Method for preventing reporting of duplicate pilots within a communication system

1. A method within a communication device for preventing reporting of duplicate pilots within a communication system, the method comprising the steps of:

communicating with one or more base stations;

monitoring and maintaining a pilot set including:

an active set comprising one or more active set pilots,

a candidate set comprising one or more candidate set pilots, and

a neighbor set comprising one or more neighbor set pilots;

allocating one or more pilots not found in the active set, the candidate set, or the neighbor set to a remaining set comprising one or more remaining set pilots;

providing a remaining set window around each remaining set pilot, said remaining set window having a size determined by an overall number of chips, said remaining set window being segmented by a plurality of chip intervals, each chip interval of said plurality of chip intervals having a corresponding remaining set pilot; and

eliminating a remaining set pilot, from said remaining set, when the remaining set window around the remaining set pilot overlaps any of the active, the candidate, or the neighbor set pilots.

2. A method as recited in claim 1 , further comprising, prior to the monitoring step, the step of:

allocating one or more pilots associated with one or more forward traffic channels assigned to service the communication device to the active set.

3. A method as recited in claim 1 , further comprising, prior to the monitoring step, the step of:

allocating one or more pilots that are not currently in the active set but have been received by the communication device with sufficient signal strength to indicate that the associated forward traffic channels could be successfully demodulated to the candidate set.

4. A method as recited in claim 1 , further comprising, prior to the monitoring step, the step of:

allocating one or more pilots that are not currently in the active set or the candidate set but are likely candidates for hand off to the neighbor set.

5. A method as recited in claim 1 , further comprising the steps of:

checking for an overlap between each of the active set pilots, candidate set pilots, and neighbor set pilots; and

eliminating one of the overlapping pilots.

6. A method within a communication system for preventing reporting of duplicate pilots, the method comprising the steps of:

communicating with one or more base stations;

monitoring and maintaining a pilot set including:

an active set comprising one or more active set pilots,

a candidate set comprising one or more candidate set pilots, and

a neighbor set comprising one or more neighbor set pilots;

allocating one or more pilots not found in the active set, the candidate set, or the neighbor set to a remaining set comprising one or more remaining set pilots;

providing a remaining set window around a remaining set pilot, said remaining set window having a size determined by an overall number of chips, said remaining set window being segmented by a plurality of chip intervals, each chip interval of said plurality of chip intervals having a corresponding remaining set pilot;

searching the remaining set window centered around the remaining set pilot;

comparing one or more multi-path components resulting from the search to the active set; and

eliminating a multi-path component with a duplicate is detected from the comparing step.

7. A method as recited in claim 6 , further comprising:

repeating the providing, searching, comparing, and eliminating steps for each of the one or more remaining set pilots of the remaining set.

8. A method as recited in claim 7 , further comprising the step of:

communicating the search results to the one or more base stations as part of a handoff process.