Communication system, communication unit and method of power saving therein

1. A communication system comprising a system management function for managing base-site resources and system throughput of data, the system management function configured to identify a number of resources, wherein the system management function comprises:

a throughput identification function to identify one or more bottleneck resources from a sub-set of system resources involved in the system throughput;

means for applying selectively at least one quality of service process selected from a group of scheduling and admission control, to the identified one or more bottleneck resources, based on the identification of the one or more bottleneck resources; and

means for prioritizing at least one of the one or more bottleneck resources and other resources from the sub-set of system resources, by the system management function, with a bottleneck resource being allocated a high priority when selectively applying at least one quality of service process.

2. The communication system according to claim 1 , wherein the bottleneck resource is identified as a bottleneck resource using at least one of the following parameters:

(i) A frequency at which an overload control function is initiated for the resource; or and

(ii) Measurement of a resource's utilisation.

3. The communication system according to claim 1 , wherein said system management function is operably coupled to a scheduler for scheduling data packets for transmission, such that the data packets are added to, or removed from a data stream for transmission based on an availability capacity of the identified one or more bottleneck resources or other resource from the sub-set of resources.

4. The communication system according to claim 1 , wherein the system management function is operably coupled to an admission control function for admitting call requests to the communication system such that the admission control function employs a tracking process to count a failure rate of admission attempts for a particular resource.

5. The communication system according to claim 4 , wherein the bottleneck resource is identified based on said failure rate count.

6. The communication system according to claim 1 , wherein the system management function only applies one or more quality of service processes to the identified one or more bottleneck resources.

7. The communication system according to claim 1 , wherein the throughput identification function identifies a bottleneck resource by detection of an alarm corresponding to a further resource and in response to the alarm the system management function adds the further resource to a list of one or more bottleneck resources.

8. The communication system according to claim 7 , wherein the detection of the alarm includes at least one of the group of; an overload alarm, the detection is performed over a time interval, the detection is performed over a number of scheduling events, and the detection is performed over a number of admission control events.

9. The communication system according to claim 1 , wherein the system management function resource receives a number of loading measurements on a number of the resources, and in response to the measurement(s) adds a percentage of a resource to, or removes a percentage of a resource from, a list of one or more bottleneck resources when a loading exceeds or falls below a loading threshold over a particular time period.

10. The communication system according to claim 1 , wherein the communication system is a 3GPP wireless communication system and the system management function is a radio network controller.

11. The communication system according to claim 10 , wherein, the resources comprise at least one:

(i) A Radio network controller resource ( 105 );

(ii) A Node B hardware/software resource ( 110 );

(iii) An I ub /I ur backhaul resource ( 115 ); and

(iv) An air-interface resource ( 120 ).

12. A method of reducing processing power consumption in a system management function in a communication system, the method comprising the steps of:

identifying a number of resources that affect data throughput in the communication system;

identifying one or more bottleneck resources from a sub-set of system resources involved in the system throughput; and

applying selectively one or more quality of service processes selected from a group of scheduling and admission control, to the identified one or more bottleneck resources, based on the identification of the one or more bottleneck resources; and

prioritizing at least one of the one or more bottleneck resources and other resources from the sub-set of system resources, by the system management function, with a bottleneck resource being allocated a high priority when selectively applying at least one quality of service process.

13. The method of reducing processing power consumption in a system management function according to claim 12 , the method further comprising a step of:

identifying a resource capacity of a number of the resources to identify the bottleneck resource.

14. The method of reducing processing power consumption in a system management function according to claim 12 , the method further comprising the step of:

scheduling data packets for transmission, such that the data packets are added to, or removed from a data stream for transmission based on the bottleneck resource.

15. The method of reducing processing power consumption in a system management function according to claim 14 , the method further comprising the step of:

performing per-cell checks on all resources that are not the bottleneck resource to identify whether further data packets are to be scheduled.

16. The method of reducing processing power consumption in a system management function according to claim 12 , the method further comprising the step of:

counting a failure rate of admission attempts for a particular resource to identify the bottleneck resource.

17. The method of reducing processing power consumption in a system management function according to claim 12 , the method further comprising the steps of:

detecting an alarm corresponding to a resource; and

adding, in response to the alarm, the resource to a list of one or more bottleneck resources.

18. The method of reducing processing power consumption in a system management function according to claim 12 , the method further comprising the steps of:

receiving a number of loading measurements related to a number of the resources, and

adding, in response to said measurement(s), a resource to a list of one or more bottleneck resources when a loading measurement exceeds a loading threshold over a particular time period; or

removing a resource from a list of one or more bottleneck resources resource when a loading measurement falls below a loading threshold over a particular time period.

19. A radio network controller managing base-site resources and system throughput of data, the radio network controller identifying a number of resources, wherein the radio network controller is comprises:

a throughput identification function to identify one or more bottleneck resources from a sub-set of the number of system resources involved in said system throughput;

means for applying selectively at least one quality of service process selected from a group of scheduling and admission control, to the identified one or more bottleneck resources, based on the identification of the one or more bottleneck resources; and

means for prioritizing at least one of the one or more bottleneck resources and other resources from the sub-set of system resources, by the system management function, with a bottleneck resource being allocated a high priority when selectively applying at least one quality of service process.

20. The radio network controller according to claim 19 , wherein the throughput identification function identifies a bottleneck resource by detection of an alarm corresponding to a further resource, and in response to the alarm radio network controller adds the further resource to a list of one or more bottleneck resources.

21. The radio network controller according to claim 20 , wherein the detection of the alarm includes at least one of a group of overload alarms wherein, the detection is performed over a time interval, the detection is performed over a number of scheduling events, or the detection is performed over a number of admission control events.

22. The radio network controller according to claim 19 , wherein the throughput identification function receives a number of loading measurements on a number of the resource, and in response to the measurement(s) the radio network controller adds a percentage of a resource to, or removes a percentage of a resource from, a list of one or more bottleneck resources when a loading exceeds or falls below a loading threshold over a particular time period.