Systems and methods for acknowledging communications from a plurality of devices

摘要

Systems, methods, and devices for acknowledging communications from a plurality of wireless devices in a wireless network are described herein. In some embodiments, an access point for the wireless network transmits a group acknowledgment (ACK) to indicate whether communications (packets) from the plurality of wireless devices have been received or correctly decoded within some time interval. Each wireless device may have a different time interval associated with it. For some embodiments, the time interval for a wireless device is relative to when a previous group ACK was sent. A group ACK may include a bitmap. In some embodiments, the bitmap indicating whether a communication has been received or correctly decoded may be transmitted as part of a beacon.

主权项

1. A method of communicating in a wireless network having an access point and a plurality of wireless devices associated with the access point, the method comprising:
for each wireless device in the plurality of wireless devices, determining at the access point whether one or more packets have been correctly decoded within a time interval associated with the each wireless device, the time interval being relative to when a previous group acknowledgement was transmitted to the each wireless device; generating at the access point a plurality of indicators in one to one correspondence with the plurality of wireless devices, each indicator signifying a result of the determining for a corresponding wireless device; and broadcasting, by the access point at a fixed period of time after a broadcast of the previous group acknowledgement, a group acknowledgment comprising the plurality of indicators, wherein the generating comprises generating an information element comprising the plurality of indicators, wherein the group acknowledgement includes the information element, wherein the information element comprises a length of the information element, a plurality of association identifications in one to one correspondence with the plurality of wireless devices, and a bitmap to represent the plurality of indicators, wherein each indicator in the plurality of indicators is represented by one bit in the bitmap, and wherein the plurality of association identifications identifies for which wireless device in the plurality of wireless devices each indicator has been generated.