Patent ID: 7920590

Claim:
A method for performing data compression in a wireless communication system, comprising: (a) sending, from a first network element, a request message to a second network element, wherein the request message includes a pre-defined indicator of a data compression/decompression algorithm; (b) receiving an accept message if the second network element supports the data compression/decompression algorithm; (c) receiving a data packet at the first network element; (d) if the second network element supports the data compression/decompression algorithm, compressing the received data packet at the first network element using the data compression/decompression algorithm; (e) if the compressed data packet has a smaller size than the received data packet, transmitting the compressed data packet through a wireless link to the second network element; and (f) if the compressed data packet has a larger size than the received data packet, transmitting the received data packet through the wireless link to the second network element, wherein the compressed data packet has a smaller size if a compression ratio, determined by dividing a first size of the received data packet by a second size of the compressed data packet, is greater than a threshold value.