Patent Publication Number: US-2011051626-A1

Title: System and method for wireless node connection

Description:
BACKGROUND 
     1. Field of the Invention 
     The present invention pertains to a method of automatically building wireless connection among multiple wireless nodes used in wireless communication infrastructure deployment. Specifically, the present invention relates to a system and method of automatic connecting multiple wireless nodes without the need to manually configure each wireless node. 
     2. Related Art 
     In wireless network deployment such as deploying multiple 802.11 WLAN network nodes, in the situation of lacking the wired connecting outlets to backend network, it often requires the wireless node at such location to be connected wirelessly to a wireless node that has access to the backend network. The common practice is to configure the two wireless nodes that are to form a wireless connected pair with network parameters such as the peer network node&#39;s MAC (Medium Access Control) address, channel used for wireless signal transmission, and wireless link security parameters. The procedures are usually time consuming and often required a separate device (such as a laptop computer or terminal) to configure the wireless nodes. This need of a separate device to configure the wireless node has caused the inconvenience in setting up the configuration environment such as in outdoor environment. Furthermore, the complicated parameters required to be configured correctly to build a secure wireless connection between two wireless nodes be require technical personnel with proficient networking knowledge. This has caused the difficulty in deployment and maintenance of building a large scale wireless network. 
     What is needed is a system and method of automatic constructing secure wireless connection between among multiple wireless nodes without the need of separate configuration device which provides the robustness in order to deploy a large scale wireless network while meeting the challenges of reducing maintenance complexity of such network deployment. 
     SUMMARY 
     It is an object of the present invention to provide a system and method of automatically establishing secure wireless links among multiple wireless nodes without the need to manually configure each wireless node. The wireless nodes that will establish a wireless link are categorized into two types, “to be connected” and “to connect”, respectively. The mechanism of triggering different types of wireless nodes can be achieved via: pressing a button on the wireless node; issuing a command on the wireless node&#39;s command line interface (CLI); and clicking on the icon on the node&#39;s configuration interface. 
     The wireless node that is triggered into the type of “to be connected” performs the following actions:
         i. enter the “waiting for connection” state within a configurable time period, wherein the wireless node will resume to its normal state when the configurable time period expires;   ii. continue transmitting the Beacon packet with an IE (Information Element) that indicates its type with parameters to be used for establishing a wireless connection;   iii. process the IE received from a peer wireless node to extract the parameters for establishing a wireless link, wherein the wireless node will discard the IE with the same node type;   iv. transmit the confirmed packet to a peer wireless node to validate the successful connection of a wireless link;   v. exchange the encryption key with a peer wireless node upon validating a successful wireless link, wherein the method of encryption could be WEP, AES, TKIP, etc.; and   vi. change the encryption key based on a pre-configured time stamp to enhance the security level.       

     The wireless node that is triggered into the type of “to connect” performs in the following actions:
         i. enter the “request for connection” state within a configurable time period, wherein the wireless node will resume to its normal state when the configurable time period expires;   ii. continue transmitting the Beacon packet with an IE (Information Element) that indicates its type with parameters to be used for establishing a wireless connection;   iii. process the IE received from a peer wireless node to extract the parameters for establishing a wireless link, wherein the wireless node will discard the IE with the same node type;   iv. transmit the confirmed packet to a peer wireless node to validate the successful connection of a wireless link;   v. exchange the encryption key with a peer wireless node upon validating a successful wireless link, wherein the method of encryption could be WEP, AES, TKIP, etc.; and   vi. change the encryption key based on a pre-configured time stamp to enhance the security level.       

     The new IE (Information Element) that is added to the Beacon to transmit the descriptive information for automatically establishing a wireless link include the following fields:
         i. Element Identifier,   ii. Information Element Length,   iii. Node Type (i.e. “to be connected” or “to connect”),   iv. Encrypted Information that comprises of the wireless node&#39;s MAC (Media       

     Access Control) address encrypted with a pre-defined secret key; the method of encryption could be MDS, SHA-1, SHA-256/224 etc. 
    
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         FIG. 1  is the system diagram of the method for wireless node connection described in this invention; 
         FIG. 2  is the generalized block diagram of a wireless node implemented with the automatic wireless connection algorithm described in this invention; 
         FIG. 3  shows a flow diagram illustrating a process for establishing the wireless connection between two wireless nodes; 
         FIG. 4  shows a flow diagram illustrating an alternative embodiment of the wireless connection process described in this invention; 
         FIG. 5A  is a new IE (Information Element) that is added to the Beacon packet to transmit the descriptive information for establishing wireless link automatically; 
         FIG. 5B  is another IE that is added to the Beacon packet for a wireless node to identify the role of establishing wireless connection described in this invention. 
     
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION 
       FIG. 1  is a system and method for wireless node connection. The SECOND WIRELESS NDOE  200  is connected to the NETWORK  400  via wired  310  or wireless  320  connection. The FIRST WIRELESS NODE  100  transmits the BEACON PACKET that includes the FIRST WIRELESS NODE&#39;s  100  NODE TYPE  5200  and CONNECTION PARAMETER  5100  ( FIG. 5A  and  FIG. 5B ). The FIRST WIRELESS NODE  100  and the SECOND WIRELESS NODE  200  establish the wireless connection based on the CONNECTION PARAMETER. Terminals  110  and  120  connect to the NETWORK  400  via the FIRST WIRELESS NODE  100  and the SECOND WIRELESS NODE  200 . 
     The wireless node&#39;s NODE TYPE  5200  used for establishing the wireless connection has two types, “to be connected” and “to connect”, respectively. The wireless connection between the FIRST WIRELESS NODE  100  and the SECOND WIRELESS NODE  200  is encrypted to protect the data communicated via this connection. The encryption key is changed continuously and automatically via a pre-defined time stamp in the FIRST WIRELESS NODE  100  and the SECOND WIRELESS NODE  200 .