or multicasts the adjacent area information of the sub-base station which can be accessed by the terminal or the terminal group.

When carrying out initialization scanning, the terminal carries out downlink synchronization with the standby sub base station and reads the broadcast information of the standby sub base station. And, in the scanning process, the terminal may report the result of the initialization scanning to the serving base station after a predetermined interval of the initialization scanning or the initialization scanning is completed.

Preferably, when the terminal scans the femto base stations to determine one or more neighboring femto base stations, the terminal actively or after scanning and determining at least one neighboring femto base station or based on an indication of the serving femto base station, actively or based on the indication of the serving femto base station, sends a scanning result report and/or a request message to the serving femto base station to request specific neighbor information, or the terminal acquires specific neighbor information from the scanned and determined neighboring femto base stations.

Preferably, in the process of performing the initialization scanning, the terminal performs scanning by using the neighboring cell information acquired from the serving base station in advance, and may request the serving base station to further provide new neighboring cell information until the terminal acquires specific neighboring cell information from the serving base station or the candidate sub-base station or determines at least one neighboring sub-base station as the candidate sub-base station.

After the initial scanning is performed, the terminal may send a request message to the serving base station before performing the targeted scanning to request the serving base station to further provide specific neighbor cell information, where the neighbor cell information may be specific neighbor cell information processed by the candidate sub base station determined by the initial scanning, and may be specific neighbor cell information processed by a predetermined candidate sub base station.

Preferably, the result report and/or the request message may include all or part of the information of the adjacent sub-base stations and/or the signal strength information of the adjacent sub-base stations determined by scanning, or the information of the sub-base stations with the strongest signal strength and/or the signal strength information thereof in the adjacent sub-base stations determined by scanning.

After the terminal sends the request message, the method further comprises: the serving base station will receive the request message; at this time, the serving base station may directly send the specific neighbor information processed by the alternative sub-base station notified in the request message and/or the result report to the terminal (if the information is retained in the serving base station), the serving base station may also request the specific neighbor information from the corresponding sub-base station according to the request message and forward the specific neighbor information obtained by the request to the terminal, or the serving base station requests the specific neighbor information from the corresponding sub-base station according to the request message and/or the result report and sends the specific neighbor information to the terminal by the corresponding sub-base station.

And, after the terminal sends the scanning result report and/or the request message to the serving base station, the serving base station may use the scanning result of the terminal to locate the terminal and/or to optimally configure the neighbor information sent to the terminal accordingly (for example, when the terminal is located in the coverage area of the femto base station, the serving base station may also locate the terminal and/or optimally configure the neighbor information sent to the terminal accordingly).

When the terminal performs the targeted scanning, the terminal may perform channel quality measurement on the determined candidate sub-base station and/or an adjacent sub-base station corresponding to specific neighbor information of the determined candidate sub-base station or a predetermined candidate sub-base station, and determine channel quality information between the terminal and the determined candidate sub-base station and between the terminal and the adjacent sub-base station or between the terminal and the predetermined candidate sub-base station.

In the process of performing the targeted scanning, the terminal may request the serving base station to provide specific neighboring cell information processed by the determined candidate femto base station or specific neighboring cell information processed by the predetermined candidate femto base station. Moreover, the terminal may report the result of the targeted scanning to the serving base station during the targeted scanning process or after the targeted scanning is completed. The terminal reporting the result of the targeted scanning further comprises:

the service base station receives the result report;

and the service base station determines the sub base station needing to be switched according to the result report and initiates a switching process.

The processing of the terminal for the targeted scanning further comprises:

when the terminal determines the sub-base station that needs to be switched (or when the terminal finds a chance to switch to an adjacent sub-base station), the terminal initiates a switching process.

Preferably, when scanning is performed, the information of the sub-base station whose status is identified as inaccessible may be ignored, or the information of the sub-base station whose type is identified as proprietary and the terminal is not authorized to access may be ignored, that is, the sub-base station which does not have the capability to continue to admit the terminal or is not allowed to admit the terminal is not scanned, so as to further save the overhead occupied by scanning.

The base station scanning method according to the present embodiment will be described below with reference to specific examples.

Fig. 12 is a flowchart of scanning neighboring femto base stations by terminals in a femto zone in the base station scanning method according to the present embodiment. As shown in fig. 12, the following processing is specifically included:

step 1201, the terminal obtains the specific information of the adjacent sub-base station from the sub-base station serving for the terminal, including the carrier frequency, base station identification number, preamble characteristics, etc. of the adjacent sub-base station, and also including the type information and state information of the adjacent sub-base station.

Step 1202, the terminal performs a targeted scan to search for a handover opportunity by using the acquired specific information of the neighboring femto base stations.

The process shown in FIG. 12 is further described below in conjunction with example 11.

Example 11

In this example, it is assumed that the terminal is located in the coverage area of a certain sub-base station, and the terminal may obtain specific information of neighboring sub-base stations from the serving sub-base station, and the terminal may also request the sub-base station for the information, and the sub-base station may also directly transmit the information. The sub-base station may send specific information of the adjacent sub-base stations in a unicast, multicast, or broadcast manner, where the information includes carrier frequency, base station identification number, preamble characteristics, physical layer and Medium Access Control (MAC) layer configuration information of the adjacent sub-base stations, and also includes type information and state information of the adjacent sub-base stations. After acquiring the specific information of the adjacent sub-base stations, the terminal may start to perform targeted scanning to the sub-base stations, and measure the signal quality from the sub-base stations to find out potential handover possibilities. However, the terminal should avoid initiating scanning to a non-owned (i.e. unauthorized) sub-base station or a sub-base station whose status is identified as inaccessible. The terminal may report the results of the scanning to the secondary base station periodically or aperiodically after the targeted scanning. A terminal may initiate a handover when certain criteria are met, such as a threshold for signal strength, degree of interference, operator policy, cell traffic load, quality of service, for example, when the terminal finds that the signal from a neighboring sub-base station is stronger than the serving sub-base station.

Fig. 13 is a flowchart of scanning a sub-base station by a terminal in a macro cell in the base station scanning method according to this embodiment. As shown in fig. 13, the specific steps include:

step 1301, the terminal acquires public information, appointed information or representative information of the sub base station in the macro area from the macro base station serving the terminal.

In step 1302, the terminal performs initialization scanning by using the acquired information of the sub-base station to acquire specific information of an adjacent sub-base station, and during the initialization scanning, the terminal acquires specific adjacent cell information broadcasted by the sub-base station through downlink synchronization and Broadcast Channel (BCH) decoding.

Step 1303, the terminal performs targeted scanning to search for a handover opportunity by using the acquired specific information of the adjacent sub-base stations.

The process shown in FIG. 13 is further described below in connection with example 12.

Example 12

Assuming that the terminal is located in a coverage area of the macro base station, the terminal may obtain, from the macro base station, common information, agreed information, or common information of the sub base stations in the macro area. The way for the terminal to acquire the information may be broadcast, multicast or unicast. When the terminal has taken this information, the terminal can start the initialization scan using this information. In the initialization scan, the terminal attempts downlink synchronization and broadcast channel decoding with a nearby sub-base station. In this way, the terminal can determine a certain sub-base station or sub-base stations in its vicinity and obtain the specific information of their neighboring sub-base stations from the broadcast information of the sub-base station or sub-base stations. The terminal may need to scan the sub-base station again after a period of time according to the indication information in the broadcast channel to obtain the specific information of the adjacent sub-base station from the broadcast channel. After obtaining the specific information of the neighboring sub-base stations, the terminal may start to scan the neighboring sub-base stations in a targeted manner, and measure the quality of the wireless signals from the neighboring sub-base stations to find out potential handover opportunities.

Fig. 14 is a flowchart of a method for scanning a sub-base station and seeking base station assistance by a terminal in a macro cell according to the present embodiment. As shown in fig. 14, the following processes may be specifically included:

in step 1401, the terminal obtains the public information, the appointed information or the commonality information of the sub base stations in the macro area from the macro base station serving the terminal.

In step 1402, the terminal performs initialization scanning by using the acquired femto cell information to determine at least one neighboring femto cell.

In step 1403, the terminal requests the serving base station to assist in acquiring the specific information of the neighboring sub-base stations.

In step 1404, the terminal performs a targeted scan to search for a handover opportunity by using the obtained specific information of the neighboring femto base stations.

The process shown in FIG. 9 is further described below in connection with examples 13 through 16.

Example 13

In this example, it is assumed that the terminal is located in a coverage area of the macro base station, and the terminal may obtain, from the macro base station, the common information, the agreed information, or the common information of the sub base stations in the macro area. The manner of acquiring the information by the terminal may be broadcast, multicast or unicast. When the terminal has taken this information, the terminal can start the initialization scan using this information. In the initialization scan, the terminal attempts downlink synchronization and broadcast channel decoding with a nearby sub-base station. In this way, the terminal may be able to determine at least one neighboring femto base station. (if the terminal cannot determine any adjacent sub-base station, it indicates that there is no sub-base station in the adjacent area or the information of the existing sub-base station is not provided by the serving base station, so the terminal may perform the initialization scanning again after a period of time or request the serving base station to further provide new neighboring area information to continue or perform the initialization scanning again.) then the terminal may seek the assistance of the serving base station to acquire the specific information of more adjacent sub-base stations. Three procedures for the terminal to seek assistance of the serving base station are detailed in example 14 (fig. 15), example 15 (fig. 16), and example 16 (fig. 17). After obtaining the specific information of the neighboring sub-base stations, the terminal may start to scan the neighboring sub-base stations in a targeted manner, and measure the quality of the wireless signals from the neighboring sub-base stations to find out potential handover opportunities.

Fig. 15 is a flowchart of a base station direct response in a base station scanning method according to the present embodiment, wherein a terminal seeks base station assistance. As shown in fig. 15, the following processing is specifically included:

step 1501, the terminal sends a specific neighbor information request to the serving base station, with the information of the determined at least one neighboring femto base station.

Step 1502, the serving base station sends specific neighbor information to the terminal.

The process shown in FIG. 15 is further described below in connection with example 14.

Example 14

In this example, it is assumed that the terminal may seek further assistance from the serving macro base station in the macro area, and the terminal may send a specific neighbor cell information request to the serving macro base station over the air interface. In the request message, the terminal attaches information of the neighboring femto base stations that has been determined by the initialization scanning, such as carrier frequencies, base station identification numbers, preambles of the neighboring femto base stations, and measured signal strengths of the neighboring femto base stations. And the serving base station directly sends the specific information of other sub-base stations adjacent to the determined adjacent sub-base station to the terminal after receiving the request. The terminal can then start a targeted scan using this specific information.

Fig. 16 is a flowchart of a terminal seeking base station assistance, base station forwarding, and neighboring sub-base station responding in the base station scanning method according to the present embodiment. As shown in fig. 16, the following processing is specifically included:

step 1601, the terminal sends a specific neighbor information request to the serving base station, accompanied by information of the determined at least one neighboring femto base station.

In step 1602, the serving base station forwards the neighbor information request to the determined neighboring sub-base stations.

In step 1603, the neighboring femto sends specific neighboring cell information to the terminal.

The process shown in FIG. 16 is further described below in connection with example 15.

Example 15

Assuming that the terminal is now in the macro area, the terminal may seek further assistance from the serving macro base station. The terminal can send a specific neighbor cell information request to a serving macro base station through an air interface. In the request message, the terminal attaches information of the neighboring femto base stations that has been determined by the initialization scanning, such as carrier frequencies, base station identification numbers, preambles of the neighboring femto base stations, and measured signal strengths of the neighboring femto base stations. After receiving the request, the serving base station may forward the neighbor cell information request to the determined neighbor cell base station if it finds that there is no information requested by the terminal. The base Station forwarding request may be sent via a backbone (backbone), backhaul, air interface, Relay Station (Relay Station), and/or other channels. After receiving the forwarded request, the adjacent sub-base station may directly send specific adjacent information to the terminal through an air interface. The terminal can then start a targeted scan using this specific information.

Fig. 17 is a flowchart of a terminal seeking base station assistance, base station forwarding, adjacent sub-base station transmission, and base station re-forwarding in the base station scanning method according to this embodiment. As shown in fig. 17, the following processes may be specifically included:

step 1701, the terminal sends a specific neighbor information request to the serving base station, accompanied by information of the determined at least one neighboring femto base station.

Step 1702, the serving base station forwards the neighbor information request to the determined neighboring femto base station.

Step 1703, the sub-base station sends specific neighbor cell information to the serving base station.

Step 1704, the serving base station forwards the specific neighbor cell information to the terminal.

The process shown in FIG. 17 is further described below in connection with example 16.

Example 16

Assuming that the terminal is now in the macro area, the terminal may seek further assistance from the serving macro base station. The terminal can send a specific neighbor cell information request to a serving macro base station through an air interface. In the request message, the terminal attaches information of the neighboring femto base stations that has been determined by the initialization scanning, such as carrier frequencies, base station identification numbers, preambles of the neighboring femto base stations, and measured signal strengths of the neighboring femto base stations. After receiving the request, the serving base station may forward the neighbor cell information request to the determined neighbor cell base station if it finds that there is no information requested by the terminal. The base Station forwarding request may be sent via a backbone (backbone), backhaul, air interface, Relay Station (Relay Station), and/or other channels. After receiving the forwarded request, the adjacent sub-base station may send specific adjacent cell information to the serving base station. And then the serving base station forwards the specific neighbor cell information to the terminal through the air interface. The terminal can then start a targeted scan using this specific information.

Apparatus embodiment one

In the present embodiment, a terminal is provided, which is capable of performing base station scanning in the system shown in fig. 1 according to the above-described base station scanning method.

As shown in fig. 18, the terminal according to the present embodiment includes a first scanning module 10 and a second scanning module 20.

The functions of the various modules in FIG. 18 are as follows:

a first scanning module 10, configured to scan the sub-base stations to determine one or more adjacent sub-base stations and/or obtain neighboring cell information; preferably, the first scanning module 10 is configured to scan the sub-base stations according to the summarized neighboring cell information to determine one or more neighboring sub-base stations and/or obtain neighboring cell information.

And a second scanning module 20, connected to the first scanning module 10, for scanning the sub-base stations according to the specific neighboring cell information to determine the sub-base station to which the terminal is switched or network access is performed.

Fig. 19 is a block diagram of a preferred structure of the terminal according to the present embodiment. As shown in fig. 19, the terminal may further include, on the basis of the structure shown in fig. 18: a handover or network access initiating module 30, configured to initiate a handover or network access procedure when the second scanning module 20 determines that a sub-base station requiring handover or network access is determined.

The terminal may perform base station scanning according to the procedures shown in fig. 11 to 17, and the specific processing procedure is not repeated here.

Device embodiment II

In the present embodiment, a base station is provided.

As shown in fig. 20, the base station according to the present embodiment includes: a neighbor cell information sending module 40 and a handover or network access initiating module 50.

A neighbor cell information sending module 40, configured to send neighbor cell information to a terminal actively or in response to a request message of the terminal or based on network triggering; the neighboring cell information may include summarized neighboring cell information and/or specific neighboring cell information, and the summarized neighboring cell information includes appointment information and/or common information. The neighboring cell information has already been described in detail in the above method embodiment, and is not described herein again.

And a handover or network access initiating module 50, configured to determine, according to the result report of the terminal scanning the sub-base stations, the sub-base stations to which the terminal needs to perform handover or network access, and initiate a handover or network access procedure.

In summary, by means of the technical scheme of the present invention, through the distributed hierarchical processing of the neighboring cell information, the problem of meaningless communication and system overhead caused by scanning and accessing a non-owned sub-base station, or a sub-base station which cannot support more users to access, or a non-neighboring sub-base station in the related art is solved, the switching performance of the wireless communication system is improved, and the communication and terminal overhead of the system is reduced.

It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that the modules or steps of the present invention described above may be implemented by a general purpose computing device, they may be centralized on a single computing device or distributed across a network of multiple computing devices, and they may alternatively be implemented by program code executable by a computing device, such that they may be stored in a storage device and executed by a computing device, or fabricated separately as individual integrated circuit modules, or fabricated as a single integrated circuit module from multiple modules or steps. Thus, the present invention is not limited to any specific combination of hardware and software.

The above description is only a preferred embodiment of the present invention and is not intended to limit the present invention, and various modifications and changes may be made by those skilled in the art. Any modification, equivalent replacement, or improvement made within the spirit and principle of the present invention should be included in the protection scope of the present invention.

Claims

1. A method for a terminal to scan a sub-base station, the method comprising:

the terminal scans the sub-base stations to determine one or more adjacent sub-base stations; and/or

The terminal scans the sub-base stations to determine the sub-base stations for switching or network access;

before the terminal scans the sub-base stations, the method further includes:

the base station sends neighbor cell information to the terminal so that the terminal can scan the sub base station according to the neighbor cell information, wherein the neighbor cell information comprises general neighbor cell information and/or specific neighbor cell information, and the general neighbor cell information comprises appointed information and/or public information; wherein,

the appointed information comprises carrier frequency division information and/or preamble division information, wherein the division information is the corresponding relation between various types of base stations and/or various network access types of base stations and the carrier frequencies and/or the preambles; wherein,

the specific neighbor information includes at least one of the following: the method comprises the following steps that the number information of adjacent sub base stations of a service base station and the specific information of a certain number of adjacent sub base stations are obtained, wherein the specific information of each adjacent sub base station comprises a carrier frequency used by the sub base station, an identification number of the sub base station, leading information of the sub base station, type information of the sub base station, state information of the sub base station, physical layer configuration information of the sub base station and medium access control layer configuration information of the sub base station, wherein the type information comprises a special identification or an open identification, and/or the type information is contained in the identification number and/or leading of the base station; the state information comprises an accessible identification or an inaccessible identification and/or comprises a low power consumption state identification.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the partitioning information of the preamble comprises partitioning information of a secondary preamble sequence, wherein the partitioning information of the secondary preamble sequence indicates correspondence between base stations of different types and/or network access types and the secondary preamble sequence.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein determining the correspondence between various types of base stations and/or various types of network entry base stations and the secondary preamble sequence comprises:

allocating all auxiliary leader sequences in advance according to various types of base stations and/or various network access types of base stations; or,

and allocating part of the secondary preamble sequences in advance according to various types of base stations and/or various network access types of base stations.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein in the case that the partial secondary preamble sequence is pre-allocated according to various types of base stations and/or various types of network entry base stations, the method further comprises:

and the terminal obtains the corresponding relation between all the auxiliary leader sequences and the various base stations and/or the base stations of various network access types by combining the pre-distributed auxiliary leader sequences through the corresponding relation between the various base stations and/or the base stations of various network access types obtained from the base station and the auxiliary leader sequences.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein in the case that the partial secondary preamble sequence is pre-allocated according to various types of base stations and/or various types of network entry base stations, the method further comprises:

the air interface message does not carry the corresponding relation between the pre-allocated part of the auxiliary leader sequence and various types of base stations and/or various network access types of base stations; and/or the presence of a gas in the gas,

the air interface message carries all the auxiliary leader sequences and the corresponding relations of various types of base stations and/or various network access types of base stations; and/or the presence of a gas in the gas,

the air interface message does not carry the corresponding relationship between the pre-allocated portion of the auxiliary preamble sequence and the various types of base stations and/or the various network access types of base stations, and the air interface message carries the corresponding relationship between the other portions of the auxiliary preamble sequence except the pre-allocated portion and the various types of base stations and/or the various network access types of base stations.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein after the base station sends the neighbor information to the terminal, the method further comprises:

and the terminal scans the sub-base stations according to the appointed information and/or the public information in the adjacent cell information so as to discover all or specific network access types of the sub-base stations.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

and the sub-base station acquires the appointed information in the adjacent cell information and carries out initialization scanning according to the appointed information and/or the public information so as to discover the adjacent sub-base stations.

8. The method according to claim 3, wherein in case of initial network entry of the terminal, the method further comprises:

and the terminal selects the base station of the type corresponding to the pre-distributed auxiliary leader sequence according to the pre-distributed auxiliary leader sequence.

9. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 8, wherein the common information comprises distribution characteristics of carrier frequencies used by the sub-base stations and/or distribution characteristics of preambles, wherein the distribution characteristics of the carrier frequencies are whether the sub-base stations exist on all or predetermined carrier frequencies and/or the number of sub-base stations using the predetermined carrier frequencies; the distribution characteristics of the preamble are the number of the sub-base stations distributed in a preset preamble interval and/or the interval range of the preamble distribution of the sub-base stations.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the operation of the terminal scanning sub-base stations to determine the one or more neighboring sub-base stations comprises:

and the terminal determines the one or more adjacent sub base stations according to the adjacent area information acquired in advance from the service base station by the terminal.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the operation of the terminal scanning the sub-base stations to determine the sub-base station performing handover or network access comprises:

and the terminal scans the sub-base station according to specific adjacent cell information to determine the sub-base station for switching or network access, wherein the specific adjacent cell information comprises specific adjacent cell information obtained by scanning in the previous stage or specific adjacent cell information of a preset adjacent sub-base station.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the operation of the terminal performing the scanning of the sub-base stations comprises:

the terminal scans a large-coverage base station in the scanning period and/or the intermittent scanning period of the sub-base station, wherein the large-coverage base station comprises a macro base station, a small base station and a micro base station.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the operation of the terminal performing the sub-base station scanning comprises:

under the condition that the terminal is positioned in the macro area and has no specific adjacent area information, the terminal firstly scans the sub base stations to determine one or more adjacent sub base stations and acquire specific adjacent area information, and scans the sub base stations after the scanning is successful to determine the sub base stations for switching or network access;

and under the condition that the terminal is positioned in the sub-district and/or grasps the specific adjacent district information, the terminal directly scans the sub-base station to determine the sub-base station for switching or network access.

14. The method of claim 1, wherein the base station sending the neighbor cell information to the terminal comprises:

and the base station actively sends the neighbor cell information of the sub-base station and/or the neighbor cell information of the large-coverage base station to the terminal on the basis of a terminal request and/or a network trigger.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the operation of the base station sending neighbor information of sub-base stations for the terminal further comprises:

and the base station transmits and/or forwards the neighbor cell information through a backbone network, and/or a backhaul, and/or an air interface, and/or a relay base station, and/or other base stations.

16. The method of claim 14, wherein the operation of the base station sending neighbor information of sub-base stations for the terminal further comprises:

and the base station sends the adjacent cell information of the sub-base station which can be accessed by the terminal to the terminal, wherein the adjacent cell information of the sub-base station which can be accessed by the terminal or the terminal group comprises the adjacent cell information of the opened sub-base station and the adjacent cell information of the special sub-base station authorized by the terminal or the terminal group.

17. The method of claim 14, wherein the operation of the base station sending neighbor cell information of the sub-base station for the terminal further comprises at least one of:

the base station broadcasts the adjacent area information of the opened sub base station;

and the base station unicasts or multicasts the adjacent area information of the sub base station which can be accessed by the terminal or the terminal group.

18. The method according to claim 14, 16 or 17, wherein in case that the serving base station is a macro base station, the serving base station broadcasts general neighbor cell information and/or unicast or multicast specific neighbor cell information; and under the condition that the service base station is a subbase station, the subbase station broadcasts, multicasts or unicasts specific adjacent area information.

19. The method of claim 14, wherein the operation of the base station sending neighbor cell information of the sub-base station for the terminal comprises at least one of:

the base station collects and generates neighbor cell information through a backbone network, and/or a backhaul, and/or an air interface, and/or a relay base station when the network is initialized;

the base station generates neighbor cell information based on a positioning function of a positioning system and/or a cable;

the base station generates neighbor cell information based on scanning and/or measurement between base stations;

the base station generates neighbor cell information based on information interaction between the terminal and the base station and/or information interaction between the base station and the base station;

the base station acquires and generates neighbor cell information from a core network and/or other base stations and/or terminals.

20. The method of claim 14, wherein the operation of the base station sending neighbor information of the sub-base station for the terminal comprises:

the base station sends optimally configured neighbor cell information according to the behavior modes of one or more terminals and/or the adjacency of the geographic positions of the terminals, wherein the behavior modes of the one or more terminals comprise a moving mode and/or a using mode, and the using mode comprises at least one of the following modes: the authorization corresponding relation information of the terminal and the special sub-base station, a terminal list which can be accessed by the special sub-base station authorization, and a special sub-base station list which can be accessed by the terminal authorization.

21. The method of claim 18, wherein the summarized neighbor information comprises at least one of: the information of the contract between the service base station and all or part of the sub-base stations in the coverage area of the service base station, the public information of all or part of the sub-base stations in the coverage area of the service base station, and the common information of all or part of the sub-base stations in the coverage area of the service base station, wherein the part of the sub-base stations comprise the sub-base stations adjacent to the terminal.

22. The method of claim 18, wherein the summary information comprises communication characteristic information used by sub-base stations within the coverage area of the serving base station, wherein the communication characteristic information comprises at least one of: carrier frequency information, leading information, carrier frequency distribution condition information, leading distribution characteristic information and reserved cell identification numbers.

23. The method of claim 21, wherein the summary information comprises communication characteristic information used by sub-base stations within the coverage area of the serving base station, wherein the communication characteristic information comprises at least one of: carrier frequency information, leading information, carrier frequency distribution condition information, leading distribution characteristic information and reserved cell identification numbers.

24. The method according to claim 19, wherein the mobile mode of the terminal comprises: the probability of the terminal moving/handing over from the serving base station to each adjacent sub-base station, and/or the probability of the terminal moving/handing over from the serving base station to an adjacent open sub-base station, and/or the probability of the terminal obtaining access authorization moving/handing over from the serving base station to an adjacent proprietary sub-base station.

25. The method of claim 19, wherein before the base station sends the optimally configured neighbor information according to the behavior pattern of one or more terminals and/or the adjacency of the geographical locations of the terminals, the method further comprises:

the base station collects terminal movement and/or handover history information from the terminal and/or neighboring base stations and/or core network to generate behavior pattern information of the terminal.

26. The method of claim 1, wherein the processing by the terminal to scan the sub-base stations to determine one or more neighboring sub-base stations further comprises:

the terminal and the corresponding sub base station carry out downlink synchronization and decipher the broadcast information of the sub base station;

and under the condition that the downlink synchronization and the broadcast information interpretation are successful, determining the sub base station as the adjacent sub base station.

27. The method of claim 1, wherein the terminal scans sub-base stations to determine the one or more neighboring sub-base stations, further comprising:

the terminal actively or after scanning and determining at least one adjacent sub base station or based on the indication of the service base station, sends a scanning result report and/or a request message to the service base station to request specific adjacent area information, or the terminal acquires the specific adjacent area information from the adjacent sub base station determined by scanning.

28. The method according to claim 27, wherein the result report and/or the request message comprises all or part of the neighboring femto cell information and/or the signal strength information of the neighboring femto cells determined by the scanning, or the femto cell information with the strongest signal strength and/or the signal strength information thereof in the neighboring femto cells determined by the scanning.

29. The method according to claim 26 or 27, wherein after the terminal sends a report of the result of the scanning and/or a request message to the serving base station, further comprising:

and the service base station positions the terminal by using the scanning result of the terminal and/or optimizes and configures the adjacent area information sent to the terminal.

30. The method of claim 1, wherein the processing of the terminal to scan sub-base stations to determine sub-base stations for handover or network access further comprises:

the terminal performs channel quality measurement on all or part of the adjacent sub-base stations corresponding to the scanned and determined adjacent sub-base stations and/or the specific adjacent cell information to obtain a scanning result, wherein the scanning result comprises channel quality information between the terminal and the adjacent sub-base stations.

31. The method of claim 1, wherein the processing of the terminal to scan sub-base stations to determine sub-base stations for handover or network access further comprises:

and the terminal reports the scanning result to the service base station actively or based on the indication of the service base station in the scanning process or after the scanning is finished.

32. The method of claim 30, wherein after the terminal reports the scanning result, further comprising:

the service base station receives the scanning result reported by the terminal;

and the service base station determines a sub base station which needs to be switched or accessed by the terminal according to the scanning result, and initiates a switching or network access process.

33. The method of claim 1, wherein the processing of the terminal to scan sub-base stations to determine sub-base stations for handover or network access further comprises:

and the terminal initiates a switching or network access process under the condition that the terminal determines the sub-base station which needs to be switched or accessed to the network according to the scanning result.

34. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 8, 10 to 17, 19 to 27, and 30 to 32, wherein the neighbor information comprises a scan indication corresponding to the neighbor information.

35. The method of claim 18, wherein the neighbor information comprises a scan indication corresponding to the neighbor information.

36. The method of claim 29, wherein the neighbor information comprises a scan indication corresponding to the neighbor information.

37. The method according to any of claims 1 to 8, 10 to 17, 19 to 27, 30 to 32, wherein the neighbor cell information comprises neighbor cell information for handover or information for network access.

38. The method of claim 18, wherein the neighbor cell information comprises neighbor cell information for handover or information for network access.

39. The method of claim 29, wherein the neighbor cell information comprises neighbor cell information for handover or information for network access.

40. A terminal, comprising:

the first scanning module is used for scanning the sub-base stations according to the summarized adjacent area information to determine one or more adjacent sub-base stations;

the second scanning module is used for scanning the sub-base stations according to the specific adjacent cell information to determine the sub-base stations switched by the terminal or accessed to the network; wherein,

the summarized neighbor cell information comprises appointment information and/or public information; the appointed information comprises carrier frequency division information and/or preamble division information, wherein the division information is the corresponding relation between various types of base stations and/or various network access types of base stations and the carrier frequencies and/or the preambles; wherein,

41. The terminal of claim 40, further comprising:

a handover or network access initiating module, configured to initiate a handover or network access procedure when the second scanning module determines that the sub-base station needs to be handed over or accessed to the network.

42. A base station, comprising:

the neighbor cell information sending module is used for actively sending the neighbor cell information to the terminal or responding to a request message of the terminal or triggering and sending the neighbor cell information to the terminal based on a network;

a switching or network access initiating module, configured to determine, according to a result report of the sub-base station performing switching or network access determined by the terminal scanning the sub-base stations, the sub-base station to which the terminal needs to perform switching or network access, and initiate a switching or network access procedure;

the neighbor cell information sent by the neighbor cell information sending module comprises summary neighbor cell information and/or specific neighbor cell information, and the summary neighbor cell information comprises appointment information and/or public information; wherein,

43. A wireless communication system, comprising:

at least one large-coverage base station, configured to send general and/or specific neighbor cell information of sub-base stations in its respective coverage area, where the large-coverage base station includes at least one of a macro base station, a small base station, and a micro base station;

at least one sub base station for sending respective specific adjacent area information; the specific neighbor cell information is used for the terminal to scan the sub base station; wherein,