Quality of service adjustments to improve network utilization
View Patent ↗Devices of a telecommunication network described herein are configured to reduce a service level associated with a quality of service offered by the telecommunication network to a user. The devices may reduce the service level responsive to data consumption by the user exceeding a threshold or responsive to data consumption associated with an application or data type. Also, the devices may be configured to increase a video-conversation-specific service level responsive to determining that a client device of the user is establishing a video conversation.
1. One or more computer storage media comprising computer-executable instructions configured to program one or more computing devices of a telecommunication network to perform operations including:
receiving an indication that a client device of the telecommunication network is consuming data associated with a specific application or with a specific data type;
in response to receiving the indication, reducing an application-specific or data-type-specific content-quality level associated with a content-quality offered by the telecommunication network when providing the data associated with the application or the data type to the client device,
receiving a second indication that consumption of data of the client device over the telecommunication network has exceeded a threshold; and
in response to receiving the second indication, reducing a maximum bit rate at which the client device is able to communicate with the telecommunication network and increasing the previously reduced content-quality level.
2. The one or more computer storage media of claim 1 , wherein the receiving comprises receiving the indication from an Internet protocol (IP) multimedia subsystem (IMS) server, the IMS server having determined that the client device is consuming the data associated with the specific application or with the specific data type.
3. The one or more computer storage media of claim 1 , wherein the receiving comprises receiving the indication from the client device, the client device having determined that it is consuming the data associated with the specific application or with the specific data type.
4. The one or more computer storage media of claim 1 , wherein the receiving comprises receiving the indication from a gateway general packet radio service (GPRS) support node (GGSN) or a Packet Gateway (PGW) of the telecommunication network, the GGSN or PGW having determined that the client device is consuming the data associated with the specific application or with the specific data type.
5. The one or more computer storage media of claim 1 , wherein multiple ones of the applications and data types are associated with different content-quality levels.
6. A method comprising:
receiving, by a computing device of the telecommunication network, an indication that a client device of the telecommunication network is establishing a video conversation;
in response to receiving the indication, increasing, by the computing device, a video-conversation-specific service level associated with a quality of service offered by the telecommunication network when providing data associated with the video conversation;
receiving a second indication that consumption of data by a user of the client device over the telecommunication network has exceeded a threshold;
in response to receiving the second indication, and while the video-conversation-specific service level is increased, reducing an additional service level associated with a second quality of service provided by the telecommunication network to the user, the additional service level to be applied for data consumption unrelated to the video conversation;
receiving a third indication that consumption of data by the user of the client device over the telecommunication network has exceeded a second threshold; and
in response to receiving the third indication, reducing a maximum bit rate at which the client device is able to communicate with the telecommunication network and increasing the previously reduced additional service level.
7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the receiving comprises receiving the indication from an IMS server, from the client device, or from a GGSN or PGW of the telecommunication network, the IMS server, the client device, or the GGSN or PGW having determined that the client device is establishing the video conversation.
8. The method of claim 6 , wherein the service level is one of a priority level or a content-quality level.
9. The method of claim 6 , wherein the video-conversion-specific service level is specified by a traffic class associated with a packet data protocol (PDP) context, by a secondary PDP context, or by a service data flow.
10. The method of claim 6 , wherein the video-conversion-specific service level is associated with a guaranteed bit rate (GBR) included in a request from the client device.
11. The method of claim 6 , further comprising providing the video-conversion-specific service level to one or more other nodes of the telecommunication network for the one or more other nodes to apply the video-conversion-specific service level.
12. The method of claim 6 , further comprising resetting the additional service level at an end of a billing cycle.
13. The method of claim 6 , further comprising performing the receiving of the second indication and the reducing at a time of day associated with a relatively larger amount of network traffic than other times of day.
14. The method of claim 6 , further comprising performing the receiving of the second indication and the reducing for a plurality of thresholds associated with increasingly larger amounts of data consumption.
15. The method of claim 6 , wherein the computing device is a policy and charging rules function (PCRF) node of the telecommunication network.
16. The method of claim 6 , further comprising offering a user of the client device an opportunity to purchase the increased video-conversation-specific service level or an opportunity to purchase a further increase.
17. The method of claim 16 , wherein the increasing is performed conditionally based on the user's purchase of the offering.
18. A system associated with a telecommunication network, comprising:
one or more processors; and
instructions configured to be executed on the one or more processors to program one or more computing devices of the telecommunication network to perform operations including:
receiving a first indication that a client device of the telecommunication network is establishing a video conversation;
in response to receiving the first indication, increasing a video-conversation-specific service level associated with a first quality of service offered by the telecommunication network when providing data associated with the video conversation;
receiving a second indication that consumption of data by a user of the client device over the telecommunication network has exceeded a threshold;
in response to receiving the second indication, and while the video-conversation-specific service level is increased, reducing an additional service level associated with a second quality of service provided by the telecommunication network to the user, the additional service level to be applied for data consumption unrelated to the video conversation;
receiving a third indication that consumption of data by the user of the client device over the telecommunication network has exceeded a second threshold; and
in response to receiving the third indication, reducing a maximum bit rate at which the client device is able to communicate with the telecommunication network and increasing the previously reduced additional service level associated with the second quality of service.