Data network accelerated access system

Details Data network accelerated access system Data network accelerated access system

1998-05-19

2003-07-08

Powell, Mark R. (Department: 2142)

Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput

Distributed data processing

Client/server

C709S219000, C709S217000, C370S335000

Reexamination Certificate

active

06591288

ABSTRACT:

FIELD OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to a system for providing accelerated access to a first data network via a second data network where the second data network is a packet switched network or other type of network which is designed to transmit bursty data. In particular this invention relates to a system for providing accelerated access to the Internet or an internal company run Intranet via a wireless telecommunications network.
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
Fixed wireless access systems are currently employed for local wireless telecommunication networks, such as the IONICA system. Known systems comprise radio transceivers which are located at subscriber's premises. The radio transceivers at the subscribers premises communicate by radio link with a base station, which provides cellular coverage over, for example, a 5 km radius in urban environments. A typical base station will support 500-2000 subscribers. Each base station is connected to a standard PSTN switch via a conventional transmission link
etwork. Thus subscribers are connected to a national telecommunications network by radio link using a wireless telecommunication network in place of the more traditional method of copper cable. Fixed wireless access systems are capable of delivering a wide range of access services from POTS (public operator telephone service), ISDN (integrated services digital network) to broadband data.
Subscribers having a computing device, such as a PC connected via a modem to a wireless telecommunication network, such as the fixed wireless access system described above may wish to access data networks, such as the Internet.
Referring to
FIG. 1
, when a request for a link to the Internet (
2
) is made at the subscriber's PC (
4
), the signal generated is communicated via the PC's modem (
6
) to a decoder (
8
), where it is encoded and then transmitted over a wireless telecommunications network by the subscriber unit's antenna (
10
) to the associated antenna (
12
) of a base station (
14
—indicated by dotted lines) which serves the subscriber unit (
16
—indicated by dotted lines). At the base station the signal is decoded by a decoder (
18
) and then transmitted in the conventional way via a standard circuit switched PSTN system (
20
) to the Internet (
2
). Similarly, when information is received from the Internet, it is transmitted over the PSTN system to the relevant base station (
14
) where it is encoded by decoder (
18
) and transmitted over the network by the base station antenna (
12
) to the antenna (
10
) at the subscriber's premises. The information is then decoded at the subscriber's premises by the decoder (
8
) and transmitted to the PC (
4
) via the PC's modem (
6
).
The wireless telecommunications network described above is a packet switched data network and as such is designed to carry intermittently transmitted packets of information (ie bursty data) from a particular subscriber to its associated base station and vice versa, as opposed to a continuous stream of information. For example, during Internet browsing when a subscriber's PC requests the next link or moves to another site on the Internet, this is transmitted between the subscriber's antenna and the base station antenna as one or more discrete packets of high bandwidth signal. There is then likely to be a long gap until the user requests a further link. Similarly, when an Internet page is downloaded onto the subscriber's PC from the Internet, the information associated with that page is transmitted between the base station antenna and the subscriber unit's antenna as one, or more likely a plurality, of packets of high bandwidth signal. Again, there is then likely to be a long gap, while the user assesses the current page until a next requested page is downloaded. For example, during normal browsing of the Internet a subscriber's modem may be idle up to 90% of the time and so information would be transmitted between the subscriber unit's antenna and a base station antenna only 10% of the time during which the user is browsing.
Recently, so called Internet accelerators or accelerated access systems have become very popular, for example the “PeakJet” package which is available from The PeakSoft Corporation and the “Net Accelerator” package which is available from IMSI. These packages operate on a computing device, such as a PC, and speed up or accelerate access to Internet pages by scanning ahead when, during browsing, a user's modem is idle and downloading onto the user's PC those pages and associated graphics which are linked to the page currently being displayed on the PC screen and being read by the user. The downloaded links are then stored as a cache (
24
—see
FIG. 1
) in the PC's (
4
) hard disk. When the user, finishes reading the current page and requests a link to a linked Internet page, it should appear on the PC screen immediately because it should already stored in the cache (
24
) in the PC's hard disk. That is provided that the Internet accelerator has had time to download that particular linked page into the cache during previous idle time.
Since many unused linked pages are downloaded, the modem (
6
) is working almost continuously. Inevitably, many of the pages loaded by the Internet accelerator into the cache (
24
) will not be requested by a user and so will have to be discarded later.
The Internet accelerated access packages described above have an intelligent caching system which learns from the PC user's Internet browsing activities, those Internet pages or sites the user accesses most frequently. Then when the modem is idle the Internet accelerating system will access these most frequently accessed pages and update the cache with recent changes which have been made to them. Therefore, when a user next requests to access one of the most frequently used pages, the up to date page is displayed on the PC screen almost immediately and less time is spent waiting for the page to be accessed from the Internet by the browser. Even if the most frequently used page has not yet been updated and so is not completely up to date, all that the Internet acceleration package needs to request is a relatively small amount of information required to update the page, which will take less time to be downloaded from the Internet onto the PC than the entire page.
When a subscriber to a wireless telecommunication network, as shown in
FIG. 1
, uses an Internet accelerator, the PC's modem (
6
) will be operating almost constantly and so the subscriber unit's antenna (
10
) will be transmitting and/or receiving almost continually. Similarly, the base station antenna (
12
) will be transmitting and/or receiving to/from the subscriber unit almost continuously. This is not consistent with the fact that such wireless telecommunication networks are packet switched networks and as such are designed to carry intermittently transmitted packets of information to and from a subscriber. Although it may not be too much of a problem for a circuit switched network (eg. PSTN), the continual transmission of data packets to and from a subscriber can be very harmful to the performance of a packet switched network where data has been assumed to be very “bursty”. In a wireless telecommunication network for carrying data or a mix of voice and data, Internet accelerated access systems can cause serious congestion.
Although the above example relates to accessing the Internet using an Internet accelerated access package via a wireless telecommunication network, it will be apparent that similar problems will be experienced when trying to access a first data network, using a network accelerated access package which scans ahead and downloads network sites before they are requested, via a second data network where the second data network is a packet switched network or other type of network which is designed to transmit bursty data.
OBJECT OF THE INVENTION
The present invention seeks to provide an accelerated access system which overcomes or at le

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