Patent ID: 8553665

Claim:
A method for establishing a wireless connection at a gateway apparatus which communicates with a base station in a wireless Wide Area Network (WAN), the method comprising steps of: sensing a downlink common control channel of the WAN to determine whether the downlink common control channel has a relay request slot; receiving a relay request message requesting to relay a data packet, in the relay request slot on the downlink common control channel, in case that the downlink common control channel has the relay request slot; establishing a wireless connection with a wireless terminal in a wireless distributed network in response to the relay request message, wherein establishing a wireless connection with the wireless terminal comprises transmitting a reply message to the wireless terminal after receiving the relay request message, receiving a selection message transmitted by the wireless terminal, the selection message contains an address of the gateway apparatus through which a relay operation is to be made, and in response to the selection message, transmitting to the wireless terminal a permit message to permit the wireless terminal transmitting the data packet to be relayed; and transmitting the reply message to the wireless terminal in the wireless distributed network after detecting that a power level on the relay request slot is larger than a noise power.