Smartphone Solutions White Paper

Issue Date 2.0 2012-07-17

Change History
Issue1.0 DescriptionThis is the rst release. Date2012-07-17 Prepared BySmartphone ecosystem R&D support team Approved ByZhao Qiyong (employee ID: 00119431)

Contents
Change History .................................................................................ii 1 Executive Summary ......................................................................1 2 Challenges on Networks by Mobile Internet Applications ........ 2
2.1 Application Categories and Characteristics ....................................................... 2

2.2 Characteristics of Small-Packet Services (SNS, IM, and VoIP) and their Impact on Networks ................................................................................................ 4 2.3 Characteristics of Video Service and Their Impact on Networks ............................ 5 2.4 Cloud Service Characteristics and Impact on Network ........................................ 6 2.5 Web Applications Characteristics and Impact on Network .................................. 7 2.6 Conclusion .............................................................................................. 7

3 Challenges on Network by Mobile Internet Terminals ................8

3.1 Terminal Capabilities and Challenges on Network .............................................. 8 3.2 OS Development and Challenges on Network ................................................ 10 3.3 Conclusion ............................................................................................ 11

4 Solutions ...................................................................... 12
4.1 E2E Solutions ........................................................................................... 12
4.1.1 Problem Description.................................................................... . 12 4.1.2 Solutions.....................................................................13

4.2 PS Solutions ............................................................................................ 14

4.2.1 Problem Description.....................................................................14 4.2.2 Solutions.....................................................................17

4.3 UMTS RAN Solutions ................................................................................ 18

4.3.1 Problem Description .......................................................................... 18 4.3.2 Solutions ................................................................................. 20

4.4 LTE Solutions .................................................................................23

4.4.1 Problems Description ........................................................................ 23 4.4.2 Solutions ................................................................................. 24

5 Summary ...................................................................... 29
5.1 Challenge Overview ................................................................................ 29 5.2 Solutions and Suggestions ............................................................................30

A Acronyms and Abbreviations .....................................................32 B Reference ...................................................................... 37 C Contributors ......................................................................38

Figures
Figure 3-1 Traf c volumes for each mobile operating system ................................................... 10 Figure 4-1 Signaling load on wireless networks by different applications over iOS and Android .......... 12 Figure 4-2 Signaling load differences from a network with Huawei equipment ............................. 13 Figure 4-3 Repeated activation request impacts on network activations and KPI ........................... 14 Figure 4-4 Unexpected signaling impact due to rewall faults ................................................. 15 Figure 4-5 PDP update Procedure Triggered by IU/RAB Release Signaling .................................... 15 Figure 4-6 PDP update due to Service Request messages ....................................................... 16 Figure 4-7 Comparison of paging volumes between CS domains and PS domains in operator M network ............................................................................................................................. 16 Figure 4-8 Small packets for smartphones ......................................................................... 19 Figure 4-9 Access signaling increases due to frequent services of smartphones ............................. 19 Figure 4-10 Decreased ef ciency in air interface under MBB model ........................................... 20 Figure 4-11 Signaling !ow during a data transmission process before the PCH function and the Enhanced Fast Dormancy function are enabled ................................................................................ 21 Figure 4-12 Signaling !ow during the transmission process of a big data packet after the PCH function and the Enhanced Fast Dormancy function are enabled ......................................................... 21 Figure 4-13 Signaling !ow during the transmission process of a small data packet after the PCH function and the Enhanced Fast Dormancy function are enabled ......................................................... 21 Figure 4-14 UE always-online solution in LTE ..................................................................... 25 Figure 4-15 Signaling-control solution for users with high mobility during handovers in LTE networks .. 26 Figure 4-16 Dynamic DRX solution in LTE networks ............................................................. 27 Figure 4-17 Service-based differentiated control solution in LTE Networks .................................. 28

Tables
Table 2-1 Mainstream mobile Internet categories and characteristics .................................................. 2 Table 2-2 Impacts and solutions ........................................................................................... 7 Table 3-1 3GPP capabilities for typical smartphones ...................................................................... 8 Table 3-2 Screen resolution and video capability for typical smartphones ........................................ 9 Table 3-3 Background behaviors for screen off between iOS and Android devices ............................ 11 Table 3-4 Terminal chips supporting 3GPP Release 8 fast dormancy .................................................. 11 Table 5-1 Impact of mainstream mobile internet services................................................................ 29 Table 5-2 Impact of Smartphone on the network.......................................................................... 30 Table 5-3 Solution overview (based on 3GPP Release 8 protocol and earlier versions) ................. 30

1 Executive Summary
The quickly development of Smartphone energizes the weary mobile Internet. The same as the innovative traditional Internet, Smartphone is blossoming freely and have been widely used in our daily life, learning, and working. Based on function attributes and data packet features, mobile Internet applications are categorized into instant messaging (IM), voice over IP (VoIP), streaming,"social"networking"services"(SNS),"web"browsing,"cloud,"email," le" transfer, gaming, and machine-to-machine (M2M) dialog. The mobile Internet applications"can"also"be"classi ed"in"other"ways. The 3GPP protocol was defined to meet the requirements of persistent connection and peak throughput at initial stage. However, various Internet applications generate traffic models which are extremely different from traditional"voice"services."These"traf c"models"bring"severe"challenges"for"the" 3GPP protocol. Major"changes"in"traf c"characteristics"are"the"increases"in"small"packets,"short" connections, signaling and data traffic, and abnormal traffic. For Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UTMS) networks in idle status, all these changes lead to sharp increases on signaling and other system resource load. They also bring severe threat on network performance, and affect application data"throughput"capability"and"network"pro tability"in"the"long"run. For the healthy development of mobile broadband (MBB) in the long term, developers are all seeking methods to achieve improvements for technique standards, existing networks, and smartphones. Developers are considering improvements in the following aspects: For"standard"design,"the"factors,"such"as"small"packets,"bearer"ef ciency," network architecture, and protocol layer optimization are considered. For"existing"networks,"original"traf c"models"for"reference"are"changed," software,"hardware"and"parameters"are"recon gured,"and"new"features" are enabled. For Smartphone and applications, a win-win situation is expected between network resource consumption and user experience. This paper proposed solutions and suggestions targeting at identified problems caused by smartphones and applications in deployed UMTS and LTE networks based on 3GPP Release 8 and earlier versions. These solutions cannot replace network reconstructions or capacity expansion to meet the requirements of increasingly growing subscribers, signaling and data"traf c.
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2 Challenges on Networks by Mobile Internet Applications

2.1 Application Categories and Characteristics
Mobile Internet is the combination of mobile communications and Internet. Mobile communications and Internet have gained their own great achievements. However, their terminal modes, network architectures, application categories, and user behaviors differ obviously. If the Internet mainly providing data service is integrated into mobile communications which provide voice service, great impacts are in!icted on network resource ef ciency, capacity, and signaling. With the development of mobile Internet in recent years, its service categories and characteristics are different from traditional Internet. Table 2-1 describes the categories of current mobile Internet and their main characteristics. Table 2-1 Mainstream mobile Internet categories and characteristics Category
IM VoIP

Description
Sending or receiving instant messaging Audio and video calls Streaming media such as HTTP audios, HTTP videos, and P2P videos Social networking sites Web browsing including wireless access protocol (WAP) page browsing Cloud computing and online cloud applications Mails including webmail, Post Of ce Protocol 3 (POP3), and Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) File transfer including P2P le sharing, le storage, and application download and update Mobile gaming such as social gaming and card gaming Machine Type Communication

Typical Application
Whatsapp, Wechat, iMessage Viber, Skype, Tango, Face Time YouTube, Youku, Spotify, Pandora, PPStream Facebook, Twitter, Sina Weibo Typical web browsers are Safari and UC Browser Siri, Evernote, iCloud

Characteristic
Small packets, less frequently Small packets, continuously Big packets, continuously Small packets, less frequently Big packets, less frequently Big packets

Streaming

SNS

Web Browsing

Cloud

Email

Gmail

Big packets, less frequently

File Transfer

Mobile Thunder, App Store Angry Birds, Draw Something, Words with Friends Auto meter reading, mobile payment

Big packets, continuously

Gaming

Big packets, less frequently Small packets 2

M2M

The preceding features are de ned as follows: If packet per second (PPS) is greater than 20, the data is transmitted continuously. If PPS is less than 10, the data is transmitted less frequently. A"data"packet"larger"than"1000"bytes"is"de ned"as"a"big"packet. A"data"packet"less"than"600"bytes"is"de ned"as"a"small"packet. Main traffic volume for mobile Internet is used for web browsing, and the rest is used for streaming media and le transfer. Mobile Internet is widely deployed and the traf c rate increases. Smartphones are equipped with more functions. Mobile streaming media services will be widely used and the main traf c volume will be occupied by video service. Instant communications with text, voice, and video are more preferable, and network access becomes more frequently. Meanwhile, the technique Hypertext Markup Language (HTML5) becomes increasingly mature. Cloud service will replace traditional web browsing and le transfer as the dominant player. The smartphones for mobile Internet become small and diverse. More and more smart machine terminals and M2M services, such as smart electrical household appliances, auto meter reading, and mobile payment come into being.

2.2 Characteristics of Small-Packet Services (SNS, IM, and VoIP) and their Impact on Networks
Small packet services on mobile Internet consist of SNS, IM, and VoIP. Depending on the traffic conditions, small packets are divided into intermittent small packets and continuous small packets. Intermittent small packets, continuous small packets and their impact on networks are analyzed in the following. Factors leading to intermittent small packets include the following items: Short messages with little information, such as friends presence update, text chatting, and IM Periodic keep alive messages, for example, keep alive messages for connections between servers and subscribers For these messages with less than 2000 bytes total traf c and less than 20 packets, the transmission duration is less than 3s, and the interval is 30s to 40 minutes periodically. On one hand, these messages lead to frequent RRC status switches. The RRC status switches from IDLE/PCH to FACH/CELL_DCH frequently. Service requests and IU releases become more frequent, which bring great signaling impact on RAN and PS network terminals. On the other hand, the data transmission duration is short. Radio channels remain in the CELL_DCH status for a long period of time due to an inactive timer, which is a waste of radio channel resources. Servers maintain network connections with clients. When the clients send requests, servers send notifications to receive ends. Paging messages are generated over the network and air interface. If emergencies occur or timed messages are required, servers send messages to large numbers of smartphones in the network at the same time. This in!icts severe impact on paging. Continuous small packets are mostly generated in audio calls and video calls in VoIP applications. During a call, the packet interval is 40 ms to 60 ms and the length of a packet is smaller than 300 bytes (100 bytes for an audio packet and 300 bytes for a video packet). The forwarding performance of a network terminal is calculated using the packet length of 500 bytes. Too many small packets lead to unquali ed forwarding. Packet aggregation can eliminate the impact of small packets on networks. The following mechanisms are used to eliminate the impact of small packets on networks. NSRM: Requests from multiple applications are delayed for a certain period of time and then sent together. APNS,"C2DM:"One"application"manages"noti cations"of"all"applications.
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2.3 Characteristics of Video Service and Their Impact on Networks

YouTube, Netflix, and Youku provide Over the Top (OTT) services that use HTTP to transfer video traffic. Compared with the User Datagram Protocol (UDP)-based Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP) used by desktop video, HTTP can achieve firewall traversal using a proxy server. HTTP can also facilitate adaptation to radio network environment changes using the gateway caching technique. HTTP progressive steaming and HTTP adaptive streaming protocols are typically used for video transfer. HTTP adaptive streaming protocols include Apple HTTP Live Streaming (HLS), Microsoft HTTP Smooth Streaming (HSS), and 3GPP Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (DASH). In these protocols, all files are downloaded using HTTP. The file size depends on a video's bit rate and duration. The typical value ranges from a few hundred KB to tens of MB. In the downlink, all are big IP packets with more than 1400 bytes. In the uplink, TCP ACK and HTTP Get packets are transmitted. Large bandwidth is required for downloading data from the server with best effort. Subscriber experience for video services is determined by buffering performance in clients. The download speed in the buffer area determines the time a subscriber has to wait before a video is played and the number of pauses during video playing. For video transmitted over UDP, UDP packet loss can prevent pauses during video playing. However, pixelation occurs. For HTTP video transmitted over TCP, if TCP packets are lost in networks, servers retransmit these packets. The TCP throughput decreases, and the download rate of the client decreases. The pause duration prolongs. Videos transmitted using HTTP contain a great deal of information, and large bandwidths are required. The following options can be used to mitigate these problems. Pacing: reduces the transmission rate to an appropriate level to fulfill the display of the video and reduces downloaded buffering capacity for clients to prevent bandwidth waste. Code adapting: Video transcoding based on smartphone screen size and network bandwidth can reduce the bit rate of video signals. Caching: caches the data at the network side to improve video delivery rate"and"reduce"transmission"traf c.

2.4 Cloud Service Characteristics and Impact on Network

Cloud services include infrastructure as a service (IaaS), platform as a service (PaaS), and software as a service (SaaS). Common subscribers typically use SaaS services. One category of SaaS is uploading data to network for computing in the cloud, such as Siri and Google voice search. Another category is online interaction and synchronization, such as Evernote. More uplink traf c would be generated with the rst category of cloud service. With telecommunications evolved from narrowband to broadband, from wireline access to radio access, information uploading becomes more and more convenient. Cloud computing with strong capabilities replaces local computing. Local data is transmitted to the cloud for computing, and then the cloud sends back the calculation results. More uplink traf c is generated when the application transmits data to the cloud. Tests show that 10 KB to 20 KB uplink traf c is generated for every one Siri service or other voice input. However, the downlink traffic is about 2 KB to 20 KB. With the popularity of SaaS, the network traffic models in the future will change. Terminal specifications and network deployment must be prepared in advance. Abundant uplink traffic enables swift response to the information that subscriber inputs, which ful lls better subscriber experience. For PaaS, frequent data backup and synchronization between the terminal and cloud lead to more bandwidth demand on the network. The applications manage the subscriber contents and save them on the data center server. When the contents are visited, applications obtain the latest data from the data center server. Subscribers are not aware that the data is saved in local disks or on the network. Each operation on terminals (login, adding contents, query, and modi cation) causes one time of data backup and synchronization. For networks, these operations generate more frequent synchronizations and more traf c volume. Local buffer and background synchronizations effectively improve subscriber experience and network friendliness. The optimal network can be selected to enhance data synchronization ef ciency and prevent the pause during subscriber operations.

2.5 Web Applications Characteristics and Impact on Network

Web browsing service is most widely used on mobile Internet at present. Most mobile phone browsers send requests with HTTP to download HTML web pages from a web server. The HTML web pages are parsed and shown on mobile phones. The data volume transmitted over mobile phone browsers is equal to that over personal computer browsers, and data distortion never occurs. Mobile phone browsers, such as Opera Mini and UCWEB browse web pages with a third-party agent server. A mobile phone sends a browsing request to the third-party server. The third-party server connects the mobile phone and the website. The website transmits data to the third-party server. The thirdparty server compresses the data and generates smaller pages with less traf c volume for the mobile phone browser. The mobile phone browser parses the compressed data and displays it on the screen. In this mode, the data transmission volume is smaller, but data distortion occurs. HTML5 provides browsers with overall applications using the technologies of Canvas, WebSocket, Storage, Audio, and Video. Most local programs function appropriately. Web-based applications bring great impact on network traf c volume and behaviors. Therefore, subscriber service usages and commercial modes change, which leads to greater impact on telecommunications industry.

2.6 Conclusion
Table 2-2 describes mobile Internet impact on networks and relative solutions. Table 2-2 Impacts and solutions
Impact
Signaling

Cause
Uplink small packets, including keeping alive and status query messages Checks the updates with periodic polling

Solutions
Qualcomm Network Socket Request Manager (NSRM) Push mechanisms in the operating system, including Apple Push Noti cation Service (APNS) and Cloud to Device Messaging (C2DM) Compressions such as UCWEB Adaptive content protocols, including HTTP and Live Streaming Local cache

Capacity and subscriber experience

The transmission contains a large amount data.