CN1224282C - Method for monitoring performance of far-end network at GSM base station and relative monitor system - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention discloses a method for monitoring the performance of a remote network established by a GSM base station. The data communication between the monitoring and analysis equipment at the end; for the dedicated time slot, the data and instructions sent by the far-end base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment are respectively loaded on the link at the far end/near end Extraction; for data in other time slots, directly establish a link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller. It can monitor the performance of the equipment in the whole network in real time.

Description

GSM base station establishes remote network performance monitoring method and related monitoring system

【Technical field】

The invention relates to a GSM mobile communication system, in particular to a method for establishing remote network property monitoring by a GSM base station. The invention also relates to a GSM base station remote network performance monitoring system.

【Background technique】

Since Bell Laboratories in the United States proposed the concept of a cellular mobile phone in the early 1960s, the cellular system has experienced several generations of development. North America, Europe and Japan have formulated different standards for the second-generation cellular system since the 1980s. Among them, the Global System for Mobile (GSM) is the first cellular system in the world that specifies digital modulation, network layer structure and services, and has become The most common cellular system in the world today. However, with the continuous expansion of the network scale and the continuous improvement of the network level, the maintenance of the GSM network is becoming more and more important.

In the GSM mobile communication system, how to effectively monitor the network performance of the base station is the most difficult problem for operators when performing system maintenance. The GSM system architecture is relatively complex, including base station subsystem (BSS), network subsystem (NSS) and operation support subsystem (OSS). The failure of any module in these subsystems will ultimately reflect the failure of some or all mobile phone user services. Influence. Among them, the operation support subsystem (OSS) can complete the function of operation and maintenance, and can maintain the operation of the network subsystem and the base station subsystem in real time, but for network failures, especially for base station failures, its ability to detect and maintain is far from sufficient . The need to develop a special equipment for real-time monitoring of base switching stations and the like is becoming more and more obvious. In the current existing technology, there are already devices for monitoring the operating status of base station equipment, base station controllers, mobile switches and other equipment. When the equipment has a fault that can be detected by the equipment itself, the maintenance personnel are notified by reporting to the operation and maintenance system. Maintenance, but it is often limited to the monitoring of individual devices, and it is impossible to achieve unified monitoring and maintenance of the entire network system. In addition, in some cases, due to equipment problems caused by system parameter configuration problems or base station master clock drift, the equipment itself cannot be detected in the working state, so when there is a problem with the network performance of the system, maintenance personnel often It is impossible to know the fault situation from the system's own operation and maintenance system. Only after the mobile phone user complains and conducts the actual test can the fault situation be known and the system maintained, which greatly reduces the maintenance efficiency and the service quality of the GSM network.

【Content of invention】

The purpose of the present invention is to overcome that the existing technology is often limited to the monitoring of individual devices, which cannot achieve unified monitoring and maintenance of the entire network system and the system maintenance of the network through the background alarm and operation and maintenance of the device itself. The real-time processing ability is poor to provide a method for GSM base station to establish remote network performance monitoring and a related monitoring system, the method and system can use technical means to monitor the performance of equipment in the entire network, and at the same time can receive real-time information about the failure of a certain equipment information to achieve real-time monitoring of system failures.

GSM base station of the present invention sets up remote network performance monitoring method, and it comprises:

Open up a dedicated time slot on the link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller, which is specially used for data communication between the remote base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment;

For the dedicated time slot, the data and instructions sent by the remote base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment are respectively loaded on the link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller at the far end or the near end extraction; for data in other time slots, directly establish a link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller.

For the dedicated time slots, the data and instructions sent by the far-end base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment are respectively carried out on the link between the far-end base station and the near-end base station controller at the far end or the near end. The specific implementation is to set up a time slot signal processing and conversion unit at the far end, and transfer the data sent by the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment on the dedicated time slot from the far-end base station and the near-end through a time-division method. Extracted from the link between the terminal base station controllers, and sent to the remote test equipment; for the data of the remote test equipment, the time slot signal processing and conversion unit passes through a time slot allocation unit, and inserts the dedicated time slot . A time slot exchange unit is also set at the near end, and the time slot used to transmit the communication data between the near end monitoring analysis equipment and the remote base station test equipment is exchanged to a signal processing and interface conversion unit, and the signal processing and interface conversion unit Extracted from the instant time slot, other time slots are exchanged to the link connected to the base station controller; the time slot exchange unit uses the signal processing and interface conversion unit to transmit the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment and the remote base station test Data communicated between devices is inserted into said dedicated time slot.

The present invention also includes a GSM base station remote network performance monitoring system, which includes:

A near-end monitoring analysis device and at least one remote base station testing device;

The remote access equipment and the near-end access equipment are used to open a link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller for the connection between the remote base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment. The dedicated time slot for data communication, the data and instructions sent by the far-end base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment are respectively carried out on the link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller at the far end or near end Load or extract; for data in other time slots, directly establish a link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller.

The remote access device includes: a time slot signal processing and conversion unit, which transfers the data sent by the near-end monitoring and analysis device on the dedicated time slot from the remote base station and the near-end base station through a time-division method The data is extracted from the link between the controllers and sent to the remote test equipment; the time slot allocation unit inserts the data sent by the remote test equipment through the time slot signal processing and conversion unit into the dedicated time slot.

The near-end access device includes a time slot exchange unit and a signal processing and interface conversion unit; the time slot exchange unit will be used to exchange time slots for transmitting data communicated between the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment and the remote base station testing equipment to a signal processing and interface conversion unit, which is extracted from the instant time slot by the signal processing and interface conversion unit, and other time slots are exchanged to the link connected to the base station controller; the time slot exchange unit processes the signal and The interface conversion unit is used to transmit the communication data between the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment and the remote base station testing equipment, and insert it into the dedicated time slot.

Because the present invention has opened up a dedicated time slot on the link between the far-end base station and the near-end base station controller, on this time slot like this, just can send the far-end base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring analysis equipment Data and instructions are loaded or extracted on the above-mentioned link, thus completing the communication between a remote base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment, thus achieving unified monitoring and maintenance of the entire network system; because The communication between the far-end base station testing equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment is real-time, so the method and system can receive the failure information of a certain equipment in real time, so as to realize the real-time monitoring of system failure.

【Description of drawings】

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a method for monitoring performance of a remote network established by a GSM base station according to the present invention.

Fig. 2 is a connection schematic diagram of a GSM base station remote network performance monitoring system according to the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of a hardware structure of a remote access unit (RAU).

Fig. 4 is a block diagram of a hardware structure of a local access unit (LAU).

Fig. 5 is a schematic diagram of the application of the base station network performance monitoring equipment in an actual network.

【Detailed ways】

In Fig. 1, it can be seen that the implementation steps of the method for establishing remote network performance monitoring by the GSM base station.

First of all, open a dedicated time slot on the link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller, which can be 64K, for communication between the far-end base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment Communication of data. In this time slot, the far-end base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment transmit various test data and control commands. The rest of the time the link carries data for normal traffic.

Then, for the dedicated time slot, the data and instructions sent by the far-end base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment are respectively carried out on the link between the far-end base station and the near-end base station controller at the far-end/near-end Loading/extracting; for data in other time slots, directly establish a link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller. In this process, a remote access device is set at the far end. In addition to providing power for the base station test equipment, it mainly realizes the adaptation of the data communicated with the serial port of the base station test equipment to the connection between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller. In the unused 64K time slot of the E1 link. Setting a local access device at the near end is mainly to extract the data of this time slot on the E1 link, send it to the monitoring and analysis equipment through the Ethernet port, and at the same time send the command from the monitoring and analysis equipment to the test equipment of the base station. It is assigned to the downlink 64K time slot and sent to the remote access device. For the data of other time slots, the local access equipment directly switches it to the E1 port connected to the near-end base station controller. Through data adaptation and exchange between the remote access device and the local access device, the base station test equipment can use the vacant time slot of the E1 link without affecting the E1 link between the remote base station and the near-end access device , to realize the communication with the local monitoring and analysis equipment. The remote base station test equipment mainly reports the system information of the cell monitored by the mobile phone and the system information of adjacent cells to the local monitoring and analysis equipment, and reports the result of regular location update. The local monitoring and analysis equipment analyzes the information reported by each cell, confirms the network performance of the cell or nearby cells, and sends an alarm to the cells with problems. When the maintenance personnel cannot confirm the current operating status of the base station, they can send test commands to the remote base station test equipment through the current monitoring and analysis equipment, so that the base station test equipment can lock a specific frequency point to make a call, and report the call result to the monitoring and analysis equipment. Enable maintenance personnel to confirm the current network performance of the cell.

The remote base station test equipment described herein may be a test mobile phone, a desktop tester, or a wireless sensor device. With regard to this part of mature technology at home and abroad, its test method can be implemented very conveniently. What we want to solve is how to monitor the whole network. This part of the existing technology will not be discussed in detail. In addition, there are currently mature technologies for near-end test and analysis equipment. The problem we are solving is how to use it to establish the monitoring problem of the entire network, so this part will not be discussed in detail.

The remote access device may include two E1 interfaces, one E1 interface is used for connection with a local base station controller (BSC), and one E1 interface is used for connection with a remote base station (BTS). The remote access device has a time-slot signal processing and conversion unit. For the messages and commands sent by the monitoring analyzer, the time-slot signal processing and conversion unit can convert the data of 64K time slots through time division according to the set data. Extracted from the 2M data bus. When the time slot signal processing and conversion unit inserts the message reported by the base station test equipment into the designated 64K time slot, it must pass through the time slot allocation unit. The time slot allocation unit can use a programmable logic device (CPLD or FPGA) to implement the system, and use a multi-way switch to insert data into the 64K time slot of the designated 2M link. The time slot signal processing and conversion unit is the core part of the remote access unit. It firstly provides the conversion function of the interface, extracts and sends the data of the 64K time slot on the specified 2M link according to the time division multiple access method. After being processed by the signal processing unit, it is sent to the test equipment through the serial interface, and at the same time, the message sent by the base station test equipment through the serial interface is converted into data in 64K time slots and sent to the monitoring computer. Since only a 64K transparent channel is provided for the near-end and far-end access devices, the rate adaptation method of serial port data and 64K time slot data can be defined by oneself.

The local access device provides multiple pairs of E1 interfaces, and each pair of E1 interfaces provides two E1 interfaces, one of which is used to connect to the remote access device, and one E1 interface is used to connect to the base station controller. The local access device also includes a time slot exchange unit to exchange the time slots of the 2M data bus (HighWay) converted by the E1 interface unit. According to the configuration of the monitoring system, the time slot exchange unit will be used to transmit the local monitoring analysis equipment and the remote The time slots of commands and messages communicated between end base station test equipment are switched to the 2M HW line with the signal processing & interface conversion unit, and other time slots are completely transparently switched to another E1 link connected to the base station controller. Vice versa, the time slot exchange unit switches a certain time slot on the 2M HW line of the signal processing & interface conversion unit used to transmit commands and messages communicated between the local monitoring and analysis equipment and the remote base station test equipment to the set E1 On a fixed 64K time slot on the link, it is transmitted to the remote access device at the far end, and sent to the base station test device at the far end through the serial port. The signal processing & interface conversion unit extracts the data exchanged to the 64K time slots of multiple test equipment on the 2MHW line, extracts the serial data sent by the test equipment according to the determined rate adaptation method, and passes the high-speed data The interface is sent to the monitoring and analysis equipment. vice versa. The remote and local access devices will be described in detail in the following introduction to the system of the present invention.

The GSM base station remote network performance monitoring system involved in the present invention includes: a near-end monitoring and analysis device and a plurality of remote base station testing devices; a remote access device and a near-end access device.

As shown in Figure 2, the remote base station test equipment is located on the side of the base station, which is a certain position in the base station equipment room, and it provides two external interfaces: a power supply interface and a serial interface. In a specific application, the base station test equipment can be an existing commercial test mobile phone on the market, a desktop tester, or a wireless sensor device. With regard to this part of mature technology at home and abroad, its test method can be implemented very conveniently. What we want to solve is how to monitor the whole network. This part of the existing technology will not be discussed in detail. The test equipment is connected with the remote access equipment through these two interfaces. The power interface between the remote access equipment and the base station test equipment can directly use the charging port of the base station test equipment, and the remote access equipment provides power to the base station test equipment through the power interface, so that the battery of the base station test equipment is in a floating charge state for a long time , to ensure the long-term work of the base station test equipment. The base station test equipment can communicate with the remote access equipment through its data port, that is, the serial interface. The base station test equipment reports the monitored parameters of the wireless cell and the signaling and results of establishing a call to the remote access device through the serial interface. At the same time, the remote access device can also use the serial interface to send The command is sent to the remote base station test equipment to control the working status of the base station test equipment and establish a specific call.

The location of the remote access equipment is also located on the side of the base station. In addition to providing the power supply and serial interface connected to the base station test equipment, it also provides two E1 interfaces, one E1 interface is used to communicate with the local base station controller (BSC) Connection, an E1 interface is used for the connection with the remote base station (BTS). In the E1 link connected between the remote access equipment and the base station controller, there is a 64K time slot for transmitting commands and message communications between the local monitoring and analysis equipment and the remote base station testing equipment. The remote access device extracts this time slot, and other time slots are completely transparently switched to the E1 link connected to the base station. In this way, the remote access device is completely transparent to the signaling and voice of the communication between the BSC and the BTS. After the remote device extracts the data in the 64K time slot used for monitoring the system, removes the encapsulated frame header, frame tail, control word and check word, and sends it to the base station test equipment through the serial interface, and the base station test equipment The reported message is sent to the remote access device through the serial interface. After the remote access device encapsulates the data, it is transmitted to the local monitoring and analysis device through the 64K time slot channel used for the monitoring system.

The hardware structure block diagram of the remote access equipment is shown in Figure 3. It is mainly composed of three parts: E1 interface unit, time slot signal processing and conversion unit, and time slot allocation unit. The E1 interface unit mainly provides two E1 interfaces conforming to the G.703 standard, one E1 interface is connected to the BTS, and the other E1 interface is used to connect to the BSC or to the transmission equipment connected to the BSC. The E1 interface converts the E1 signal of the HD3 code transmitted by the line into a 2M serial data bus (HighWay). For the messages and commands issued by the monitoring and analysis equipment, the time slot signal processing and conversion unit can be time-divided according to the set Data, the data of the 64K time slot is extracted from the 2M data bus. When the time slot signal processing and conversion unit inserts the message reported by the test equipment into the designated 64K time slot, it must pass through the time slot allocation unit. The time slot allocation unit can use a programmable logic device (CPLD or FPGA) to implement the system, and use a multi-way switch to insert data into the 64K time slot of the designated 2M link. The time slot signal processing and conversion unit is the core part of the remote access unit. It firstly provides the conversion function of the interface, extracts and sends the data of the 64K time slot on the specified 2M link according to the TDM (Time Division Multiplexing) method. After being processed by the signal processing unit, it is sent to the base station test equipment through the serial interface, and at the same time, the message sent by the base station test equipment through the serial interface is converted into data in 64K time slots and sent to the monitoring and analysis equipment. Since only a 64K transparent channel is provided for the near-end and far-end access devices, the rate adaptation method of serial port data and 64K time slot data can be defined by oneself.

The local access device is located locally, that is, on the side of the base station controller, and it mainly provides an E1 interface and a high-speed communication interface. The connection of the E1 link between the local access device and the remote access device can be realized by transmission means such as microwave and optical transmission.

The local access device provides multiple pairs of E1 interfaces, and each pair of E1 interfaces provides two E1 interfaces, one of which is used to connect to the remote access device, and one E1 interface is used to connect to the base station controller. A 64K time slot of the E1 link connected to the remote access device is used to transmit commands and messages between the local monitoring and analysis equipment and the remote base station test equipment. The local access device extracts this time slot, Other time slots are completely transparently switched to another E1 link connected to the base station controller. In this way, the local access device is completely transparent to the signaling and voice of the communication between the BSC and the BTS. After the local access device extracts the data in the 64K time slot used for monitoring the system, removes the encapsulated frame header, frame tail, control word and check word, and sends it to the local monitoring system for monitoring through the high-speed communication port. At the same time, the monitoring and analysis equipment for local monitoring sends the issued commands to the local access equipment through the high-speed communication port. After the local access equipment encapsulates the data, it transmits the commands to the remote end remote access device.

The hardware structure block diagram of the local access equipment is shown in Figure 4, which mainly consists of three parts: E1 interface unit, time slot exchange unit, signal processing and interface conversion unit. The E1 interface unit provides multiple pairs of E1 interfaces, and each pair of E1 interfaces provides two E1 interfaces, one of which is used to connect to remote access equipment, and one E1 interface is used to connect to the base station controller or connect to the base station The E1 interface of the transmission equipment is connected. The time slot exchange unit exchanges the time slots of the 2M data bus (HighWay) converted by the E1 interface unit. According to the configuration of the monitoring system, the time slot exchange unit will be used to transmit the communication between the local monitoring analysis equipment and the remote base station test equipment The time slots of commands and messages are switched to the 2M HW line with the signal processing & interface conversion unit, and other time slots are completely transparently switched to another E1 link connected to the base station controller. Vice versa, the time slot exchange unit switches a certain time slot on the 2M HW line of the signal processing & interface conversion unit used to transmit commands and messages communicated between the local monitoring and analysis equipment and the remote base station test equipment to the set E1 On a fixed 64K time slot on the link, it is transmitted to the remote access device at the far end, and sent to the test device at the far end through the serial port. The signal processing & interface conversion unit extracts the data exchanged to the 64K time slots of multiple test equipment on the 2M HW line, extracts the serial data sent by the test equipment according to the determined rate adaptation method, and passes through the high-speed The data interface is sent to the monitoring and analyzing equipment for monitoring. vice versa.

Fig. 5 is a base station network performance monitoring system with 4 monitoring terminals. The BTS can be a macrocell base station or a microcell base station. The transmission of the E1 link between the remote access device and the local access device can adopt various transmission methods such as SDH optical transmission, microwave, and HDSL. In this system, the base station test equipment adopts the commercial test mobile phone in the market, the RS232 interface is used between the test mobile phone and the remote access equipment, and the Ethernet port is used between the local access equipment and the monitoring and analysis equipment. For this set of network performance monitoring system, more monitoring terminals can be brought in. The main limitation lies in the number of E1 link interfaces that the local access equipment can provide.

According to the design of this scheme, the entire device can also be integrated inside the BSS system as a part of the BSS system, which can increase the reliability and flexibility of the device, and some configurations of monitoring and analysis equipment can be directly through the GSM communication system. Operation and maintenance system (OSS) to achieve, can greatly reduce the hardware cost of the monitoring system, but doing so will also affect the relative independence of the monitoring system.

Claims (14)

1, a kind of GSM base station establishes remote network performance monitoring method, it comprises: Open up a dedicated time slot on the link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller for data communication between the remote base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment; For the dedicated time slot, the data and instructions sent by the remote base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment are respectively loaded on the link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller at the far end or the near end extraction; for data in other time slots, directly establish a link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller. 2, GSM base station according to claim 1 establishes remote network performance monitoring method, it is characterized in that: time slot signal processing and conversion unit are set at far end, by the method for time division, by the described dedicated time slot The data sent by the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment is extracted from the link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller, and sent to the remote base station test equipment; for the data of the remote base station test equipment, it is processed by the time slot signal The sum conversion unit inserts the dedicated time slot through a time slot allocation unit. 3. The GSM base station according to claim 1 establishes a remote network performance monitoring method, characterized in that: a time slot exchange unit is set at the near end, which will be used to transmit the communication between the near end monitoring analysis equipment and the remote base station testing equipment The time slot of the data is exchanged to a signal processing and interface conversion unit, which is extracted from the dedicated time slot by the signal processing and interface conversion unit, and other time slots are exchanged to the link connected to the base station controller; the time slot The switching unit uses the signal processing and interface conversion unit to transmit the communication data between the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment and the remote base station testing equipment, and inserts it into the dedicated time slot. 4. The GSM base station establishment remote network performance monitoring method according to claim 1, 2 or 3, characterized in that a 64K dedicated time slot is used on the link. 5. The GSM base station according to claim 2 or 3 establishes a remote network performance monitoring method, characterized in that: at the remote or near-end, two ends are connected to the remote base station and the near-end base station controller The E1 interface is used to convert the signal transmitted by the line into serial data. 6. A GSM base station remote network performance monitoring system comprising: A near-end monitoring analysis device and at least one remote base station testing device; The remote access equipment and the near-end access equipment are used to open a link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller for the connection between the remote base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment. The dedicated time slot for data communication, the data and instructions sent by the far-end base station test equipment and the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment are respectively carried out on the link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller at the far end or near end Load or extract; for data in other time slots, directly establish a link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller. 7. The GSM base station remote network performance monitoring system according to claim 6, wherein said remote access device comprises: The time slot signal processing and conversion unit extracts the data sent by the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment on the dedicated time slot from the link between the remote base station and the near-end base station controller by means of time division , sent to the remote test equipment; The time slot allocation unit inserts the data sent by the remote test equipment through the time slot signal processing and conversion unit into the dedicated time slot. 8. The GSM base station remote network performance monitoring system according to claim 6, characterized in that: said near-end access equipment includes a time slot exchange unit and a signal processing and interface conversion unit; the time slot exchange unit will use The time slot for transmitting the data communicated between the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment and the remote base station testing equipment is exchanged to a signal processing and interface conversion unit, which is extracted from the dedicated time slot by the signal processing and interface conversion unit, and other The time slot is switched to the link connected to the base station controller; the time slot exchange unit uses the signal processing and interface conversion unit to transmit the data communicated between the near-end monitoring and analysis equipment and the remote base station testing equipment, and inserts the dedicated time slot. 9. The GSM base station remote network performance monitoring system according to claim 6, characterized in that: said dedicated time slots are 64K dedicated time slots. 10. The GSM base station remote network performance monitoring system according to claim 6, characterized in that: said remote or near-end access equipment also includes at least one terminal connected to the remote base station and the near-end base station The E1 interface of the controller is used to convert the signal transmitted by the line into serial data. 11. The GSM base station remote network performance monitoring system according to claim 6, wherein said remote base station test equipment is a test mobile phone. 12. The GSM base station remote network performance monitoring system according to claim 6, wherein said remote base station test equipment is a desktop tester. 13. The GSM base station remote network performance monitoring system according to claim 6, characterized in that: said remote base station test equipment is a wireless sensor device. 14. The GSM base station remote network performance monitoring system according to claim 6, 11, 12 or 13, characterized in that: said remote base station can be implemented in conjunction with an operation support subsystem.

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