Patent ID: 8971273
Filing Date: 2015-03-03
Classification: H04W

Abstract:
1. A method comprising: in a wireless local area network including a plurality of wireless access point devices each capable of serving wireless client devices with a bandwidth from a set of possible bandwidths associated with one or multiple contiguous or non-contiguous radio frequency (RF) channels for each access point device, wherein a primary channel is a set of one or more RF channels that is a smaller denomination of RF channels used by an access point device when it is operating with the first bandwidth and a secondary channel is one or more RF channels used in conjunction with a primary channel when an access point device is operating with the second bandwidth, computing metrics for a set of RF channels which are available for use, wherein the metrics are based in part on one or both of presence and severity of detected interference from non-wireless local area network devices and based on presence and severity of detected co-channel and adjacent channel interference; determining at least one of: type of traffic for wireless client devices served by the access point device, or a client composition ratio of a number of wireless client devices which are capable of operating with a first bandwidth in the set of possible bandwidths and a number of wireless client devices which are capable of operating with a second bandwidth in the set of possible bandwidths, wherein the second bandwidth is greater than the first bandwidth; and generating a bias to favor channel assignment that results in a particular bandwidth in the set of bandwidths based on the determining; applying the bias to the metrics to produce adjusted metrics; and selecting, based on the adjusted metrics, a bandwidth from the set of possible bandwidths for each access point device, wherein the generating includes generating the bias based on client composition ratios computed for overlapping first and second access point devices so as to favor selection of a staggered RF channel alignment in which the primary channel and single RF channel secondary channel of the first access point device are aligned with a multiple RF channel secondary channel of the second access point device, and the primary channel and single RF channel secondary channel of the second access point device are aligned with the multiple RF channel secondary channel of the first access point device.