CN116669134B

CN116669134B - Method, device, equipment and medium for adapting SMF network element and UPF network element

Info

Publication number: CN116669134B
Application number: CN202310835050.0A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 尹君; 陈洁; 贾聿庸; 丁海峰
Original assignee: China Telecom Corp Ltd
Current assignee: China Telecom Corp Ltd
Priority date: 2023-07-07
Filing date: 2023-07-07
Publication date: 2023-11-07
Anticipated expiration: 2043-07-07
Also published as: CN116669134A

Abstract

The disclosure provides a method, a device, electronic equipment and a computer readable storage medium for adapting an SMF network element and a UPF network element, and relates to the technical field of wireless communication and terminals. The method comprises the following steps: the signaling intercommunication gateway receives a first N4 interface signaling sent by a sending network element, wherein the sending network element is a first Session Management Function (SMF) network element or a first User Plane Function (UPF) network element; identifying a first N4 interface signaling to generate data forwarding information; generating a second N4 interface signaling according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information; receiving network element information as combined setting information of a first UPF network element or combined setting information of a second UPF network element of different factories corresponding to the first SMF network element; transmitting the second N4 interface signaling to a receiving network element, and establishing a ULCL forwarding path by the receiving network element according to the second N4 interface signaling; the embodiment of the disclosure can realize the deployment of SMF network elements and UPF network elements by different manufacturers, establish ULCL session and decouple N4 interfaces.

Description

Method, device, equipment and medium for adapting SMF network element and UPF network element

Technical Field

The present disclosure relates to the field of wireless communications and terminal technologies, and in particular, to a method, an apparatus, an electronic device, and a computer readable storage medium for adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element.

Background

PFCP (Packet Forwarding Control Protocol ) of the N4 interface between SMF (Session Management function, session management function) and UPF (The User plane function, user plane function), although defined in 3GPP (3 rd Generation Partnership Project, third generation partnership project); however, due to the realization of manufacturer equipment and the deployment requirement of operators, the N4 interface is difficult to decouple all the time, and the SMF and the UPF cannot be docked by different manufacturers.

Especially in the ul cl (uplink classifier ) scenario, the operator requires that the UPF as the ul cl is combined with the UPF of the PSA (PDU Session Anchor, protocol data unit session anchor), but the implementation manner of the combination is different from that of different manufacturers, so that the N4 interface cannot be decoupled from different manufacturers all the time, and the ul cl function cannot be used.

It should be noted that the information disclosed in the above background section is only for enhancing understanding of the background of the present disclosure and thus may include information that does not constitute prior art known to those of ordinary skill in the art.

Disclosure of Invention

The present disclosure provides a method, an apparatus, an electronic device, and a computer readable storage medium for adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element, which at least overcome to a certain extent the problem in the related art that a different manufacturer cannot dock between an SMF and a UPF.

Other features and advantages of the present disclosure will be apparent from the following detailed description, or may be learned in part by the practice of the disclosure.

According to one aspect of the present disclosure, there is provided a method for adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element, applied to a signaling interworking gateway, including: receiving a first N4 interface signaling sent by a sending network element, wherein the sending network element is a first Session Management Function (SMF) network element or a first User Plane Function (UPF) network element; identifying the first N4 interface signaling and generating data forwarding information; generating a second N4 interface signaling according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information; the receiving network element information is the combined information of the first UPF network element or the combined information of the second UPF network element of different factories corresponding to the first SMF network element; and sending the second N4 interface signaling to the receiving network element so that the receiving network element establishes a forwarding path according to the second N4 interface signaling.

In one embodiment of the disclosure, the identifying the first N4 interface signaling, generating data forwarding information includes: according to the first N4 interface signaling, at least one of the following rule fields is obtained: forwarding behavior rule FAR field, packet detection rule PDR field, usage reporting rule URR field, buffer action rule BAR field, quality of service enforcement rule QER field; and obtaining the data forwarding information according to the FAR field and the PDR field.

In one embodiment of the present disclosure, the provisioning information of the first UPF network element includes: the first UPF network element is physically and logically combined, or the first UPF network element is physically and logically combined and logically respectively arranged; the combined setting information of the second UPF network element includes: and the second UPF network element is physically and logically combined, or the second UPF network element is physically and logically combined and logically respectively arranged.

In one embodiment of the disclosure, the generating the second N4 interface signaling according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information includes: when the sending network element is the first SMF network element, the receiving network element is the second UPF network element, and the combined setting information of the second UPF network element is the physical combined setting and the logic setting of the second UPF network element respectively, generating the second N4 interface signaling for the data forwarding information based on a disassembly method; and when the sending network element is the first SMF network element, the receiving network element is the second UPF network element, and the combination setting information of the second UPF network element is the combination setting of the physical and logical of the second UPF network element, generating the second N4 interface signaling for the data forwarding information based on a combination method.

In one embodiment of the disclosure, the generating the second N4 interface signaling according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information includes: when the sending network element is the first UPF network element, the receiving network element is a second SMF network element, and the combination setting information of the first UPF network element is the physical combination setting and the logic setting of the first UPF network element respectively, generating the second N4 interface signaling for the data forwarding information based on a combination method; and when the sending network element is the first UPF network element, the receiving network element is the second SMF network element, and the combination setting information of the first UPF network element is the combination setting of the physical and logical of the first UPF network element, generating the second N4 interface signaling for the data forwarding information based on a disassembly method.

In one embodiment of the present disclosure, the disassembly method or the combination method includes: updating the FAR field and the PDR field; binding the rule field with the updated PDR field.

In one embodiment of the present disclosure, further comprising: caching and updating session context data of the sending network element and the receiving network element; wherein the session context data comprises at least one of: FAR field identification, PDR field identification, URR field identification, BAR field identification, QER field identification, user terminal identification, address field identification, session endpoint identification with complete control plane, user session identification.

In one embodiment of the present disclosure, further comprising: and generating data source information according to the PDR field, wherein the data forwarding information comprises the data source information.

According to another aspect of the present disclosure, there is also provided an apparatus for adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element, including:

a receiving module, configured to receive a first N4 interface signaling sent by a sending network element, where the sending network element is a first session management function SMF network element or a first user plane function UPF network element;

the identification module is used for identifying the first N4 interface signaling and generating data forwarding information;

the generation module generates a second N4 interface signaling according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information; the receiving network element information is the combined information of the first UPF network element or the combined information of the second UPF network element of different factories corresponding to the first SMF network element;

and the sending module is used for sending the second N4 interface signaling to the receiving network element so that the receiving network element establishes a forwarding path according to the second N4 interface signaling.

According to another aspect of the present disclosure, there is also provided an electronic apparatus including: a processor; and a memory for storing executable instructions of the processor; wherein the processor is configured to perform the SMF network element and UPF network element adaptation method of any of the above via execution of the executable instructions.

According to another aspect of the present disclosure, there is also provided a computer readable storage medium having stored thereon a computer program which, when executed by a processor, implements a method of adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element according to any of the above.

The embodiment of the disclosure provides a method, a device, an electronic device and a computer readable storage medium for adapting an SMF network element and a UPF network element, wherein a signaling interworking gateway receives a first N4 interface signaling sent by a sending network element, and the sending network element is a first session management function SMF network element or a first user plane function UPF network element; identifying a first N4 interface signaling to generate data forwarding information; generating a second N4 interface signaling according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information; the receiving network element information is the combined setting information of a first UPF network element or the combined setting information of a second UPF network element of different factories corresponding to the first SMF network element; and sending the second N4 interface signaling to the receiving network element so that the receiving network element establishes a ULCL forwarding path according to the second N4 interface signaling, realizes the deployment of different manufacturers of the SMF network element and the UPF network element, completes the session establishment of the ULCL, and realizes the decoupling of the N4 interface.

It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary and explanatory only and are not restrictive of the disclosure.

Drawings

The accompanying drawings, which are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification, illustrate embodiments consistent with the disclosure and together with the description, serve to explain the principles of the disclosure. It will be apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art that the drawings in the following description are merely examples of the disclosure and that other drawings may be derived from them without undue effort.

Fig. 1 shows a flowchart of a method for adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element in an embodiment of the present disclosure;

fig. 2 shows a flowchart of a method for adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element according to an embodiment of the present disclosure;

fig. 3 shows a flowchart of a method for adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element according to an embodiment of the present disclosure;

fig. 4 illustrates a signaling interworking gateway to N4 interface signaling reconfiguration diagram in an embodiment of the present disclosure;

fig. 5 illustrates a schematic diagram of a signaling interworking gateway to N4 interface signaling reconfiguration in an embodiment of the present disclosure;

fig. 6 is a schematic diagram of an SMF network element and UPF network element adaptation device in an embodiment of the present disclosure;

fig. 7 shows a schematic diagram of an exemplary system architecture of an SMF network element to UPF network element adaptation method or an SMF network element to UPF network element adaptation apparatus that may be applied to embodiments of the present disclosure; and

Fig. 8 shows a block diagram of an electronic device in an embodiment of the disclosure.

Detailed Description

Example embodiments will now be described more fully with reference to the accompanying drawings. However, the exemplary embodiments may be embodied in many forms and should not be construed as limited to the examples set forth herein; rather, these embodiments are provided so that this disclosure will be thorough and complete, and will fully convey the concept of the example embodiments to those skilled in the art. The described features, structures, or characteristics may be combined in any suitable manner in one or more embodiments.

Furthermore, the drawings are merely schematic illustrations of the present disclosure and are not necessarily drawn to scale. The same reference numerals in the drawings denote the same or similar parts, and thus a repetitive description thereof will be omitted. Some of the block diagrams shown in the figures are functional entities and do not necessarily correspond to physically or logically separate entities. These functional entities may be implemented in software or in one or more hardware modules or integrated circuits or in different networks and/or processor devices and/or microcontroller devices.

For ease of understanding, the following first explains the several terms involved in this disclosure as follows:

the SMF (Session Management function ) is responsible for tunnel maintenance, IP address allocation and management, UP function selection, policy enforcement and control in QoS, charging data collection, roaming, etc.

UPF (The User plane function, user plane function) is responsible for packet routing forwarding, policy enforcement, traffic reporting, qos handling.

PFCP (Packet Forwarding Control Protocol, message forwarding control protocol) is used for control plane interactions with the user plane.

The ul cl (uplink classifier ) node may send upstream traffic split to different PSAs and downstream traffic aggregate to the user terminal.

The PSA (PDU Session Anchor, protocol data unit session anchor) is used to provide mobility upon wireless access.

DN (Data Network), operator traffic, internet access or third party traffic, etc.

The RAN (Radio Access Network ) is part of a mobile communication system.

The PDR (Packet Detection Rule ) is used to instruct the UPF network element to detect and classify data.

The URR (usage reporting rule ) must be associated with a PDR, which is first looked at for packet detection and classification, then statistics of usage are made according to different traffic classifications, and reported to the control plane.

FAR (Forwarding Action Rule, forwarding behavior rules) indicate how the UPF network element should take forwarding behavior on the data.

BAR (Buffering Action Rule, caching action rules) are used to instruct the UPF network element how to cache data.

QER (QoS Enforcement Rule, quality of service enforcement rules) is used to instruct UPF network elements how to implement QoS policies for PDR-identified packets, the QoS policies being used to bind specified classes to popularity, and to perform actions defined in flow behavior on classified packets.

The present exemplary embodiment will be described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings and examples.

Firstly, in the embodiment of the present disclosure, a method for adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element is provided, where the method may be executed by any electronic device having a computing processing capability.

Fig. 1 shows a flowchart of an SMF network element and UPF network element adaptation method in an embodiment of the present disclosure, and as shown in fig. 1, the SMF network element and UPF network element adaptation method provided in the embodiment of the present disclosure is applied to a signaling interworking gateway, and includes the following steps:

S102, receiving a first N4 interface signaling sent by a sending network element, wherein the sending network element is a first session management function SMF network element or a first user plane function UPF network element.

S104, identifying the first N4 interface signaling and generating data forwarding information.

In one embodiment, according to the first N4 interface signaling, a rule field is obtained, the rule field including, but not limited to, at least one of the following fields:

a forwarding behavior rules FAR field indicating how the UPF network element should take forwarding behavior on the data;

a packet detection rule PDR field, configured to instruct a UPF network element to detect and classify data;

the report rule URR field is used and must be related to a PDR, firstly, the PDR is seen to carry out packet detection and classification, then statistics of the usage amount is carried out according to different service classifications, and the statistics is reported to a control plane;

a buffer action rule BAR field for indicating how the UPF network element performs data buffering;

the QoS enforcement rule QER field is used to instruct the UPF network element how to enforce QoS policies on the PDR identified packets, the QoS policies being used to bind the specified class to the popularity, and to perform actions defined in the flow behavior on the classified packets.

In one embodiment, the data forwarding information includes, but is not limited to, at least one of: forwarding direction information obtained according to the FAR field, and data source information obtained according to the PDR field.

In one embodiment, the PDR field includes source detection data, data source information obtained according to the PDR field, data forwarding information obtained according to the PDR field and a FAR field bound with the PDR field, and second N4 interface signaling generated according to the data forwarding information and receiving network element information; and identifying a URR field, a BAR field, a QER field and the like which are associated with the PDR field in the first N4 interface signaling and are used for binding with the PDR field of the reconstructed second interface signaling.

S106, generating a second N4 interface signaling according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information; the receiving network element information is the combined information of the first UPF network element or the combined information of the second UPF network element of different factories corresponding to the first SMF network element.

In one embodiment, the second N4 interface signaling is generated according to forwarding direction information and receiving network element information obtained by the FAR field.

In one embodiment, the second N4 interface signaling is generated according to forwarding direction information obtained from the FAR field, data source information obtained from the PDR field, and receiving network element information.

In one embodiment, the provisioning information of the first UPF network element includes, but is not limited to: the first UPF network element physical and logical combination setting, or the first UPF network element physical combination setting and logical separate setting, etc.

In one embodiment, the provisioning information of the second UPF network element includes, but is not limited to: the second UPF network element physical and logical combination setting, or the second UPF network element physical combination setting and logical separate setting, etc.

In one embodiment, according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information, the first N4 interface signaling is disassembled or combined, and the disassembling method or the combining method includes: updating the FAR field and the PDR field; binding the rule field with the updated PDR field.

S108, the second N4 interface signaling is sent to the receiving network element, so that the receiving network element establishes a forwarding path according to the second N4 interface signaling.

In one embodiment, session context data of a sending network element and a receiving network element is cached and updated;

wherein the session context data includes, but is not limited to, at least one of:

FAR field identification, PDR field identification, URR field identification, BAR field identification, QER field identification, user terminal identification User ID, address segment identification Node ID, session endpoint identification CP F-SEID with complete control plane, user session identification, etc., one User can establish a plurality of User sessions, such as voice session, video session, etc., each User session corresponds to one User session identification.

The signaling intercommunication gateway can directly or indirectly store the processing information and session context of the N4 interface signaling message in the processes of identification, analysis and reconstruction, and can identify and process subsequent operations such as session updating, deleting and the like when a plurality of user terminals are served, so that data can be updated in time, and timeliness and accuracy of the message are ensured.

In the above embodiment, the signaling intercommunication gateway forwards the N4 interface signaling, and in the forwarding process, the N4 interface signaling sent by the SMF network element and the UPF network element is identified, the data flow direction and policy binding are determined according to each field in the PDR and the FAR and the QER, URR, BAR field bound by each field, and the N4 interface signaling is reconstructed according to the determination result and the implementation logic of the receiving network element, so that the receiving network element can correctly identify the reconstructed N4 interface signaling, and a ul cl forwarding path is established; the SMF network element and UPF network element different manufacturers are deployed, the session establishment of ULCL is completed, and the decoupling of an N4 interface is realized; and the SMF network element and the UPF network element do not need to be updated and reformed in a complex way, so that the flexibility of network deployment and the selectivity of equipment are improved, and the cost can be saved.

Fig. 2 shows a flowchart of another SMF network element and UPF network element adaptation method in an embodiment of the present disclosure, and as shown in fig. 2, the SMF network element and UPF network element adaptation method provided in the embodiment of the present disclosure is applied to a signaling interworking gateway, and includes the following steps:

S202, receiving a first N4 interface signaling sent by a first SMF network element.

S204, identifying the first N4 interface signaling and generating data forwarding information.

S206, when the receiving network element is a second UPF network element, and the combination setting information of the second UPF network element is the physical combination setting and the logic setting of the second UPF network element respectively, generating a second N4 interface signaling based on the disassembly method for the data forwarding information.

S208, when the receiving network element is a second UPF network element and the combination setting information of the second UPF network element is the combination setting of the physical and logical of the second UPF network element, generating a second N4 interface signaling based on the combination method for the data forwarding information.

And S210, the second N4 interface signaling is sent to a second UPF network element so that the receiving network element establishes a ULCL forwarding path according to the second N4 interface signaling.

In the above embodiment, the signaling intercommunication gateway is used for identifying, analyzing and reconstructing the N4 interface, so as to realize decoupling adaptation of the N4 interface, solve the problem that the N4 interface can not be decoupled by different manufacturers and can not use the ULCL function all the time, realize the ULCL capability of different manufacturers under the N4 butt joint scene, and the SMF network element and the UPF network element of the existing network do not need to be updated and reformed in a complicated way, thereby improving the flexibility of network deployment, the selectivity of equipment and the development of network service.

Fig. 3 shows a flowchart of an adaptation method of an SMF network element and a UPF network element in an embodiment of the present disclosure, and as shown in fig. 3, the adaptation method of an SMF network element and a UPF network element provided in the embodiment of the present disclosure is applied to a signaling interworking gateway, and includes the following steps:

s302, receiving a first N4 interface signaling sent by a first UPF network element.

S304, identifying the first N4 interface signaling and generating data forwarding information.

S306, when the receiving network element is a second SMF network element, and the combination setting information of the first UPF network element is the physical combination setting and the logic setting of the first UPF network element respectively, generating a second N4 interface signaling based on the combination method for the data forwarding information.

S308, when the receiving network element is a second SMF network element and the combination setting information of the first UPF network element is that the physical and logical combination setting of the first UPF network element are both carried out, generating a second N4 interface signaling based on the disassembly method for the data forwarding information.

And S310, the second N4 interface signaling is sent to a second SMF network element so that the receiving network element establishes a forwarding path according to the second N4 interface signaling.

And inserting a signaling intercommunication gateway between the SMF network element and the UPF network element of different manufacturers, and forwarding and identifying interface signaling between the SMF network element and the UPF network element by the signaling intercommunication gateway.

In one embodiment, the identification is as follows:

1. identifying source interface and 3gpp interface type fields in the PDR field, and further obtaining data source information of the data packet; for example: source interface is access;3gpp interface type is N3, and the source direction of the PDR identification packet is the data sent from the base station by the N3 interface.

2. The FAR field, URR field, BAR field, QER field, etc. associated with the PDR field are identified for rebinding when reconstructing the N4 interface signaling.

3. Identifying destination interface and 3gpp interface type fields in the FAR field, and further obtaining forwarding direction information of the data packet; for example: destination interface is core;3gpp interface type is N6, and the direction to be forwarded by the FAR is the data sent to the DN by the N6 interface.

After the N4 interface signaling identification is completed, the signaling intercommunication gateway reconstructs the N4 interface signaling.

Fig. 4 shows a schematic diagram of a signaling interworking gateway to N4 interface signaling reconfiguration in an embodiment of the present disclosure.

When the SMF network element decides to split, a ULCL node and a newly added PSA are inserted into the data link; in the related art, the ULCL and PSA are combined in scheme one: the physical and the logic are combined, 2 UPF network elements exist in the user plane, and the UPF network elements are respectively used as ULCL, PSA1 and PSA2; as UPF network elements which are combined by ULCL and PSA1 receive the forwarding rules of N3-N9 (PSA 2) and N3-N6 (PSA 1), PSA2 receives the forwarding rules of N9-N6; namely, the SMF network element which is combined and arranged by both physics and logic is issued to N4 interface signaling of UPF network elements of the same manufacturer to contain forwarding rules N3-N6 (PSA 1) and N3-N9 (PSA 2).

In the embodiment of the disclosure, when the SMF network elements with both physical and logical combining settings are abutted against the UPF network elements with different manufacturers with physical combining settings and logical setting respectively, the signaling interworking gateway disassembles the forwarding rule of N3-N6 (PSA 1) in the N4 interface signaling into N3-N9 (PSA 1) and N9-N6 (PSA 1), and N3-N9 (PSA 2) remains unchanged.

The second UPF network element is connected with the corresponding DN and RAN.

Creating a new PDR field (N9 source direction) and a FAR field (N9 destination direction), and re-binding the binding relation of the QER field, the BAR field and the URR field of the original N3-N6 (PSA 1) to the PDR field of the new N3-N9 (PSA 1) and the PDR field of the original N9-N6 (PSA 1).

It should be noted that the URR field should be bound to the forwarding rule corresponding to PSA, and not to the rule corresponding to ULCL, so as to avoid repeated reporting of data.

In one embodiment, when the UPF network elements which are physically combined and logically respectively set are butted with the SMF network elements which are physically and logically combined and set by different manufacturers, the signaling intercommunication gateway combines forwarding rules in the N4 interface signaling, deletes redundant FAR fields, and rebinds the binding relation of the QER field, the BAR field and the URR field to the corresponding PDR field.

Fig. 5 illustrates a schematic diagram of a signaling interworking gateway to N4 interface signaling reconfiguration in an embodiment of the present disclosure.

In the related art, the ULCL and PSA are combined in scheme two: the user plane is physically provided with 2 UPF network elements which are respectively used as ULCL and PSA1 and PSA2; the UPF network element that is co-located with the PSA1 as a ULCL is logically further divided into ULCL and PSA1; as UPF network element with ULCL and PSA1 receives the forwarding rules of N3-N9 (PSA 1), N3-N9 (PSA 2) and N9-N6 (PSA 1), PSA2 receives the forwarding rules of N9-N6; namely, the SMF network elements which are physically combined and logically respectively arranged are issued to N4 interface signaling of the split UPF network elements of the same manufacturer, wherein forwarding rules N3-N9 (PSA 1), N3-N9 (PSA 2) and N9-N6 (PSA 1) are included.

In the embodiment of the disclosure, when the SMF network elements which are physically combined and logically respectively set are butted with the UPF network elements which are physically and logically combined and set by different manufacturers, the signaling interworking gateway combines forwarding rules in the N4 interface signaling into N3-N9 (PSA 2), N3-N6, deletes redundant FAR fields (the N9 direction forwarded by ULCL to PSA 1), and the binding relation of the QER field, BAR field and URR field of the original N9-N6 (PSA 1) is rebind to the PDR field of N3-N6.

The second UPF network element is connected with the corresponding DN and RAN.

In one embodiment, when the UPF network elements which are both physically and logically combined are connected with the SMF network elements which are physically combined and logically respectively arranged by different manufacturers, the signaling intercommunication gateway disassembles the forwarding rule of the N4 interface signaling, creates a new PDR field and a FAR field, and rebinds the binding relation of the QER field, the BAR field and the URR field to the new PDR field.

In the above embodiment, while forwarding the N4 interface signaling through the signaling interworking gateway, under the existing standard framework, the N4 interface signaling issued by the SMF network element is subjected to reconstruction adaptation according to the implementation manner of the UPF network element manufacturer, so that the UPF network element can accept the N4 interface signaling issued by the SMF network element, and the SMF network element can be ensured to normally issue forwarding rules to UPF network elements of different manufacturers, thereby implementing SMF and UPF networking of different manufacturers, and increasing flexibility and selectivity of network deployment.

Based on the same inventive concept, the embodiments of the present disclosure further provide an SMF network element and UPF network element adapting device, as in the following embodiments. Since the principle of solving the problem of the embodiment of the device is similar to that of the embodiment of the method, the implementation of the embodiment of the device can be referred to the implementation of the embodiment of the method, and the repetition is omitted.

Fig. 6 is a schematic diagram of an SMF network element and UPF network element adapting device in an embodiment of the present disclosure, where, as shown in fig. 6, the SMF network element and UPF network element adapting device 6 includes: a receiving module 601, an identifying module 602, a generating module 603 and a transmitting module 604;

a receiving module 601, configured to receive a first N4 interface signaling sent by a sending network element, where the sending network element is a first session management function SMF network element or a first user plane function UPF network element;

the identification module 602 identifies the first N4 interface signaling and generates data forwarding information;

the generating module 603 generates a second N4 interface signaling according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information; the receiving network element information is the combined setting information of a first UPF network element or the combined setting information of a second UPF network element of different factories corresponding to the first SMF network element;

and a sending module 604, configured to send the second N4 interface signaling to the receiving network element, so that the receiving network element establishes a forwarding path according to the second N4 interface signaling.

In one embodiment, the identification module 602 includes a first identification module, and obtains forwarding direction information according to a FAR field in the first N4 interface signaling, where the data forwarding information includes: forwarding direction information.

In one embodiment, the identification module 602 includes a second identification module, which obtains forwarding direction information according to the FAR field and the PDR field in the first N4 interface signaling.

In one embodiment, the generating module 603 includes a first generating module, and when the receiving network element is a second UPF network element, and the combination setting information of the second UPF network element is physical combination setting and logic setting of the second UPF network element respectively, generates the second N4 interface signaling based on the disassembling method for the data forwarding information.

In one embodiment, the generating module 603 includes a second generating module, and when the receiving network element is a second UPF network element and the combination setting information of the second UPF network element is both physical and logical combination setting of the second UPF network element, generates the second N4 interface signaling based on the combination method for the data forwarding information.

In one embodiment, the generating module 603 includes a third generating module, when the receiving network element is a second SMF network element, and the combination setting information of the first UPF network element is physical combination setting and logic setting of the first UPF network element respectively, generating the second N4 interface signaling based on the combination method for the data forwarding information.

In one embodiment, the generating module 603 includes a fourth generating module, and when the receiving network element is a second SMF network element and the combination setting information of the first UPF network element is that both physical and logical combination settings of the first UPF network element, generates the second N4 interface signaling based on the disassembling method for the data forwarding information.

Fig. 7 shows a schematic diagram of an exemplary system architecture of an SMF network element to UPF network element adaptation method or an SMF network element to UPF network element adaptation apparatus that may be applied to embodiments of the present disclosure.

As shown in fig. 7, a system architecture 700 may include terminal devices 701, 702, 703, a network 704, and a server 705.

The network 704 is used for providing a medium of a communication link between the terminal devices 701, 702, 703 and the server 705, the network 704 inserts a signaling intercommunication gateway between an SMF network element and a UPF network element of different manufacturers, interface signaling between the two network elements is forwarded and identified by the signaling intercommunication gateway, data flow and policy binding are judged according to each field in PDR and FAR and a QER, URR, BAR field bound by the fields, and N4 interface signaling is reconstructed according to a judging result and realization logic of an accepting network element, so that the receiving network element can correctly identify the reconstructed N4 interface signaling, and a ULCL forwarding path is established.

In some embodiments, data exchanged over a network is represented using techniques and/or formats including HyperText Mark-up Language (HTML), extensible markup Language (Extensible MarkupLanguage, XML), and the like. All or some of the links may also be encrypted using conventional encryption techniques such as secure sockets layer (Secure Socket Layer, SSL), transport layer security (Transport Layer Security, TLS), virtual private network (Virtual Private Network, VPN), internet protocol security (Internet ProtocolSecurity, IPsec), etc. In other embodiments, custom and/or dedicated data communication techniques may also be used in place of or in addition to the data communication techniques described above.

The terminal devices 701, 702, 703 may be a variety of electronic devices including, but not limited to, smartphones, tablets, laptop portable computers, desktop computers, and the like.

Alternatively, the clients of the applications installed in the different terminal devices 701, 702, 703 are the same or clients of the same type of application based on different operating systems. The specific form of the application client may also be different based on the different terminal platforms, for example, the application client may be a mobile phone client, a PC client, etc.

The server 705 may be a server providing various services, such as a background management server providing support for devices operated by users with the terminal apparatuses 701, 702, 703. The background management server can analyze and process the received data such as the request and the like, and feed back the processing result to the terminal equipment.

Optionally, the server may be an independent physical server, a server cluster or a distributed system formed by a plurality of physical servers, or a cloud server providing cloud services, cloud databases, cloud computing, cloud functions, cloud storage, network services, cloud communication, middleware services, domain name services, security services, CDNs (Content Delivery Network, content delivery networks), basic cloud computing services such as big data and artificial intelligence platforms, and the like. The terminal may be, but is not limited to, a smart phone, a tablet computer, a notebook computer, a desktop computer, etc. The terminal and the server may be directly or indirectly connected through wired or wireless communication, and the present application is not limited herein.

Those skilled in the art will appreciate that the number of terminal devices, networks, and servers in fig. 7 is merely illustrative, and that any number of terminal devices, networks, and servers may be provided as desired. The embodiments of the present disclosure are not limited in this regard.

Those skilled in the art will appreciate that the various aspects of the present disclosure may be implemented as a system, method, or program product. Accordingly, various aspects of the disclosure may be embodied in the following forms, namely: an entirely hardware embodiment, an entirely software embodiment (including firmware, micro-code, etc.) or an embodiment combining hardware and software aspects may be referred to herein as a "circuit," module "or" system.

An electronic device 800 according to such an embodiment of the present disclosure is described below with reference to fig. 8. The electronic device 800 shown in fig. 8 is merely an example and should not be construed to limit the functionality and scope of use of embodiments of the present disclosure in any way.

As shown in fig. 8, the electronic device 800 is embodied in the form of a general purpose computing device. Components of electronic device 800 may include, but are not limited to: the at least one processing unit 810, the at least one memory unit 820, and a bus 830 connecting the various system components, including the memory unit 820 and the processing unit 810.

Wherein the storage unit stores program code that is executable by the processing unit 810 such that the processing unit 810 performs steps according to various exemplary embodiments of the present disclosure described in the above section of the present specification.

For example, the processing unit 810 may perform the following steps of the method embodiment described above: the signaling intercommunication gateway receives a first N4 interface signaling sent by a sending network element, wherein the sending network element is a first Session Management Function (SMF) network element or a first User Plane Function (UPF) network element; identifying a first N4 interface signaling to generate data forwarding information; generating a second N4 interface signaling according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information; the receiving network element information is the combined setting information of a first UPF network element or the combined setting information of a second UPF network element of different factories corresponding to the first SMF network element; and sending the second N4 interface signaling to the receiving network element so that the receiving network element establishes a ULCL forwarding path according to the second N4 interface signaling.

For example, the processing unit 810 may perform the following steps of the method embodiment described above: n4 interface signaling is forwarded through a signaling intercommunication gateway, N4 interface signaling sent by an SMF network element and a UPF network element is identified in the forwarding process, data flow direction and strategy binding are judged according to each field in PDR and FAR and QER, URR, BAR field bound by the fields, and N4 interface signaling is reconstructed according to a judging result and realization logic of a receiving network element, so that the receiving network element can correctly identify the reconstructed N4 interface signaling, and a ULCL forwarding path is established; the SMF network element and UPF network element different manufacturer deployment is realized, and the session establishment of ULCL is completed.

The storage unit 820 may include readable media in the form of volatile storage units, such as Random Access Memory (RAM) 8201 and/or cache memory 8202, and may further include Read Only Memory (ROM) 8203.

Storage unit 820 may also include a program/utility 8204 having a set (at least one) of program modules 8205, such program modules 8205 including, but not limited to: an operating system, one or more application programs, other program modules, and program data, each or some combination of which may include an implementation of a network environment.

Bus 830 may be one or more of several types of bus structures including a memory unit bus or memory unit controller, a peripheral bus, an accelerated graphics port, a processing unit, or a local bus using any of a variety of bus architectures.

The electronic device 800 may also communicate with one or more external devices 840 (e.g., keyboard, pointing device, bluetooth device, etc.), one or more devices that enable a user to interact with the electronic device 800, and/or any device (e.g., router, modem, etc.) that enables the electronic device 800 to communicate with one or more other computing devices. Such communication may occur through an input/output (I/O) interface 850. Also, electronic device 800 may communicate with one or more networks such as a Local Area Network (LAN), a Wide Area Network (WAN), and/or a public network, such as the Internet, through network adapter 860. As shown, network adapter 860 communicates with other modules of electronic device 800 over bus 830. It should be appreciated that although not shown, other hardware and/or software modules may be used in connection with electronic device 800, including, but not limited to: microcode, device drivers, redundant processing units, external disk drive arrays, RAID systems, tape drives, data backup storage systems, and the like.

From the above description of embodiments, those skilled in the art will readily appreciate that the example embodiments described herein may be implemented in software, or may be implemented in software in combination with the necessary hardware. Thus, the technical solution according to the embodiments of the present disclosure may be embodied in the form of a software product, which may be stored in a non-volatile storage medium (may be a CD-ROM, a U-disk, a mobile hard disk, etc.) or on a network, including several instructions to cause a computing device (may be a personal computer, a server, a terminal device, or a network device, etc.) to perform the method according to the embodiments of the present disclosure.

In an exemplary embodiment of the present disclosure, a computer-readable storage medium, which may be a readable signal medium or a readable storage medium, is also provided. On which a program product is stored which enables the implementation of the method described above of the present disclosure. In some possible implementations, various aspects of the disclosure may also be implemented in the form of a program product comprising program code for causing a terminal device to carry out the steps according to the various exemplary embodiments of the disclosure as described in the "exemplary methods" section of this specification, when the program product is run on the terminal device.

For example, a program product in an embodiment of the disclosure, when executed by a processor, performs a method of: the signaling intercommunication gateway receives a first N4 interface signaling sent by a sending network element, wherein the sending network element is a first Session Management Function (SMF) network element or a first User Plane Function (UPF) network element; identifying a first N4 interface signaling to generate data forwarding information; generating a second N4 interface signaling according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information; the receiving network element information is the combined setting information of a first UPF network element or the combined setting information of a second UPF network element of different factories corresponding to the first SMF network element; and sending the second N4 interface signaling to the receiving network element so that the receiving network element establishes a ULCL forwarding path according to the second N4 interface signaling.

For example, a program product in an embodiment of the disclosure, when executed by a processor, performs a method of: n4 interface signaling is forwarded through a signaling intercommunication gateway, N4 interface signaling sent by an SMF network element and a UPF network element is identified in the forwarding process, data flow direction and strategy binding are judged according to each field in PDR and FAR and QER, URR, BAR field bound by the fields, and N4 interface signaling is reconstructed according to a judging result and realization logic of a receiving network element, so that the receiving network element can correctly identify the reconstructed N4 interface signaling, and a ULCL forwarding path is established; the SMF network element and UPF network element different manufacturer deployment is realized, and the session establishment of ULCL is completed.

More specific examples of the computer readable storage medium in the present disclosure may include, but are not limited to: an electrical connection having one or more wires, a portable computer diskette, a hard disk, a Random Access Memory (RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM or flash memory), an optical fiber, a portable compact disc read-only memory (CD-ROM), an optical storage device, a magnetic storage device, or any suitable combination of the foregoing.

In this disclosure, a computer readable storage medium may include a data signal propagated in baseband or as part of a carrier wave, with readable program code embodied therein. Such a propagated data signal may take any of a variety of forms, including, but not limited to, electro-magnetic, optical, or any suitable combination of the foregoing. A readable signal medium may also be any readable medium that is not a readable storage medium and that can communicate, propagate, or transport a program for use by or in connection with an instruction execution system, apparatus, or device.

Alternatively, the program code embodied on a computer readable storage medium may be transmitted using any appropriate medium, including but not limited to wireless, wireline, optical fiber cable, RF, etc., or any suitable combination of the foregoing.

In particular implementations, the program code for carrying out operations of the present disclosure may be written in any combination of one or more programming languages, including an object oriented programming language such as Java, C++ or the like and conventional procedural programming languages, such as the "C" programming language or similar programming languages. The program code may execute entirely on the user's computing device, partly on the user's device, as a stand-alone software package, partly on the user's computing device, partly on a remote computing device, or entirely on the remote computing device or server. In the case of remote computing devices, the remote computing device may be connected to the user computing device through any kind of network, including a Local Area Network (LAN) or a Wide Area Network (WAN), or may be connected to an external computing device (e.g., connected via the Internet using an Internet service provider).

It should be noted that although in the above detailed description several modules or units of a device for action execution are mentioned, such a division is not mandatory. Indeed, the features and functionality of two or more modules or units described above may be embodied in one module or unit in accordance with embodiments of the present disclosure. Conversely, the features and functions of one module or unit described above may be further divided into a plurality of modules or units to be embodied.

Furthermore, although the steps of the methods in the present disclosure are depicted in a particular order in the drawings, this does not require or imply that the steps must be performed in that particular order or that all illustrated steps be performed in order to achieve desirable results. Additionally or alternatively, certain steps may be omitted, multiple steps combined into one step to perform, and/or one step decomposed into multiple steps to perform, etc.

From the description of the above embodiments, those skilled in the art will readily appreciate that the example embodiments described herein may be implemented in software, or may be implemented in software in combination with the necessary hardware. Thus, the technical solution according to the embodiments of the present disclosure may be embodied in the form of a software product, which may be stored in a non-volatile storage medium (may be a CD-ROM, a U-disk, a mobile hard disk, etc.) or on a network, including several instructions to cause a computing device (may be a personal computer, a server, a mobile terminal, or a network device, etc.) to perform the method according to the embodiments of the present disclosure.

Other embodiments of the disclosure will be apparent to those skilled in the art from consideration of the specification and practice of the disclosure disclosed herein. This disclosure is intended to cover any adaptations, uses, or adaptations of the disclosure following the general principles of the disclosure and including such departures from the present disclosure as come within known or customary practice within the art to which the disclosure pertains. It is intended that the specification and examples be considered as exemplary only, with a true scope and spirit of the disclosure being indicated by the following claims.

Claims

1. An adaptation method of an SMF network element and a UPF network element, which is applied to a signaling interworking gateway, and includes:

receiving a first N4 interface signaling sent by a sending network element;

generating data forwarding information according to a forwarding behavior rule FAR field and a data packet detection rule PDR field in the first N4 interface signaling;

according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information, the first N4 interface signaling is disassembled or combined to generate a second N4 interface signaling; the disassembly method or the combination method comprises the following steps: updating the FAR field and the PDR field; the receiving network element information is the combined setting information of a first UPF network element or the combined setting information of a second UPF network element of different factories corresponding to the first SMF network element;

transmitting the second N4 interface signaling to a receiving network element so that the receiving network element establishes a forwarding path according to the second N4 interface signaling;

wherein the step of disassembling or combining the first N4 interface signaling according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information, and the step of generating a second N4 interface signaling includes:

when the sending network element is the first UPF network element, the receiving network element is a second SMF network element, and the combination setting information of the first UPF network element is the physical combination setting and the logic setting of the first UPF network element respectively, generating the second N4 interface signaling for the data forwarding information based on the combination method;

And when the sending network element is the first UPF network element, the receiving network element is the second SMF network element, and the combination setting information of the first UPF network element is the combination setting of the physical and logical of the first UPF network element, generating the second N4 interface signaling for the data forwarding information based on the disassembly method.

2. The method for adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element according to claim 1, wherein said generating data forwarding information according to a forwarding behavior rule FAR field and a packet detection rule PDR field in said first N4 interface signaling includes:

according to the first N4 interface signaling, at least one of the following rule fields is obtained:

the FAR field, the PDR field, the usage reporting rule URR field, the caching action rule BAR field, the quality of service enforcement rule QER field.

3. The method for adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element according to claim 2, wherein the configuration information of the first UPF network element includes: the first UPF network element is physically and logically combined, or the first UPF network element is physically and logically combined and logically respectively arranged;

the combined setting information of the second UPF network element includes: and the second UPF network element is physically and logically combined, or the second UPF network element is physically and logically combined and logically respectively arranged.

4. A method for adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element according to claim 3, wherein generating a second N4 interface signaling according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information comprises:

when the sending network element is the first SMF network element, the receiving network element is the second UPF network element, and the combined setting information of the second UPF network element is the physical combined setting and the logic setting of the second UPF network element respectively, generating the second N4 interface signaling for the data forwarding information based on a disassembly method;

and when the sending network element is the first SMF network element, the receiving network element is the second UPF network element, and the combination setting information of the second UPF network element is the combination setting of the physical and logical of the second UPF network element, generating the second N4 interface signaling for the data forwarding information based on a combination method.

5. The method of adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element according to claim 4, wherein said disassembling method or said merging method comprises:

updating the FAR field and the PDR field;

binding the rule field with the updated PDR field.

6. The method of adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element according to claim 2, further comprising:

Caching and updating session context data of the sending network element and the receiving network element;

wherein the session context data comprises at least one of:

FAR field identification, PDR field identification, URR field identification, BAR field identification, QER field identification, user terminal identification, address field identification, session endpoint identification with complete control plane, user session identification.

7. The method of adapting an SMF network element to a UPF network element according to claim 2, further comprising:

and generating data source information according to the PDR field, wherein the data forwarding information comprises the data source information.

8. An SMF network element and UPF network element adapting device, comprising:

the receiving module is used for receiving a first N4 interface signaling sent by the sending network element;

the identification module generates data forwarding information according to a forwarding behavior rule FAR field and a data packet detection rule PDR field in the first N4 interface signaling;

the generation module is used for disassembling or combining the first N4 interface signaling according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information to generate a second N4 interface signaling; the disassembly method or the combination method comprises the following steps: updating the FAR field and the PDR field; the receiving network element information is the combined setting information of a first UPF network element or the combined setting information of a second UPF network element of different factories corresponding to the first SMF network element; wherein the step of disassembling or combining the first N4 interface signaling according to the data forwarding information and the receiving network element information, and the step of generating a second N4 interface signaling includes: when the sending network element is the first UPF network element, the receiving network element is a second SMF network element, and the combination setting information of the first UPF network element is the physical combination setting and the logic setting of the first UPF network element respectively, generating the second N4 interface signaling for the data forwarding information based on the combination method; when the sending network element is the first UPF network element, the receiving network element is the second SMF network element, and the combination setting information of the first UPF network element is the combination setting of the physical and logical of the first UPF network element, generating the second N4 interface signaling for the data forwarding information based on the disassembly method;

And the sending module is used for sending the second N4 interface signaling to a receiving network element so that the receiving network element establishes a forwarding path according to the second N4 interface signaling.

9. An electronic device, comprising:

a processor; and

a memory for storing executable instructions of the processor;

wherein the processor is configured to perform the SMF network element and UPF network element adaptation method of any of claims 1 to 7 via execution of the executable instructions.

10. A computer readable storage medium having stored thereon a computer program, which when executed by a processor implements the SMF network element and UPF network element adaptation method of any of claims 1 to 7.