Patent ID: 8509197

Claim:
A media access control method in a wireless network including a plurality of devices, the media access control method comprising: first determining including determining, by each of the devices in the wireless network, one of a plurality of beacon slots within a beacon period as a beacon slot of the device; second determining including determining, by each of the devices in the wireless network, a data transmission order in accordance with a slot number of the beacon slot of the device, slot numbers of the beacon slots of the other devices, and whether or not the devices have data to transmit; and transmitting, by each of the devices in the wireless network, data in an unreserved period in accordance with the determined data transmission order, wherein the second determining further includes broadcasting, by each of the devices, an information element containing a first field indicating whether or not the device has data to be transmitted in the unreserved period, and receiving, in each of the devices, the information elements of the other devices in order to check whether or not the corresponding devices have data to transmit, and to determine the data transmission order depending on the slot number of the beacon slot of the device, the slot numbers of the beacon slots of the other devices, and whether or not the devices have data to transmit.