Enhanced HARQ feedback for reliable communications

1. An apparatus for a user equipment (UE), the apparatus comprising:

a memory interface to send or receive, to or from a memory device, data correspond to hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) feedback; and

a processor to:

process repetitions of a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) transmission;

determine a fewest number of the repetitions used by the UE to decode the PDSCH transmission;

determine that four or more of the repetitions have been scheduled for the PDSCH transmission; and

generate the HARQ feedback in response to the PDSCH transmission, the HARQ feedback indicating the fewest number of the repetitions used by the UE to decode the PDSCH transmission, wherein in response to the determination that the four or more of the repetitions have been scheduled for the PDSCH transmission, the processor is further configured to generate the HARQ feedback using a HARQ-value mapping comprising:

HARQ value 0 to indicate a negative acknowledgement (NACK);

HARQ value 1 to indicate an acknowledgement (ACK) with up to a quarter of the repetitions used by the UE to decode the PDSCH transmission;

HARQ value 2 to indicate an ACK with up to half of the repetitions used by the UE to decode the PDSCH transmission; and

HARQ value 3 to indicate an ACK with more than half of the repetitions used by the UE to decode the PDSCH transmission.

2. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the processor is further configured to configure the UE with at least four physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) sequences corresponding to respectively different HARQ values.

3. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein to generate the HARQ feedback comprises generating a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) format 0 sequence where m defines a cyclic shift value, and wherein:

m=0 corresponds to the HARQ value 0;

m=3 corresponds to the HARQ value 1;

m=6 corresponds to the HARQ value 2; and

m=9 corresponds to the HARQ value 3.

4. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the PDSCH transmission is configured for PDSCH data map type B such that a scheduled PDSCH is not aligned with a slot boundary, wherein the processor is further configured to determine the scheduled PDSCH with repetition by mini-slot based physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) scheduling a single PDSCH spanning a plurality of mini-slots corresponding to a total time duration of a plurality of repetitions.

5. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the processor is further configured to process a radio resource control (RRC) signal to determine whether to enable the HARQ feedback to use multiple values for the repetitions of the PDSCH transmission.

6. The apparatus of claim 5 , wherein to process the RRC signal comprises to determine an RRC parameter indicating use of a 4-value HARQ feedback.

7. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the processor is further configured to:

process a radio resource control (RRC) signal from a base station to determine a maximum number of repetitions for scheduled data transmission;

generate channel state information (CSI) for the base station; and

determine an actual number of repetitions used by the base station based on the CSI for the scheduled data transmission, wherein the actual number of repetitions is not more than the maximum number of repetitions.

8. The apparatus of claim 7 , wherein to determine the actual number of repetitions comprises to process a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) scheduling the data transmission.

9. The apparatus of claim 7 , wherein to determine the actual number of repetitions comprises to decode downlink control information (DCI) indicating the actual number of repetitions.

10. The apparatus of claim 9 , wherein the processor is further configured to use a single DCI bit to determine the actual number of repetitions, wherein a first value of the single DCI bit indicates use of half of the maximum number of repetitions, and where a second value of the single DCI bit indicates use of the maximum number of repetitions.

11. The apparatus of claim 9 , wherein the processor is further configured to use a 2-bit repetition field in the DCI to determine the actual number of repetitions, wherein a first value of the 2-bit repetition field indicates use of a quarter of the maximum number of repetitions, a second value of the 2-bit repetition field indicates use of half of the maximum number of repetitions, and a third value of the 2-bit repetition field indicates use of the maximum number of repetitions.

12. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium, the non-transitory computer-readable storage medium including instructions that when executed by a processor of a node in a wireless network, cause the processor to:

schedule a first physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) transmission with a first number of repetitions for a user equipment (UE);

process hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) feedback corresponding to the first PDSCH transmission from the UE;

determine, from the HARQ feedback, a second number of repetitions used by the UE to decode the first PDSCH transmission, wherein the HARQ feedback comprises a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) format 0 including a cyclic shift corresponding to the second number; and

schedule a second PDSCH transmission for the UE based on the second number of repetitions.

13. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 12 , wherein the HARQ feedback indicates that the second number is one of a quarter of the first number, a half of the first number, or is equal to the first number.

14. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 12 , wherein the instructions further configure the processor to generate a radio resource control (RRC) signal to enable the UE for multi-value HARQ acknowledgment (ACK) feedback for PDSCH with repetition.

15. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 14 , wherein the RRC signal comprises an RRC parameter to indicate use of one of a 2-value HARQ feedback corresponding to a 1-bit HARQ feedback, a 3-value HARQ feedback, and a 4-value HARQ feedback.

16. An apparatus for a user equipment (UE), the apparatus comprising:

a memory interface to send or receive, to or from a memory device, data correspond to hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) feedback; and

a processor to:

process repetitions of a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH) transmission;

determine a fewest number of the repetitions used by the UE to decode the PDSCH transmission; and

generate the HARQ feedback in response to the PDSCH transmission, the HARQ feedback indicating the fewest number of the repetitions used by the UE to decode the PDSCH transmission, wherein the processor is further configured to generate the HARQ feedback using a HARQ-value mapping comprising:

HARQ value 0 to indicate a negative acknowledgement (NACK);

HARQ value 1 to indicate an acknowledgement (ACK) with up to half of the repetitions used by the UE to decode the PDSCH transmission; and

HARQ value 2 to indicate an ACK with more than half or all of the repetitions used by the UE to decode the PDSCH transmission.

17. The apparatus of claim 16 , wherein the processor is further configured to configure the UE with three physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) sequences corresponding to respectively different HARQ values.

18. The apparatus of claim 16 , wherein to generate the HARQ feedback comprises generating a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) format 0 sequence where m defines a cyclic shift value, and wherein:

m=0 corresponds to the HARQ value 0;

m=4 corresponds to the HARQ value 1; and

m=8 corresponds to the HARQ value 2.

19. The apparatus of claim 16 , wherein the PDSCH transmission is configured for PDSCH data map type B such that a scheduled PDSCH is not aligned with a slot boundary, wherein the processor is further configured to determine the scheduled PDSCH with repetition by mini-slot based physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) scheduling a single PDSCH spanning a plurality of mini-slots corresponding to a total time duration of a plurality of repetitions.

20. The apparatus of claim 16 , wherein the processor is further configured to process a radio resource control (RRC) signal to determine whether to enable the HARQ feedback to use multiple values for the repetitions of the PDSCH transmission.