WO2018071105A1

WO2018071105A1 - Null data packet feedback report protocol

Info

Publication number: WO2018071105A1
Application number: PCT/US2017/049569
Authority: WO
Inventors: Robert J. Stacey; Laurent Cariou; Po-Kai Huang; Xiaogang Chen; Qinghua Li
Original assignee: Intel IP Corporation
Priority date: 2016-10-11
Filing date: 2017-08-31
Publication date: 2018-04-19

Abstract

A wireless access point (AP) requests a response from a group of wireless station (STAs) and a STA within the group of STAs provides a response to the request in a resource block (RB). The AP may encode, for transmission, a null data packet (NDP) feedback report poll variant trigger frame including a request and specifying a range of association identifiers (AIDs) associated with STAs scheduled to respond. The STA may decode the trigger frame and determine whether the AID of the STA is within the range of AIDs associated with STAs scheduled to respond to the request. When within the range of scheduled AIDs, the STA may encode an NDP feedback in an RB represented by a resource unit (RU) together with a spatial stream (SS). The AP may receive the NDP feedback report response from the STA and determine the response to the request.

Description

NULL DATA PACKET FEEDBACK REPORT PROTOCOL

PRIORITY

[0001] This application claims benefit of priority to U.S. Application

Serial No. 62/406,509, filed October 11, 2016, which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.

TECHNICAL FIELD

[0002] Embodiments pertain to wireless networks and wireless communications. Some embodiments relate to wireless local area networks

(WLANs) and Wi-Fi networks including networks operating in accordance with the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802.11 family of standards. Some embodiments relate to the IEEE 802.1 lax study group (SG). Some embodiments relate to methods, computer readable media, and apparatus for a null data packet feedback report protocol.

BACKGROUND

[0003] Wireless communications have been evolving toward ever increasing data rates (e.g., from IEEE 802.11a/g to IEEE 802.11η to IEEE 802.1 lac and IEEE 802.1 lad). In high-density deployment situations, overall system efficiency increases in importance. Efficient use of the resources of a WLAN is important to provide bandwidth and acceptable response times to the users of the WLAN. A recently -formed study group for Wi-Fi evolution referred to as the IEEE 802.11 High Efficiency WLAN (HEW) study group (SG) (i.e., IEEE 802.1 lax) is addressing these high-density deployment scenarios. In addition, IEEE 802.11 ad, IEEE 802.11 ay and/or other technologies may be used in these and other scenarios, in some cases. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0004] The present disclosure is illustrated by way of example and not limitation in the figures of the accompanying drawings, in which like references indicate similar elements and in which:

[0005] FIG. 1 illustrates a WLAN, in accordance with some embodiments;

[0006] FIG. 2 illustrates an example machine in accordance with some embodiments;

[0007] FIG. 3 illustrates a station (STA) in accordance with some embodiments and an access point (AP) in accordance with some embodiments;

[0008] FIG. 4 is a block diagram of a radio architecture in accordance with some embodiments;

[0009] FIG. 5 illustrates a front-end (FE) module circuitry for use in the radio architecture of FIG. 4 in accordance with some embodiments;

[0010] FIG. 6 illustrates a radio IC circuitry for use in the radio architecture of FIG. 4 in accordance with some embodiments;

[0011] FIG. 7 illustrates a baseband processing circuitry for use in the radio architecture of FIG. 4 in accordance with some embodiments;

[0012] FIG. 8 is a block diagram that illustrates the logical structure of a null data packet (NDP) feedback report poll variant trigger frame in accordance with some embodiments;

[0013] FIG. 9 is a block diagram that illustrates the logical structure of the Common Info field of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame illustrated in FIG. 8 in accordance with some embodiments;

[0014] FIG. 10 is a block diagram that illustrates the logical structure of the Trigger Dependent Common Info field of the Common Info field illustrated in FIG. 9, for the NDP feedback report poll variant, in accordance with some embodiments;

[0015] FIG. 11 is a block diagram that illustrates a method of a wireless

STA in accordance with some embodiments; and

[0016] FIG. 12 is a block diagram that illustrates a method of a wireless

AP in accordance with some embodiments. DESCRIPTION

[0017] The following description and the drawings sufficiently illustrate specific embodiments to enable those skilled in the art to practice them. Other embodiments may incorporate structural, logical, electrical, process, and other changes. Portions and features of some embodiments may be included in, or substituted for, those of other embodiments. Embodiments set forth in the claims encompass all available equivalents of those claims.

[0018] FIG. 1 illustrates a WLAN 100 in accordance with some embodiments. In some embodiments, the WLAN 100 may be a High Efficiency (HE) WLAN network. In some embodiments, the WLAN 100 may be a Wi-Fi network. These embodiments are not limiting, however, as some embodiments of the WLAN 100 may include a combination of such networks. That is, the WLAN 100 may support multiple-user (MU) operation (for example HE) devices in some cases, non-MU operation devices in some cases, and a combination of MU operation devices and non-MU operation devices in some cases. Accordingly, it is understood that although techniques described herein may refer to either a non-MU operation device or to an MU operation device, such techniques may be applicable to both non-MU operation devices and MU operation devices in some cases. The WLAN 100 may comprise a basic service set (BSS) that may include a master station 102, which may be an access point (AP), a plurality of HE (e.g., IEEE 802.1 lax) stations 104, and a plurality of legacy (e.g., IEEE 802.1 ln/ac) devices 106. The HE stations 104 and the legacy devices 106 may each be referred to as a user station (STA). The WLAN 100 may include any or all of the components shown, and embodiments are not limited to the number of each component shown in FIG. 1. In various embodiments, the WLAN 100 may include any number (including zero) of the HE stations 104 and the legacy devices 106. The master station 102 may receive and/or detect signals from one or more HE stations 104 and/or legacy devices 106, and may transmit data packets to one or more HE stations 104 and/or legacy devices 106. It should be noted that embodiments are not limited to usage of a master station 102. References herein to the master station 102 are not limiting. In some embodiments, a legacy devices 106, an MU operation device (device capable of MU operation), an HE station 104 and/or other device may be configurable to operate as a master station. Accordingly, in such embodiments, operations that may be performed by the master station 102 as described herein may be performed by a legacy device 106, an MU operation device, an HE station 104 and/or other device that is configurable to operate as the master station.

[0019] The master station 102 may be an AP using one of the IEEE

802.11 protocols to transmit and receive. The master station 102 may be a base station. The master station 102 may use other communications protocols as well as the IEEE 802.11 protocol. The IEEE 802.11 protocol may be IEEE 802.1 lax. The IEEE 802.11 protocol may include using orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA), time division multiple access (TDMA), and/or code division multiple access (CDMA). The IEEE 802.11 protocol may include a multiple access technique. For example, the IEEE 802.11 protocol may include space-division multiple access (SDMA) and/or multiple-user multiple-input multiple-output (MU-MIMO). The master station 102 and/or HE station 104 may use one or both of MU-MIMO and OFDMA. There may be more than one master station 102 that is part of an extended service set (ESS). A controller (not illustrated) may store information that is common to the more than one master station 102. The controller may have access to an external network such as the Internet.

[0020] The legacy devices 106 may operate in accordance with one or more of IEEE 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac/ad/af/ah/aj, or another legacy wireless communication standard. The legacy devices 106 may be STAs or IEEE 802.11 STAs. The HE stations 104 may be wireless transmit and receive devices such as cellular telephone, smart telephone, handheld wireless device, wireless glasses, wireless watch, wireless personal device, tablet, or another device that may be transmitting and receiving using the IEEE 802.11 protocol such as IEEE 802.11 ax or another wireless protocol such as IEEE 802.11 az. In some embodiments, the HE stations 104, master station 102, and/or legacy devices 106 may be termed wireless devices. In some embodiments the HE station 104 may be a "group owner" (GO) for peer-to-peer modes of operation where the HE station 104 may perform some operations of a master station 102.

[0021] The master station 102 may communicate with legacy devices

106 in accordance with legacy IEEE 802.11 communication techniques. In example embodiments, the master station 102 may also be configured to communicate with HE stations 104 in accordance with legacy IEEE 802.11 communication techniques.

[0022] In some embodiments, a HE frame may be configurable to have the same bandwidth as a channel. The bandwidth of a channel may be 20MHz, 40MHz, or 80MHz, 160MHz, 320MHz contiguous bandwidths or an 80+80MHz (160MHz) non-contiguous bandwidth. In some embodiments, the bandwidth of a channel may be 1 MHz, 1.25MHz, 2.03MHz, 2.5MHz, 5MHz and 10MHz, or a combination thereof or another bandwidth that is less than or equal to the available bandwidth may also be used. In some embodiments the bandwidth of the channels may be based on a number of active subcarriers. In some embodiments the bandwidth of the channels are multiples of 26 (e.g., 26, 52, 104, etc.) active subcarriers or tones that are spaced by 20 megahertz (MHz). In some embodiments the bandwidth of the channels are 26, 52, 104, 242, etc. active data subcarriers or tones that are spaced 20 MHz apart. In some embodiments the bandwidth of the channels is 256 tones spaced by 20 MHz. In some embodiments a 20 MHz channel may comprise 256 tones for a 256 point Fast Fourier Transform (FFT). In some embodiments, a different number of tones is used. In some embodiments, the OFDMA structure consists of a 26- subcarrier resource unit (RU), 52-subcarrier RU, 106-subcarrier RU, 242- subcarrier RU, 484-subcarrier RU and 996-subcarrier RU. In some

embodiments, resource allocations for single user (SU) consist of a 242 subcarrier RU, 484-subcarrier RU, 996-subcarrier RU and 2x996-subcarrier RU.

[0023] An HE frame may be configured for transmitting a number of spatial streams (SSs), which may be in accordance with MU-MIMO. In some embodiments, there may be four or eight spatial streams. In some embodiments, an HE frame may be configured for transmitting in accordance with one or both of OFDMA and MU-MIMO. In other embodiments, the master station 102, HE station 104, and/or legacy device 106 may also implement different technologies such as code division multiple access (CDMA) 2000, CDMA 2000 IX, CDMA 2000 Evolution-Data Optimized (EV-DO), Interim Standard 2000 (IS-2000), Interim Standard 95 (IS-95), Interim Standard 856 (IS-856), Long Term

Evolution (LTE), Global System for Mobile communications (GSM), Enhanced Data rates for GSM Evolution (EDGE), GSM EDGE (GERAN), IEEE 802.16 (i.e., Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX)),

BlueTooth®, WiMAX, WiGig, or other technologies.

[0024] Some embodiments relate to HE communications. In accordance with some IEEE 802.11 ax embodiments, a master station 102 may operate as a master station which may be arranged to contend for a wireless medium (e.g., during a contention period) to receive exclusive control of the medium for an HE control period. In some embodiments, the HE control period may be termed a transmission opportunity (TXOP). The master station 102 may transmit a HE master-sync transmission, which may be a trigger frame or HE control and schedule transmission, at the beginning of the HE control period. The master station 102 may transmit a time duration of the TXOP and channel information. During the HE control period, HE stations 104 may communicate with the master station 102 in accordance with a non-contention based multiple access technique such as OFDMA and/or MU-MIMO. This is unlike conventional WLAN communications in which devices communicate in accordance with a contention-based communication technique, rather than a multiple access technique. During the HE control period, the master station 102 may communicate with HE stations 104 using one or more HE frames. During the HE control period, the HE STAs 104 may operate on a channel smaller than the operating range of the master station 102. During the HE control period, legacy stations may refrain from communicating.

[0025] In accordance with some embodiments, during the master-sync transmission the HE STAs 104 may contend for the wireless medium with the legacy devices 106 being excluded from contending for the wireless medium during the master-sync transmission or TXOP. In some embodiments the trigger frame may indicate an uplink (UL) UL-MU-MIMO and/or UL OFDMA control period. In some embodiments, the trigger frame may indicate a portions of the TXOP that are contention based for some HE station 104 and portions that are not contention based.

[0026] In some embodiments, the multiple-access technique used during the HE control period may be a scheduled OFDMA technique, although this is not a requirement. In some embodiments, the multiple access technique may be a time-division multiple access (TDMA) technique or a frequency division multiple access (FDMA) technique. In some embodiments, the multiple access technique may be a space-division multiple access (SDMA) technique.

[0027] In example embodiments, the HE device 104 and/or the master station 102 are configured to perform the methods and operations herein described in conjunction with FIGS. 1-12.

[0028] FIG. 2 illustrates a block diagram of an example machine in accordance with some embodiments. The machine 200 is an example machine upon which any one or more of the techniques and/or methodologies discussed herein may be performed. In alternative embodiments, the machine 200 may operate as a standalone device or may be connected (e.g., networked) to other machines. In a networked deployment, the machine 200 may operate in the capacity of a server machine, a client machine, or both in server-client network environments. In an example, the machine 200 may act as a peer machine in peer-to-peer (P2P) (or other distributed) network environment. The machine 200 may be a master station 102, HE station 104, STA, HE device, HE AP, HE STA, UE, eNodeB (eNB, e.g., base station for LTE), mobile device, base station, personal computer (PC), tablet PC, set-top box (STB), personal digital assistant (PDA), mobile telephone, smart phone, web appliance, network router, switch or bridge, or any machine capable of executing instructions (sequential or otherwise) that specify actions to be taken by that machine. Further, while only a single machine is illustrated, the term "machine" shall also be taken to include any collection of machines that individually or jointly execute a set (or multiple sets) of instructions to perform any one or more of the methodologies discussed herein, such as cloud computing and/or software as a service (SaaS), and/or other computer cluster configurations.

[0029] Examples as described herein, may include, or may operate on, logic or a number of components, modules, or mechanisms. Modules are tangible entities (e.g., hardware) capable of performing specified operations and may be configured or arranged in a certain manner. In an example, circuits may be arranged (e.g., internally or with respect to external entities such as other circuits) in a specified manner as a module. In an example, the whole or part of one or more computer systems (e.g., a standalone, client or server computer system) or one or more hardware processors may be configured by firmware or software (e.g., instructions, an application portion, or an application) as a module that operates to perform specified operations. In an example, the software may reside on a machine readable medium. In an example, the software, when executed by the underlying hardware of the module, causes the hardware to perform the specified operations.

[0030] Accordingly, the term "module" is understood to encompass a tangible entity, be that an entity that is physically constructed, specifically configured (e.g., hardwired), or temporarily (e.g., transitorily) configured (e.g., programmed) to operate in a specified manner or to perform part or all of any operation described herein. Considering examples in which modules are temporarily configured, each of the modules need not be instantiated at any one moment in time. For example, where the modules comprise a general-purpose hardware processor configured using software, the general-purpose hardware processor may be configured as respective different modules at different times. Software may accordingly configure a hardware processor, for example, to constitute a particular module at one instance of time and to constitute a different module at a different instance of time.

[0031] The machine (e.g., computer system) 200 may include a hardware processor 202 (e.g., a central processing unit (CPU), a graphics processing unit

(GPU), a hardware processor core, or any combination thereof), a main memory

204 and a static memory 206, some or all of which may communicate with each other via an interlink (e.g., bus) 208. The machine 200 may further include a display unit 210, an alphanumeric input device 212 (e.g., a keyboard), and a user interface (UI) navigation device 214 (e.g., a mouse). In an example, the display unit 210, input device 212 and UI navigation device 214 may be a touch screen display. The machine 200 may additionally include a storage device (e.g., drive unit) 216, a signal generation device 218 (e.g., a speaker), a network interface device 220, and one or more sensors 221 , such as a global positioning system (GPS) sensor, compass, accelerometer, or other sensor. The machine 200 may include an output controller 228, such as a serial (e.g., universal serial bus (USB)), parallel, or other wired or wireless (e.g., infrared (IR), near field communication (NFC), etc.) connection to communicate or control one or more peripheral devices (e.g., a printer, card reader, etc.).

[0032] The storage device 216 may include a machine readable medium

222 on which is stored one or more sets of data structures or instructions 224 (e.g., software) embodying or utilized by any one or more of the techniques or functions described herein. The instructions 224 may also reside, completely or at least partially, within the main memory 204, within static memory 206, or within the hardware processor 202 during execution thereof by the machine 200. In an example, one or any combination of the hardware processor 202, the main memory 204, the static memory 206, or the storage device 216 may constitute machine readable media. In some embodiments, the machine readable medium may be or may include a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium. In some embodiments, the machine readable medium may be or may include a computer-readable storage medium.

[0033] While the machine readable medium 222 is illustrated as a single medium, the term "machine readable medium" may include a single medium or multiple media (e.g., a centralized or distributed database, and/or associated caches and servers) configured to store the one or more instructions 224. The term "machine readable medium" may include any medium that is capable of storing, encoding, or carrying instructions for execution by the machine 200 and that cause the machine 200 to perform any one or more of the techniques of the present disclosure, or that is capable of storing, encoding or carrying data structures used by or associated with such instructions. Non-limiting machine readable medium examples may include solid-state memories, and optical and magnetic media. Specific examples of machine readable media may include: non-volatile memory, such as semiconductor memory devices (e.g., Electrically Programmable Read-Only Memory (EPROM), Electrically Erasable

Programmable Read-Only Memory (EEPROM)) and flash memory devices; magnetic disks, such as internal hard disks and removable disks; magneto- optical disks; Random Access Memory (RAM); and CD-ROM and DVD-ROM disks. In some examples, machine readable media may include non-transitory machine readable media. In some examples, machine readable media may include machine readable media that is not a transitory propagating signal.

[0034] The instructions 224 may further be transmitted or received over a communications network 226 using a transmission medium via the network interface device 220 utilizing any one of a number of transfer protocols (e.g., frame relay, internet protocol (IP), transmission control protocol (TCP), user datagram protocol (UDP), hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP), etc.). Example communication networks may include a local area network (LAN), a wide area network (WAN), a packet data network (e.g., the Internet), mobile telephone networks (e.g., cellular networks), Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS) networks, and wireless data networks (e.g., IEEE 802.11 family of standards known as Wi-Fi®, IEEE 802.16 family of standards known as WiMax®, IEEE 802.15.4 family of standards, a Long Term Evolution (LTE) family of standards, a Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) family of standards, peer-to-peer (P2P) networks, among others. In an example, the network interface device 220 may include one or more physical jacks (e.g., Ethernet, coaxial, or phone jacks) or one or more antennas to connect to the communications network 226. In an example, the network interface device 220 may include a plurality of antennas to wirelessly communicate using at least one of single-input multiple- output (SIMO), multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO), or multiple-input single-output (MISO) techniques. In some examples, the network interface device 220 may wirelessly communicate using Multiple User MIMO (MU- MIMO) techniques, OFDMA techniques and combination. The term

"transmission medium" shall be taken to include any intangible medium that is capable of storing, encoding or carrying instructions for execution by the machine 200, and includes digital or analog communications signals or other intangible medium to facilitate communication of such software.

[0035] FIG. 3 illustrates a station (STA) in accordance with some embodiments and an access point (AP) in accordance with some embodiments. It should be noted that in some embodiments, an STA or other mobile device may include some or all of the components shown in either FIG. 2 or FIG. 3 (as in 300) or both. The STA 300 may be suitable for use as an HE station 104 as depicted in FIG. 1, in some embodiments. It should also be noted that in some embodiments, an AP or other base station may include some or all of the components shown in either FIG. 2 or FIG. 3 (as in 350) or both. The AP 350 may be suitable for use as a master station 102 as depicted in FIG. 1, in some embodiments.

[0036] The STA 300 may include physical layer circuitry 302 and a transceiver 305, one or both of which may enable transmission and reception of signals to and from components such as the master station 102 (FIG. 1), other STAs or other devices using one or more antennas 301. As an example, the physical layer circuitry 302 may perform various encoding and decoding functions that may include formation of baseband signals for transmission and decoding of received signals. As another example, the transceiver 305 may perform various transmission and reception functions such as conversion of signals between a baseband range and a Radio Frequency (RF) range.

Accordingly, the physical layer circuitry 302 and the transceiver 305 may be separate components or may be part of a combined component. In addition, some of the described functionality related to transmission and reception of signals may be performed by a combination that may include one, any or all of the physical layer circuitry 302, the transceiver 305, and other components or layers. The STA 300 may also include medium access control (MAC) layer circuitry 304 for controlling access to the wireless medium. The STA 300 may also include processing circuitry 306 and memory 308 arranged to perform the operations described herein.

[0037] The AP 350 may include physical layer circuitry 352 and a transceiver 355, one or both of which may enable transmission and reception of signals to and from components such as the HE station 104 (FIG. 1), other APs or other devices using one or more antennas 351. As an example, the physical layer circuitry 352 may perform various encoding and decoding functions that may include formation of baseband signals for transmission and decoding of received signals. As another example, the transceiver 355 may perform various transmission and reception functions such as conversion of signals between a baseband range and a Radio Frequency (RF) range. Accordingly, the physical layer circuitry 352 and the transceiver 355 may be separate components or may be part of a combined component. In addition, some of the described functionality related to transmission and reception of signals may be performed by a combination that may include one, any or all of the physical layer circuitry 352, the transceiver 355, and other components or layers. The AP 350 may also include medium access control (MAC) layer circuitry 354 for controlling access to the wireless medium. The AP 350 may also include processing circuitry 356 and memory 358 arranged to perform the operations described herein.

[0038] The antennas 301, 351, 230 may comprise one or more directional or omnidirectional antennas, including, for example, dipole antennas, monopole antennas, patch antennas, loop antennas, microstrip antennas or other types of antennas suitable for transmission of RF signals. In some multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) embodiments, the antennas 301, 351, 230 may be effectively separated to take advantage of spatial diversity and the different channel characteristics that may result.

[0039] In some embodiments, the STA 300 may be configured as an HE station 104 (FIG. 1), and may communicate using OFDM and/or OFDMA communication signals over a multicarrier communication channel. In some embodiments, the AP 350 may be configured to communicate using OFDM and/or OFDMA communication signals over a multicarrier communication channel. In some embodiments, the HE station 104 may be configured to communicate using OFDM communication signals over a multicarrier communication channel. Accordingly, in some cases, the STA 300, AP 350 and/or HE station 104 may be configured to receive signals in accordance with specific communication standards, such as the IEEE standards including IEEE 802.11-2012, 802.11n-2009 and/or 802.11ac-2013 and/or 802. Had and/or 802.1 lah standards and/or proposed specifications for WLANs including proposed HE standards, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect as they may also be suitable to transmit and/or receive

communications in accordance with other techniques and standards. In some other embodiments, the AP 350, HE station 104 and/or the STA 300 configured as an HE station 104 may be configured to receive signals that were transmitted using one or more other modulation techniques such as spread spectrum modulation (e.g., direct sequence code division multiple access (DS-CDMA) and/or frequency hopping code division multiple access (FH-CDMA)), time- division multiplexing (TDM) modulation, and/or frequency-division

multiplexing (FDM) modulation, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect. Embodiments disclosed herein provide two preamble formats for High Efficiency (HE) Wireless LAN standards specification that is under development in the IEEE Task Group 1 lax (TGax).

[0040] In some embodiments, the STA 300 and/or AP 350 may be a mobile device and may be a portable wireless communication device, such as a personal digital assistant (PDA), a laptop or portable computer with wireless communication capability, a web tablet, a wireless telephone, a smartphone, a wireless headset, a pager, an instant messaging device, a digital camera, an access point, a television, a wearable device such as a medical device (e.g., a heart rate monitor, a blood pressure monitor, etc.), or other device that may receive and/or transmit information wirelessly. In some embodiments, the STA 300 and/or AP 350 may be configured to operate in accordance with 802.11 standards, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect. Mobile devices or other devices in some embodiments may be configured to operate according to other protocols or standards, including other IEEE standards, Third Generation Partnership Project (3 GPP) standards or other standards. In some embodiments, the STA 300 and/or AP 350 may include one or more of a keyboard, a display, a non-volatile memory port, multiple antennas, a graphics processor, an application processor, speakers, and other mobile device elements. The display may be an LCD screen including a touch screen.

[0041] Although the STA 300 and the AP 350 are each illustrated as having several separate functional elements, one or more of the functional elements may be combined and may be implemented by combinations of software-configured elements, such as processing elements including digital signal processors (DSPs), and/or other hardware elements. For example, some elements may comprise one or more microprocessors, DSPs, field- programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), application specific integrated circuits (ASICs), radio-frequency integrated circuits (RFICs) and combinations of various hardware and logic circuitry for performing at least the functions described herein. In some embodiments, the functional elements may refer to one or more processes operating on one or more processing elements.

[0042] Embodiments may be implemented in one or a combination of hardware, firmware and software. Embodiments may also be implemented as instructions stored on a computer-readable storage device, which may be read and executed by at least one processor to perform the operations described herein. A computer-readable storage device may include any non-transitory mechanism for storing information in a form readable by a machine (e.g., a computer). For example, a computer-readable storage device may include read- only memory (ROM), random-access memory (RAM), magnetic disk storage media, optical storage media, flash-memory devices, and other storage devices and media. Some embodiments may include one or more processors and may be configured with instructions stored on a computer-readable storage device.

[0043] It should be noted that in some embodiments, an apparatus used by the STA 300 may include various components of the STA 300 as shown in FIG. 3 and/or the example machine 200 as shown in FIG. 2. Accordingly, techniques and operations described herein that refer to the STA 300 (or HE station 104) may be applicable to an apparatus for an STA, in some

embodiments. It should also be noted that in some embodiments, an apparatus used by the AP 350 may include various components of the AP 350 as shown in FIG. 3 and/or the example machine 200 as shown in FIG. 2. Accordingly, techniques and operations described herein that refer to the AP 350 (or master station 102) may be applicable to an apparatus for an AP, in some embodiments. In addition, an apparatus for a mobile device and/or base station may include one or more components shown in FIGS. 2-3, in some embodiments. Accordingly, techniques and operations described herein that refer to a mobile device and/or base station may be applicable to an apparatus for a mobile device and/or base station, in some embodiments.

[0044] FIG. 4 is a block diagram of a radio architecture 400 in accordance with some embodiments. Radio architecture 400 may include radio front-end module (FEM) circuitry 404, radio IC circuitry 406 and baseband processing circuitry 408. Radio architecture 400 as shown includes both Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) functionality and Bluetooth (BT) functionality although embodiments are not so limited. In this disclosure, "WLAN" and "Wi-Fi" are used interchangeably.

[0045] FEM circuitry 404 may include a WLAN or Wi-Fi FEM circuitry

404A and a Bluetooth (BT) FEM circuitry 404B. The WLAN FEM circuitry 404A may include a receive signal path comprising circuitry configured to operate on WLAN RF signals received from one or more antennas 401, to amplify the received signals and to provide the amplified versions of the received signals to the WLAN radio IC circuitry 406A for further processing. The BT FEM circuitry 404B may include a receive signal path which may include circuitry configured to operate on BT RF signals received from one or more antennas 401, to amplify the received signals and to provide the amplified versions of the received signals to the BT radio IC circuitry 406B for further processing. FEM circuitry 404A may also include a transmit signal path which may include circuitry configured to amplify WLAN signals provided by the radio IC circuitry 406A for wireless transmission by one or more of the antennas 401. In addition, FEM circuitry 404B may also include a transmit signal path which may include circuitry configured to amplify BT signals provided by the radio IC circuitry 406B for wireless transmission by the one or more antennas. In the embodiment of FIG. 4, although FEM 404A and FEM 404B are shown as being distinct from one another, embodiments are not so limited, and include within their scope the use of an FEM (not shown) that includes a transmit path and/or a receive path for both WLAN and BT signals, or the use of one or more FEM circuitries where at least some of the FEM circuitries share transmit and/or receive signal paths for both WLAN and BT signals.

[0046] Radio IC circuitry 406 as shown may include WLAN radio IC circuitry 406 A and BT radio IC circuitry 406B. The WLAN radio IC circuitry 406A may include a receive signal path which may include circuitry to down- convert WLAN RF signals received from the FEM circuitry 404A and provide baseband signals to WLAN baseband processing circuitry 408A. BT radio IC circuitry 406B may in turn include a receive signal path which may include circuitry to down-convert BT RF signals received from the FEM circuitry 404B and provide baseband signals to BT baseband processing circuitry 408B. WLAN radio IC circuitry 406A may also include a transmit signal path which may include circuitry to up-convert WLAN baseband signals provided by the WLAN baseband processing circuitry 408A and provide WLAN RF output signals to the FEM circuitry 404A for subsequent wireless transmission by the one or more antennas 401. BT radio IC circuitry 406B may also include a transmit signal path which may include circuitry to up-convert BT baseband signals provided by the BT baseband processing circuitry 408B and provide BT RF output signals to the FEM circuitry 404B for subsequent wireless transmission by the one or more antennas 401. In the embodiment of FIG. 4, although radio IC circuitries 406A and 406B are shown as being distinct from one another, embodiments are not so limited, and include within their scope the use of a radio IC circuitry (not shown) that includes a transmit signal path and/or a receive signal path for both WLAN and BT signals, or the use of one or more radio IC circuitries where at least some of the radio IC circuitries share transmit and/or receive signal paths for both WLAN and BT signals.

[0047] Baseband processing circuity 408 may include a WLAN baseband processing circuitry 408A and a BT baseband processing circuitry 408B. The WLAN baseband processing circuitry 408A may include a memory, such as, for example, a set of RAM arrays in a Fast Fourier Transform or Inverse Fast Fourier Transform block (not shown) of the WLAN baseband processing circuitry 408 A. Each of the WLAN baseband circuitry 408 A and the BT baseband circuitry 408B may further include one or more processors and control logic to process the signals received from the corresponding WLAN or BT receive signal path of the radio IC circuitry 406, and to also generate corresponding WLAN or BT baseband signals for the transmit signal path of the radio IC circuitry 406. Each of the baseband processing circuitries 408A and

408B may further include physical layer (PHY) and medium access control layer (MAC) circuitry, and may further interface with application processor 411 for generation and processing of the baseband signals and for controlling operations of the radio IC circuitry 406.

[0048] Referring still to FIG. 4, according to the shown embodiment,

WLAN-BT coexistence circuitry 413 may include logic providing an interface between the WLAN baseband circuitry 408A and the BT baseband circuitry 408B to enable use cases requiring WLAN and BT coexistence. In addition, a switch 403 may be provided between the WLAN FEM circuitry 404A and the BT FEM circuitry 404B to allow switching between the WLAN and BT radios according to application needs. In addition, although the antennas 401 are depicted as being respectively connected to the WLAN FEM circuitry 404A and the BT FEM circuitry 404B, embodiments include within their scope the sharing of one or more antennas as between the WLAN and BT FEMs, or the provision of more than one antenna connected to each of FEM 404A or 404B.

[0049] In some embodiments, the front-end module circuitry 404, the radio IC circuitry 406, and the baseband processing circuitry 408 may be provided on a single radio card, such as wireless radio card 402. In some other embodiments, the one or more antennas 401, the FEM circuitry 404, and the radio IC circuitry 406 may be provided on a single radio card. In some other embodiments, the radio IC circuitry 406 and the baseband processing circuitry 408 may be provided on a single chip or integrated circuit (IC), such as IC 412.

[0050] In some embodiments, the wireless radio card 402 may include a

WLAN radio card and may be configured for Wi-Fi communications, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect. In some of these embodiments, the radio architecture 400 may be configured to receive and transmit orthogonal frequency division multiplexed (OFDM) or orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) communication signals over a multicarrier communication channel. The OFDM or OFDMA signals may comprise a plurality of orthogonal subcarriers.

[0051] In some of these multicarrier embodiments, radio architecture 400 may be part of a Wi-Fi communication station (STA) such as a wireless access point (AP), a base station or a mobile device including a Wi-Fi device. In some of these embodiments, radio architecture 400 may be configured to transmit and receive signals in accordance with specific communication standards and/or protocols, such as any of the IEEE standards including, IEEE 802.1 ln-2009, IEEE 802.11-2012, IEEE 802.11-2016, IEEE 802.1 lac, and/or IEEE 802.11ax standards and/or proposed specifications for WLANs, although the scope of embodiments is not limited in this respect. Radio architecture 400 may also be suitable to transmit and/or receive communications in accordance with other techniques and standards. [0052] In some embodiments, the radio architecture 400 may be configured for high-efficiency (HE) Wi-Fi (HEW) communications in accordance with the IEEE 802.11 ax standard. In these embodiments, the radio architecture 400 may be configured to communicate in accordance with an OFDMA technique, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect.

[0053] In some other embodiments, the radio architecture 400 may be configured to transmit and receive signals transmitted using one or more other modulation techniques such as spread spectrum modulation (e.g., direct sequence code division multiple access (DS-CDMA) and/or frequency hopping code division multiple access (FH-CDMA)), time-division multiplexing (TDM) modulation, and/or frequency-division multiplexing (FDM) modulation, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect.

[0054] In some embodiments, as further shown in FIG. 4, the BT baseband circuitry 408B may be compliant with a Bluetooth (BT) connectivity standard such as Bluetooth, Bluetooth 4.0 or Bluetooth 5.0, or any other iteration of the Bluetooth Standard. In embodiments that include BT functionality as shown for example in FIG. 4, the radio architecture 400 may be configured to establish a BT synchronous connection oriented (SCO) link and/or a BT low energy (BT LE) link. In some of the embodiments that include functionality, the radio architecture 400 may be configured to establish an extended SCO (eSCO) link for BT communications, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect. In some of these embodiments that include a BT functionality, the radio architecture may be configured to engage in a BT Asynchronous Connection-Less (ACL) communications, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect. In some embodiments, as shown in FIG. 4, the functions of a BT radio card and WLAN radio card may be combined on a single wireless radio card, such as single wireless radio card 402, although embodiments are not so limited, and include within their scope discrete WLAN and BT radio cards.

[0055] In some embodiments, the radio-architecture 400 may include other radio cards, such as a cellular radio card configured for cellular (e.g., 3GPP such as LTE, LTE- Advanced or 5G communications). [0056] In some IEEE 802.11 embodiments, the radio architecture 400 may be configured for communication over various channel bandwidths including bandwidths having center frequencies of about 900 MHz, 2.4 GHz, 5 GHz, and bandwidths of about 1 MHz, 2 MHz, 2.5 MHz, 4 MHz, 5MHz, 8 MHz, 10 MHz, 16 MHz, 20 MHz, 40MHz, 80MHz (with contiguous bandwidths) or 80+80MHz (160MHz) (with non-contiguous bandwidths). In some embodiments, a 320 MHz channel bandwidth may be used. The scope of the embodiments is not limited with respect to the above center frequencies however.

[0057] FIG. 5 illustrates FEM circuitry 500 in accordance with some embodiments. The FEM circuitry 500 is one example of circuitry that may be suitable for use as the WLAN and/or BT FEM circuitry 404A/404B (FIG. 4), although other circuitry configurations may also be suitable.

[0058] In some embodiments, the FEM circuitry 500 may include a transmit/receive (TX/RX) switch 502 to switch between transmit mode and receive mode operation. The FEM circuitry 500 may include a receive signal path and a transmit signal path. The receive signal path of the FEM circuitry 500 may include a low-noise amplifier (LNA) 506 to amplify received RF signals 503 and provide the amplified received RF signals 507 as an output (e.g., to the radio IC circuitry 406 (FIG. 4)). The transmit signal path of the circuitry 500 may include a power amplifier (PA) to amplify input RF signals 509 (e.g., provided by the radio IC circuitry 406), and one or more filters 512, such as band-pass filters (BPFs), low-pass filters (LPFs) or other types of filters, to generate RF signals 515 for subsequent transmission (e.g., by one or more of the antennas 401 (FIG. 4)).

[0059] In some dual-mode embodiments for Wi-Fi communication, the

FEM circuitry 500 may be configured to operate in either the 2.4 GHz frequency spectrum or the 5 GHz frequency spectrum. In these embodiments, the receive signal path of the FEM circuitry 500 may include a receive signal path duplexer 504 to separate the signals from each spectrum as well as provide a separate

LNA 506 for each spectrum as shown. In these embodiments, the transmit signal path of the FEM circuitry 500 may also include a power amplifier 510 and a filter 512, such as a BPF, a LPF or another type of filter for each frequency spectrum and a transmit signal path duplexer 514 to provide the signals of one of the different spectrums onto a single transmit path for subsequent transmission by the one or more of the antennas 401 (FIG. 4). In some embodiments, BT communications may utilize the 2.4 GHZ signal paths and may utilize the same FEM circuitry 500 as the one used for WLAN communications.

[0060] FIG. 6 illustrates radio IC circuitry 600 in accordance with some embodiments. The radio IC circuitry 600 is one example of circuitry that may be suitable for use as the WLAN or BT radio IC circuitry 406A/406B (FIG. 4), although other circuitry configurations may also be suitable.

[0061] In some embodiments, the radio IC circuitry 600 may include a receive signal path and a transmit signal path. The receive signal path of the radio IC circuitry 600 may include at least mixer circuitry 602, such as, for example, down-conversion mixer circuitry, amplifier circuitry 606, and filter circuitry 608. The transmit signal path of the radio IC circuitry 600 may include at least filter circuitry 612 and mixer circuitry 614, such as, for example, up- conversion mixer circuitry. Radio IC circuitry 600 may also include synthesizer circuitry 604 for synthesizing a frequency 605 for use by the mixer circuitry 602 and the mixer circuitry 614. The mixer circuitry 602 and/or 614 may each, according to some embodiments, be configured to provide direct conversion functionality. The latter type of circuitry presents a much simpler architecture as compared with standard super-heterodyne mixer circuitries, and any flicker noise brought about by the same may be alleviated for example through the use of OFDM modulation. FIG. 6 illustrates only a simplified version of a radio IC circuitry, and may include, although not shown, embodiments where each of the depicted circuitries may include more than one component. For instance, mixer circuitry 620 and/or 614 may each include one or more mixers, and filter circuitries 608 and/or 612 may each include one or more filters, such as one or more BPFs and/or LPFs according to application needs. For example, when mixer circuitries are of the direct-conversion type, they may each include two or more mixers.

[0062] In some embodiments, mixer circuitry 602 may be configured to down-convert RF signals 507 received from the FEM circuitry 404 (FIG. 4) based on the synthesized frequency 605 provided by synthesizer circuitry 604. The amplifier circuitry 606 may be configured to amplify the down-converted signals and the filter circuitry 608 may include a LPF configured to remove unwanted signals from the down-converted signals to generate output baseband signals 607. Output baseband signals 607 may be provided to the baseband processing circuitry 408 (FIG. 4) for further processing. In some embodiments, the output baseband signals 607 may be zero-frequency baseband signals, although this is not a requirement. In some embodiments, mixer circuitry 602 may comprise passive mixers, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect.

[0063] In some embodiments, the mixer circuitry 614 may be configured to up-convert input baseband signals 61 1 based on the synthesized frequency 605 provided by the synthesizer circuitry 604 to generate RF output signals 509 for the FEM circuitry 404. The baseband signals 611 may be provided by the baseband processing circuitry 408 and may be filtered by filter circuitry 612. The filter circuitry 612 may include a LPF or a BPF, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect.

[0064] In some embodiments, the mixer circuitry 602 and the mixer circuitry 614 may each include two or more mixers and may be arranged for quadrature down-conversion and/or up-conversion respectively with the help of synthesizer 604. In some embodiments, the mixer circuitry 602 and the mixer circuitry 614 may each include two or more mixers each configured for image rejection (e.g., Hartley image rejection). In some embodiments, the mixer circuitry 602 and the mixer circuitry 614 may be arranged for direct down- conversion and/or direct up-conversion, respectively. In some embodiments, the mixer circuitry 602 and the mixer circuitry 614 may be configured for superheterodyne operation, although this is not a requirement.

[0065] Mixer circuitry 602 may comprise, according to one embodiment: quadrature passive mixers (e.g., for the in-phase (I) and quadrature phase (Q) paths). In such an embodiment, RF input signal 507 from FIG. 6 may be down- converted to provide I and Q baseband output signals to be sent to the baseband processor.

[0066] Quadrature passive mixers may be driven by zero and ninety- degree time-varying LO switching signals provided by a quadrature circuitry which may be configured to receive a LO frequency (fLo) from a local oscillator or a synthesizer, such as LO frequency 605 of synthesizer 604 (FIG. 6). In some embodiments, the LO frequency may be the carrier frequency, while in other embodiments, the LO frequency may be a fraction of the carrier frequency (e.g., one-half the carrier frequency, one-third the carrier frequency). In some embodiments, the zero and ninety-degree time-varying switching signals may be generated by the synthesizer, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect.

[0067] In some embodiments, the LO signals may differ in duty cycle (the percentage of one period in which the LO signal is high) and/or offset (the difference between start points of the period). In some embodiments, the LO signals may have a 25% duty cycle and a 50% offset. In some embodiments, each branch of the mixer circuitry (e.g., the in-phase (I) and quadrature phase (Q) path) may operate at a 25% duty cycle, which may result in a significant reduction is power consumption.

[0068] The RF input signal 507 (FIG. 5) may comprise a balanced signal, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect. The I and Q baseband output signals may be provided to low-nose amplifier, such as amplifier circuitry 606 (FIG. 6) or to filter circuitry 608 (FIG. 6).

[0069] In some embodiments, the output baseband signals 607 and the input baseband signals 611 may be analog baseband signals, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect. In some alternate

embodiments, the output baseband signals 607 and the input baseband signals 611 may be digital baseband signals. In these alternate embodiments, the radio IC circuitry may include analog-to-digital converter (ADC) and digital-to-analog converter (DAC) circuitry.

[0070] In some dual-mode embodiments, a separate radio IC circuitry may be provided for processing signals for each spectrum, or for other spectrums not mentioned here, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect.

[0071] In some embodiments, the synthesizer circuitry 604 may be a fractional -N synthesizer or a fractional N/N+1 synthesizer, although the scope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect as other types of frequency synthesizers may be suitable. For example, synthesizer circuitry 604 may be a delta-sigma synthesizer, a frequency multiplier, or a synthesizer comprising a phase-locked loop with a frequency divider. According to some embodiments, the synthesizer circuitry 604 may include digital synthesizer circuitry. An advantage of using a digital synthesizer circuitry is that, although it may still include some analog components, its footprint may be scaled down much more than the footprint of an analog synthesizer circuitry. In some embodiments, frequency input into synthesizer circuity 604 may be provided by a voltage controlled oscillator (VCO), although that is not a requirement. A divider control input may further be provided by either the baseband processing circuitry 408 (FIG. 4) or the application processor 411 (FIG. 4) depending on the desired output frequency 605. In some embodiments, a divider control input (e.g., N) may be determined from a look-up table (e.g., within a Wi-Fi card) based on a channel number and a channel center frequency as determined or indicated by the application processor 411.

[0072] In some embodiments, synthesizer circuitry 604 may be configured to generate a carrier frequency as the output frequency 605, while in other embodiments, the output frequency 605 may be a fraction of the carrier frequency (e.g., one-half the carrier frequency, one-third the carrier frequency). In some embodiments, the output frequency 605 may be a LO frequency (fLo).

[0073] FIG. 7 illustrates a functional block diagram of baseband processing circuitry 700 in accordance with some embodiments. The baseband processing circuitry 700 is one example of circuitry that may be suitable for use as the baseband processing circuitry 408 (FIG. 4), although other circuitry configurations may also be suitable. The baseband processing circuitry 700 may include a receive baseband processor (RX BBP) 702 for processing receive baseband signals 609 provided by the radio IC circuitry 406 (FIG. 4) and a transmit baseband processor (TX BBP) 704 for generating transmit baseband signals 611 for the radio IC circuitry 406. The baseband processing circuitry 700 may also include control logic 706 for coordinating the operations of the baseband processing circuitry 700.

[0074] In some embodiments (e.g., when analog baseband signals are exchanged between the baseband processing circuitry 700 and the radio IC circuitry 406), the baseband processing circuitry 700 may include ADC 710 to convert analog baseband signals received from the radio IC circuitry 406 to digital baseband signals for processing by the RX BBP 702. In these embodiments, the baseband processing circuitry 700 may also include digital to analog converter (DAC) 712 to convert digital baseband signals from the TX BBP 704 to analog baseband signals.

[0075] In some embodiments that communicate OFDM signals or

OFDMA signals, such as through baseband processor 408A, the transmit baseband processor 704 may be configured to generate OFDM or OFDMA signals as appropriate for transmission by performing an inverse fast Fourier transform (IFFT). The receive baseband processor 702 may be configured to process received OFDM signals or OFDMA signals by performing an FFT. In some embodiments, the receive baseband processor 702 may be configured to detect the presence of an OFDM signal or OFDMA signal by performing an autocorrelation, to detect a preamble, such as a short preamble, and by performing a cross-correlation, to detect a long preamble. The preambles may be part of a predetermined frame structure for Wi-Fi communication.

[0076] Referring back to FIG. 4, in some embodiments, the antennas 401

(FIG. 4) may each comprise one or more directional or omnidirectional antennas, including, for example, dipole antennas, monopole antennas, patch antennas, loop antennas, microstrip antennas or other types of antennas suitable for transmission of RF signals. In some multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) embodiments, the antennas may be effectively separated to take advantage of spatial diversity and the different channel characteristics that may result.

Antennas 401 may each include a set of phased-array antennas, although embodiments are not so limited.

[0077] Although the radio-architecture 400 is illustrated as having several separate functional elements, one or more of the functional elements may be combined and may be implemented by combinations of software-configured elements, such as processing elements including digital signal processors (DSPs), and/or other hardware elements. For example, some elements may comprise one or more microprocessors, DSPs, field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), application specific integrated circuits (ASICs), radio-frequency integrated circuits (RFICs) and combinations of various hardware and logic circuitry for performing at least the functions described herein. In some embodiments, the functional elements may refer to one or more processes operating on one or more processing elements.

[0078] In various embodiments, a communication protocol that crosses the physical (PHY) and the media access control (MAC) Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) network model layers may facilitate feedback from a large number of STAs in a shorter period of time than in the prior art. This cross-layer PHY-MAC protocol may include transmission of a null data packet (NDP) feedback report poll variant trigger frame from an AP to a group of STAs to elicit NDP feedback reports from addressed STAs. Transmission of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame may utilize both the MAC and the PHY layers, while the STAs' transmission of the NDP feedback reports may only utilize the PHY layer and not include any data packet or payload. Thus, the NDP feedback report may include only the PHY header and no MAC information. This cross-layer PHY-MAC protocol may reduce an amount of information transmitted by any one STA in response to a request for feedback from an AP to a single data bit or a few data bits.

[0079] For example, feedback for power efficiency (PS-Poll) and channel availability (collision avoidance) may only require a single bit, while other feedback, e.g., to specify a number of buffered bytes that a STA is waiting to transmit to the AP, may require two bits. The PHY may facilitate a single bit response to represent three states: a state with no response, a state with a bit received having a value of 0, and a state with a bit received having a value of 1. For example, a single bit resource request in an NDP feedback report may be for no resource request, a resource request for a small payload, and a resource request for a large payload, where the dividing line between a small payload and a large payload may be defined by a predetermined threshold parameter (e.g., resource request buffer threshold).

[0080] The reduced amount of information transmitted by the addressed

STAs in response to the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame may facilitate an AP collecting information from many STAs in a short period of time, thereby improving system and power efficiencies. For example, a short simultaneous resource request feedback may support a high number of STAs for efficient UL MU simultaneous scheduling in addition to piggybacked buffer information. This approach may also provide low and stable latencies for resource request feedback compared to possibly high and unpredictable latency with Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Collision Avoidance (CSMA-CA) in dense environments.

[0081] During an association process by which a STA initially becomes associated with an AP, the STA may be assigned an association identifier (ID) (AID) by the AP. Following the assignment of the AID, the STA may communicate with the AP. The AP may assign a resource block (RB) for each STA to use to provide feedback to the AP in response to a request from the AP. The RB may be a specific and unique orthogonal allocation on the High Efficiency - Long Training Field (HE-LTF) dimensions (e.g., a combination of a frequency (e.g., one of 26 tones or resource units (RUs) in frequency) and a P- matrix spreading code or spatial stream (SS)). In an embodiment, there may be 9 RUs and 4 SSs, and therefore 36 RBs allocated. In another embodiment, there may be 9 RUs and 8 SSs, and therefore 72 RBs allocated. Other combinations of RUs and SSs may also be provided.

[0082] The AP may transmit a trigger frame that makes a specific request of all STAs or a subset of all STAs associated with the AP. For example, the request may be for each STA addressed to indicate whether it has something to transmit as an upload (UL) or whether it is awake. Each addressed STA may respond by sending an UL MU NDP response within its assigned RB. The RB may be uniquely assigned to a STA within a range of STAs addressed as a group, or within all STAs associated with the AP. The AP may recognize a transmission within the RB uniquely associated with a particular STA as indicating a positive response to the request, and the absence of a transmission within the RB uniquely associated with the particular STA as indicating a negative response to the request. In this way, the AP may simply detect whether energy above some threshold level is present within the RB for the particular STA to determine that particular STAs response to the request. The AID of the particular STA that transmitted the energy detected within the RB may be determined by the AP due to the unique assignment of the RB within which the energy is detected to the particular STA that is uniquely assigned a particular AID. Following receipt of the feedback from each STA that provides feedback, the AP may send a multi-user block acknowledgment (M-BA) to acknowledge to the STA that the feedback was received by the AP.

[0083] FIG. 8 is a block diagram that illustrates the logical structure of a null data packet (NDP) feedback report poll variant trigger frame in accordance with some embodiments. The AP may specify, via the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame, information for each of the STAs that receive it to determine whether it is scheduled to respond, which of a plurality of possible resource blocks (RBs) it is allocated to transmit its response, the type of feedback that is requested, and how many bits are to be included in the response. This information may include a specification of a range of AIDs that are scheduled to respond to the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame, so that STAs having an AID within the range of scheduled AIDs may respond. In this way, a single RB can be allocated to different AIDs as long as the AIDs that are allocated a same RB are within different ranges of AIDs and therefore are not asked to respond to a same NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame. By defining a range of AIDs that are scheduled to respond to the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame, the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame may not identify specific AIDs for each NDP feedback report allocation, and may not include any per-user info field to identify the STAs individually, thereby significantly reducing overhead and improving efficiency.

[0084] In some embodiments, rather than a range of AIDs, a Group ID may be specified that identifies a group of AIDs, and the STA receiving the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame may determine whether its AID is within the group of AIDs specified by the Group ID, and an index of its AID within the group of AIDs according to parameters within the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame. The Group ID management may include a Membership Status Array field and/or an HE STA Position Array field. Each STA may be notified by the AP which group of STAs it is a member of and a position of the STA within that group.

[0085] The NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame may include a

Frame Control field that is 2 octets in length, a Duration field that is 2 octets in length, a Receiver Address (RA) field that is 6 octets in length, a Transmitter Address (TA) field that is 6 octets in length, a Common Info field that is of a variable length, a variable number of User Info fields that are each of variable length, a variable length Padding field, and a Frame Check Sequence (FCS) field that is 4 octets in length. Other field lengths may also be suitable. The RA field value may be set to a broadcast address. The TA field value may be set to an address of an AP or STA that transmits the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame.

[0086] FIG. 9 is a block diagram that illustrates the logical structure of the Common Info field of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame illustrated in FIG. 8 in accordance with some embodiments. In an embodiment, bits 0-3 include the Feedback type field, bits 4-15 include the Length field, bit 16 includes the Cascade Indication field, bit 17 includes the Carrier Sense (CS) Required field, bits 18-19 include the Bandwidth (BW) field, bits 20-21 include the Guard Interval (GI) and Long Training Field (LTF) Type field, bit 22 includes the MU-MIMO LTF Mode field, bits 23-25 include the Number of HE- LTF Symbols (NHELTF) field, bit 26 includes the Space-Time Block Code (STBC) field, bit 27 includes the Low Density Parity Check (LDPC) Extra Symbol field, bits 28-33 include the AP TX Power field, bits 34-36 include the Packet Extension field., bits 37-52 include the Spatial Reuse field, bit 53 includes the Doppler field, bits 54-62 include the High Efficiency - Signal Field A (HE-SIG-A) Reserved field, bit 63 includes a Reserved field, and a variable number of bits thereafter include a Trigger Dependent Common Info field. The format and content of the Trigger Dependent Common Info field may be dependent upon a type of trigger as specified in the Feedback Type field of the Common Info field. In some embodiments, the Trigger Dependent Common Info field may not be present. In some embodiments, the Trigger Dependent

Common Info field may be replaced with a Per User or Per STA Info field that is used as a common info field to specify a range of the AIDs addressed by the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame. In some embodiments, a single Per User or Per STA Info field may apply to all scheduled STAs in the specified range of AIDS and be used instead of a Trigger Dependent Common Info field. In an embodiment, the Per STA Info field may have subfields to specify values for AID Start, Feedback Size, Scheduling Type, Feedback Type, Target RSSI, and Number of Users per Set of Tones. The Number of Users per Set of Tones field may define a number of users or STAs that are multiplexed with P-matrix codes on a same set of tones in the same RU. The NHELTF field of the Common Info field illustrated in FIG. 9 may indicate the number of HE- LTF symbols present in the NDP feedback report response, e.g., 2 for two HE- LTF symbols. The Feedback type field may be encoded with a value (e.g., 5, or 7) that specifies the trigger type as NDP Feedback Report Poll. The BW field may be encoded to specify the bandwidth of the NDP feedback report response. The STBC, LDPC Extra Symbol, Packet Extension, and Doppler fields may be reserved. The GI and LTF Type field may be set to a value of 2.

[0087] FIG. 10 is a block diagram that illustrates the logical structure of the Trigger Dependent Common Info field of the Common Info field illustrated in FIG. 9, for the NDP feedback report poll variant, in accordance with some embodiments. In an embodiment, at the beginning of the Trigger Dependent

Common Info field, which begins at bit 64 of the Common Info field illustrated in FIG. 9, the AID Start field includes 11 bits, followed by the RU Allocation Offset field that includes 6 bits, the Target Received Signal Strength Indication (RSSI) field that includes 7 bits, the Feedback Type field that includes 4 bits, and a Reserved field that includes 4 bits. The AID Start field may define the first AID of the range of AIDs scheduled to respond to the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame. The RU Allocation Offset field may be used by the HE non-AP STAs that are scheduled to respond to the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame to define the RU allocation of the solicited NDP feedback report response. The Target RSSI field may indicate the target received signal power of the NDP Feedback Report Response for all scheduled STAs. The value for the Target RSSI field may indicate a number of dBs of received signal power, e.g., the resolution of the Target RSSI field may be 1 dB. The NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame may not include a User Info field.

[0088] Using the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame and its subfields described above with reference to FIGS. 8-10, an HE AP may collect short feedback responses from a higher number of HE STAs in an efficient manner relative to the prior art. An HE AP may send an NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame to solicit an NDP Feedback Report Response from many STAs that are identified by a range of scheduled AIDs in the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame. The NDP Feedback Report Response from an HE non-AP STA may be an HE UL trigger-based Physical (PHY) Layer Convergence Procedure (PLCP) Protocol Data Unit (PPDU) without a data payload, where the feedback information and the identification of the STA is embedded in the NDP feedback allocation that is assigned to the STA.

[0089] A STA may not transmit an NDP Feedback Report Response unless it is explicitly enabled by an AP, e.g., by having an AID that is included within the range of AIDs invited to respond to a NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame. An inter-frame space (e.g., a period of time) between a PPDU that contains an NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame and a NDP Feedback Report Response may be referred to as short inter-frame space (SIFS). A STA may commence transmission of an NDP Feedback Report Response at a SIFS time boundary after the end of a received PPDU, when the following conditions are met:

• The received PPDU contains an NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame

• The STA is scheduled by the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame.

[0090] The STA may be scheduled to respond to the NDP Feedback

Report Poll Variant Trigger frame if its AID is superior or equal to AID Start and lower than AID Start + NAIDS, where NAIDS is the number of STAs scheduled to respond to the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame. Thus, the range of AIDS scheduled may be expressed as AID Start to AID Start + NAIDS - 1. In various embodiments, NAIDS may be up to and including 100 STAs. In various embodiments, NAIDS may be more than 100 STAs. The value of AID Start may be determined from the AID Start subfield in the eliciting NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame as illustrated in FIG. 10. In some embodiments, the value of NAIDs may be calculated by the following equation, using the BW subfield and the Number of HE-LTF Symbols (NHELTF) subfield:

if BW=0 or 1 : NAIDS=9x(BW+l)xNHELTF;

if BW=2: NAIDS=37 xNHELTF; (Eq. 1) if BW=3: NAIDS=37x2xNHELTF.

[0091] In some embodiments, the value of NAIDs may be calculated by the following equation, using the BW subfield, a Number of Users per Set of Tones field, and a Feedback Size field of the eliciting of the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame:

if BW=0 or 1 : NAIDS=18 x(BW+l)x(Number of Users per Set of Tones) /(Feedback Size+1);

if BW=2: NAIDS=72x(Number of Users per Set of Tones)

/(Feedback Size+1); (Eq. 2) if BW=3: NAIDS=144x(Number of Users per Set of Tones)

/(Feedback Size+1).

[0092] In various embodiments, NAIDS may be specified within a field of the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame. In various

embodiments, NAIDS may be computed from an AID End field within the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame in conjunction with the AID Start field.

[0093] A STA that is scheduled in the NDP Feedback Report Poll

Variant Trigger frame may send an NDP Feedback Report Response when responding positively to the request included in the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame, and may not send a response at all to indicate a negative response to the request included in the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame. As such, the AP that transmits the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame may interpret the presence of an NDP Feedback Report Response associated with the AID of a STA within the range of STAs scheduled to respond to the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame as a positive response to the request represented by the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant

Trigger frame, and the absence of an NDP Feedback Report Response associated with the AID of a STA within the range of STAs scheduled to respond to the

NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame as a negative response to the request represented by the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame. When the Feedback Type field of the Trigger Dependent Common Info field of the Common Info field of the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame as illustrated in FIGS. 8-10 is set to represent a Resource Request, e.g., has a value of 1 to represent a Resource Request, a STA that is scheduled may send an NDP Feedback Report Response to signal to the AP that transmitted that eliciting NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame that the STA has packets to be transmitted in its queue(s) and requests to be triggered in UL MU mode to transmit the packets stored in its queue(s), for example, to the AP.

[0094] The STA that is scheduled may derive parameters for transmitting the NDP Feedback Report Response from data contained within the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame in combination with its assigned AID. Each AID may have a unique combination of RU allocation (e.g., out of 242 potential RU allocations), tone set within each RU allocation, and SS allocation.

[0095] In an embodiment, for each 20 MHz of bandwidth (BW), 242 potential RU allocations may be divided into 18 sets of tones. Each tone set may include 12 tones equally distributed over the RU (e.g., with two tones adjacent to each other). An RB allocation may include specification of one tone set and one SS, and one or more RB allocations may be assigned to one STA so that each STA within a range of STAs, and/or within all STAs associated with a single AP, has one or more RB allocations that are assigned to the STA and not to other STAs within the range of STAs, and/or within all STAs associated with the single AP. In some embodiments, a 20 MHz channel may multiplex 18 RU allocations, with two STAs multiplexed in time and/or code via spatial streams, to facilitate 36 STAs to be addressed by and respond to an NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame. The following table illustrates an exemplary maximum number of STAs that may simultaneously send a UL short feedback to an AP according to RB allocations based on a number of tones (18 per 20 MHz of BW), a number of SSs (1, 2, or 4), and a number of bits in the response (1 or 2). As used herein, an RB for two bits in the response may be represented by a single RU combined with two SSs, one SS for each of the two bits of the response. Table 1

In a Simple mode, there may be no change to the present version of the IEEE 802.1 lax PHY standard specification pertaining to allocation of an RU and a single STS index. In the Simple mode, an NDP Feedback Report Response may include an HE NDP Feedback Report PPDU, in which there is no data or packet extension fields. The HE NDP Feedback Report PPDU may use the HE Trigger-Based PPDU format without a Data field, and may have a Packet Extension field that is 4 microseconds in duration. A STA transmitting an NDP Feedback Report Response elicited by an NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame, may set a TXVECTOR parameter for transmitting an HE Trigger Based PPDU as described in subsection 25.5.2.3 of the draft 802.1 lax specification (IEEE P802.11ax™/D0.5, September 2016), except for the following parameters:

The RU allocation parameter may be set with the following equation according to the values of the AID Start field, the Number of HE-LTF Symbols field, the RU Allocation Offset field, and the BW field of the eliciting NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame:

• if BW= 0 or 1 : RU allocation = (floor((AID-AIDstart) /

(Number of HE-LTF Symbols)) + RUoffset ) mod (9 ^χ

(BW+1)); (Eq. 3)

• if BW= 2: RU allocation = (floor((AID-AIDstart) / (Number

of HE-LTF Symbols)) + RUoffset ) mod (37);

• if BW= 3 and AID-AIDstart < ((37) ^χ (Number of HE-LTF

Symbols)): RU allocation = (floor((AID-AIDstart) / (Number of HE-LTF Symbols)) + RUoffset) mod (37);

• if BW= 3 and AID-AIDstart > ((37) ^χ (Number of HE-LTF

Symbols)): RU allocation = 128 + (floor((AID-AIDstart) / (Number of HE-LTF Symbols)) + RUoffset) mod (37).

The Number of Space-Time-Streams Per User (NUM_STS) parameter may be set to 1. • The Starting Index of Spatial Stream for STA (STARTING STS NUM) parameter may be set with the following equation according to the values of the AID Start field and of the Number of HE-LTF Symbols field in the Common Info field of the eliciting NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame:

• STARTING STS NUM = (AID-AIDstart) mod (Number of

HE-LTF Symbols). (Eq. 4)

[0097] In a mode having more than one response per STA, there may also be no change to the present IEEE 802.1 lax PHY specification pertaining to allocation of an RU and a single STS index. In this mode, one field may be added to the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame to include a Number of Allocations Per User or NUM_STS per user. A STA transmitting an NDP Feedback Report Response elicited by an NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame, may set a TXVECTOR parameter (e.g., parameters exchanged between MAC and PHY when transmitting a PPDU) for transmitting an HE Trigger Based PPDU as described in subsection 25.5.2.3 of the present 802.1 lax specification, except for the following parameters:

• The RU allocation parameter may be set with the following equation according to the values of the AID Start field, the Number of HE-LTF Symbols field, the RU Allocation Offset field, and the BW field of the eliciting NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame:

• if BW= 0 or 1 : RU allocation = (floor((AID-AIDstart) /

(Number of HE-LTF Symbols) / (NUM_STS)) + RUoffset ) mod (9 x (BW+1)); (Eq. 5) · if BW= 2: Reallocation = (floor((AID-AIDstart) / (Number

of HE-LTF Symbols) / (NUM_STS)) + RUoffset ) mod (37);

• if BW= 3 and AID-AIDstart < ((37) ^χ (Number of HE-LTF

Symbols)): RU allocation = (floor((AID-AIDstart) / (Number of HE-LTF Symbols) / (NUM_STS)) + RUoffset) mod (37); · if BW= 3 and AID-AIDstart > ((37) ^χ (Number of HE-LTF

Symbols)): RU allocation = 128 + (floor((AID-AIDstart) / (Number of HE-LTF Symbols) / (NUM_STS)) + RUoffset) mod (37).

• The NUM_STS parameter may be set to the value of NUM_STS

provided in the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame. • The STARTING STS NUM parameter may be set with the following equation according to the values of the AID Start field and of the

Number of HE-LTF Symbols field in the Common Info field of the eliciting NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame:

· STARTING STS NUM = ((AID-AIDstart) ^χ (NUM STS))

mod (Number of HE-LTF Symbols). (Eq. 6)

[0098] In a mode that differs from the IEEE 802.11 ax PHY specification in that it does not use P-matrix codes for the RBs and where the allocations are instead based on an RU allocation and an HE-LTF symbol allocation (e.g., number of HE-LTF symbols per user and starting HE-LTF symbol), the allocations may be set according to the following parameters:

• if BW= 0 or 1 : RU allocation = (floor((AID-AIDstart) /

(Number of HE-LTF Symbols) / (NUM_HE_LTF_per_user)) + RUoffset ) mod (9 ^χ (BW+1)); (Eq. 7)

• if BW= 2: RU allocation = (floor((AID-AIDstart) / (Number

of HE-LTF Symbols) / (NUM_HE_LTF_per_user)) +

RUoffset ) mod (37);

• if BW= 3 and AID-AIDstart < ((37) ^χ (Number of HE-LTF

Symbols)): RU allocation = (floor((AID-AIDstart) / (Number of HE-LTF Symbols) / (NUM_HE_LTF_per_user)) +

RUoffset) mod (37);

• if BW= 3 and AID-AIDstart > ((37) ^χ (Number of HE-LTF

Symbols)): RU allocation = 128 + (floor((AID-AIDstart) / (Number of HE-LTF Symbols) / (NUM_HE_LTF_per_user)) + RUoffset) mod (37).

- The NUM_STS parameter may be set to 1.

• The STARTING STS NUM parameter may be set to 1.

• The NUM_HE_LTF_per_user parameter may be set to a value of a

NUM_HE_LTF_symbols_per_user field in the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame.

- The STARTING HE LTF SYMBOL may be defined by the following equation according to the values of the AID Start field and of the Number of HE-LTF Symbols field in the Common Info field of the eliciting NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame:

• STARTING STS NUM = ((AID-AIDstart) ^χ

(NUM_HE_LTF_per_user)) mod (Number of HE-LTF

Symbols). (Eq. 8)

[0099] In another mode, a STA transmitting an NDP Feedback Report

Response in response to a trigger frame may set the TXVECTOR parameter as for transmitting an HE trigger-based PPDU as described in subsection 27.5.2.3, of the current IEEE 802.1 lax specification, except for the following parameters:

· The RU allocati on parameter may be set with the following equation according to the values of the AID Start field, a Number of Users per Set of Tones field, a Symbol Size field, and the BW field of the eliciting NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame:

• if BW= 0, 1 , or 2: Reallocation = 61 + (floor((AID- AIDstart) ^χ (Symbol Size + 1) / (18))) mod ((BW+1) ^χ

(BW+1)); (Eq. 9)

• if BW= 3 : Reallocation = 61 + (floor(( AID- AIDstart) ^χ

(Symbol Size + 1) / (18))) mod (4) + 128 ^χ (floor((AID- AIDstart) ^χ (Symbol Size + 1) / (72))) mod (2);

· The RU TONE SET parameter may be set with the following equation according to the values of the AID Start field and the Symbol Size field of the eliciting NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame:

• RU TONE SET = (AID-AIDstart) mod 18/(Symbol Size +

1)); (Eq. 10) · The NUM_STS parameter may be set to 1.

• The STARTING STS NUM parameter may be set according to the

following equation, with the values of the AIDstart field, the Number of Users per Set of Tones field, the BW field, and the Symbol Size field of the eliciting NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame:

· If BW=0, 1 , or 2: STARTING STS NUM = (floor((AID-

AIDstart) ^χ (Symbol Size + 1)/18/(BW+1)/(BW+1))); • If BW=3 : STARTING STS NUM = (floor((AID-AIDstart) ^χ

(Symbol Size + 1)/144)). (Eq. 11)

• A MCS parameter may be set to 0.

• A DCM parameter may be set to 0.

· An FEC CODING parameter may be set to 0.

• A TXPWR LEVEL INDEX parameter may be set to a value based on the Transmit Power Control for HE Trigger-based PPDU and based on a value of the AP TX Power subfield and the Target RSSI subfield in the Common Info field of the eliciting Trigger frame.

[00100] A STA transmitting an NDP Feedback Report Response according to the above mode may modulate the assigned tones as described following. When the Symbol Size field of the NDP Feedback Report Poll

Variant Trigger frame is set to 0 for a single-bit feedback, each STA that is scheduled for providing a feedback may be assigned an RU allocation, a

STARTING STS NUM and an RU TONE SET of 12 tones to transmit a bit bO. Its set of 12 tones may be divided into 2 groups of 6 tones:

• If bO = 1, the STA may send energy on the first group of 6 tones and be quiet on the second group of tones, on its assigned RU_TONE_SET of 12 tones on its assigned RU_allocation.

· If bO = 0, the STA may send energy on the second group of 6 tones and be quiet on the first group of tones, on its assigned RU TONE SET of 12 tones on its assigned RU_allocation.

[00101] Following transmission from an AP of an NDP Feedback Report

Poll Variant Trigger frame, many STAs may simultaneously send NDP

Feedback Report Responses to the AP. All the NDP Feedback Report Responses from different STAs may be orthogonal as a unique combination of Set of Tones, Reallocation, and STARTING STS NUM associated with a STA's AID.

[00102] Based on an RxVECTOR NDP REPORT, which provides the vector of the detected bits for each P-matrix code on each set of tones of each RU, the AP may derive the list of AIDs for which an NDP Feedback Report Response was sent, and their corresponding responses. The AP may not send any acknowledgements in response to the reception of an NDP Feedback Report Response from a STA.

[00103] In an embodiment, an AP may transmit an NDP Feedback

Report Poll Variant Trigger frame with a Type subfield of the Common Info field set to a value of 0 to indicate a Resource Request and a Scheduling Type subfield also set to 0. In response, a STA that is scheduled may transmit an NDP Feedback Report Response to indicate to the AP that the STA has packets in its queues and would like to be triggered in UL MU mode to transmit the packets to the AP

[00104] In an embodiment, if the Symbol Size field of the NDP Feedback

Report Poll Variant Trigger frame is set to 0 to indicate a single-bit feedback, each STA that is scheduled may be assigned an RU_TONE_SET (e.g., of 12 tones) and a STARTING STS NUM to transmit a bit bO. The bit bO may indicate whether the resource request with buffered bytes is for transmission of a quantity of bytes between 1 and a value of a Resource Request Buffer Threshold field in the eliciting NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame, or a greater number of bytes.

[00105] In an embodiment, an NDP Report may be included in an

RXVECTOR parameter NDP REPORT when receiving an NDP Feedback Report Response from a STA.

[00106] In an embodiment, a pilot sequence used in each RB allocation may differ from those used for an HE trigger-based PPDU. The pilot sequence may be specifically configured to include only odd or only even tones in frequency combined with modulation using a 2xHE-LTF. The MAC protocol may not be modified relative to the IEEE 802.1 lax standard when used with this embodiment.

[00107] FIG. 11 is a block diagram that illustrates a method 1100 of a wireless STA in accordance with some embodiments. The wireless STA may include memory and processing circuitry coupled to the memory. The processing circuitry may be configured to perform the method 1100. The STA and the AP may each include one from the following group: an Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) 802.1 lax access point, an IEEE 802.1 lax station, an IEEE 802.11 station, and an IEEE 802.11 access point. The wireless STA may include transceiver circuitry coupled to the processing circuitry. The wireless STA may include one or more antennas coupled to the transceiver circuitry.

[00108] In an operation 1110, the processing circuitry may decode an NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame received from an AP. The NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame may include an AID start field, a BW field, a Feedback Size field, a Number of Users Per Set of Tones field, and/or an NHELTF field, among other fields as discussed elsewhere herein with reference to FIGS. 8-10.

[00109] In an operation 1120, the processing circuitry may determine whether an AID of the STA is within the range of scheduled AIDs associated with STAs scheduled to respond to the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame according to at least an AID Start field of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame, for example, by determining whether the STA's AID is equal or greater than the AID start value and lower than an AID start value added to an NAIDS value as described elsewhere herein.

[00110] In an operation 1130, when the processing circuitry determines that the AID of the STA is within the range of scheduled AIDs, the processing circuitry may encode, for transmission to the AP, an NDP Feedback Report Response in response to a request of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame. The NDP Feedback Report Response may be a high efficiency (HE) uplink (UL) trigger-based Physical (PHY) Layer Convergence Procedure (PLCP) Protocol Data Unit (PPDU) without a data payload.

[00111] In an operation 1140, the processing circuitry may determine an RB assigned to the STA by the AP according to the AID of the STA and the trigger frame. The RB may be uniquely assigned to the STA among all the STAs having AIDs within the scheduled range of AIDs, or among all STAs associated with the AP. Each combination of RU and SS may be assigned to a maximum of one STA among the STAs scheduled to respond to the request or among all STAs associated with the AP. The RB may be an orthogonal allocation on HE- LTF dimensions represented by an RU or transmission frequency together with a spatial stream (SS) or P-matrix spreading code. The processing circuitry may determine the RB at least in part by an RU allocation offset field within the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant trigger frame. In an embodiment, the NDP Feedback Report Response may be transmitted at a short interframe space (SIFS) time boundary after an end of a received PPDU that includes the trigger frame.

[00112] The NDP feedback report response may include a single bit. The single bit may be represented by the presence or absence of transmission within the RB. The processing circuitry may refrain from encoding the NDP feedback report response according to a value of the NDP feedback report response when the request in the trigger frame is regarding a type of the NDP feedback and/or when the AID of the STA is not within the range of scheduled AIDs. For example, the processing circuitry may control transceiver circuitry to transmit the NDP Feedback Report Response when the response is positive, and refrain from transmitting the NDP Feedback Report Response when the response is negative.

[00113] FIG. 12 is a block diagram that illustrates a method 1200 of a wireless AP in accordance with some embodiments. The wireless AP may include memory and processing circuitry coupled to the memory. The processing circuitry may be configured to perform the method 1200. The STA and the AP may each include one from the following group: an Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) 802.1 lax access point, an IEEE 802.1 lax station, an IEEE 802.11 station, and an IEEE 802.11 access point. The wireless AP may include transceiver circuitry coupled to the processing circuitry. The wireless AP may include one or more antennas coupled to the transceiver circuitry.

[00114] In an operation 1210, the processing circuitry may encode, for transmission to one or more STAs, an NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame with a request and a range of AIDs associated with STAs scheduled to respond to the request. The processing circuitry may encode the trigger frame to specify the range of scheduled AIDs at least in part by an AID Start value encoded within an AID Start field within the NDP Feedback Report Poll Variant Trigger frame. The NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame may include an AID Start field, a BW field, a Feedback Size field, a Number of Users Per Set of Tones field, and/or an NHELTF field, among other fields as discussed elsewhere herein with reference to FIGS. 8-10. [00115] In an operation 1220, the processing circuitry may receive, from a

STA having an AID within the range of AIDs, an NDP Feedback Report Response comprising a response to the request. The NDP Feedback Report Response may be received within an RB assigned to the STA by the AP according to the AID of the STA and the trigger frame. The RB may be an orthogonal allocation on HE-LTF dimensions represented by an RU or transmission frequency and an SS or P-matrix spreading code. The NDP Feedback Report Response may be received using a receiver antenna and receiver circuitry coupled to the receiver antenna. The RB may be uniquely assigned to the STA among all STAs having AIDs within the scheduled range of AIDs, or among all STAs associated with the AP, by each combination of RU and SS being assigned to a maximum of one STA among the STAs scheduled to respond to the request or among all STAs associated with the AP. The receiver circuitry may communicate the received data corresponding to the NDP

Feedback Report Response to the processing circuitry, for example, via a data bus or electronic transmission line.

[00116] In an operation 1230, the processing circuitry may determine the response to the request from the NDP Feedback Report Response. The NDP feedback report response may be determined to include a single bit represented by the presence or absence of transmission within the RB, e.g., when the request in the trigger frame is regarding a type of the NDP feedback. For example, when there is no transmission detected within the RB, the NDP feedback report response may be determined to be negative, and when there is a transmission detected within the RB, the NDP feedback report response may be determined to be positive. In an embodiment, the NDP feedback report response may be decoded from a high efficiency (HE) uplink (UL) trigger-based physical layer (PHY) Layer Convergence Procedure (PLCP) Protocol Data Unit (PPDU) without a data payload.

[00117] In an operation 1240, the processing circuitry may determine the AID of the STA from the NDP feedback report response. For example, the AID of the particular STA that transmitted the energy detected within the RB may be determined by the AP due to the unique assignment of the RB within which the energy is detected to the particular STA that is uniquely assigned a particular AID.

[00118] It should be noted that embodiments are not limited to the operations, phases, frames, signals and/or other elements shown in the FIGS. 1- 12. Some embodiments may not necessarily include all operations, phases, frames, signals and/or other elements shown. Some embodiments may include one or more additional operations, phases, frames, signals and/or other elements. One or more operations may be optional, in some embodiments.

[00120] Example 1 is an apparatus of a wireless station (STA), the apparatus comprising memory; and processing circuitry coupled to the memory, the processing circuity configured to: decode a null data packet (NDP) feedback report poll variant trigger frame received from an access point (AP); determine whether an association identifier (AID) of the STA is within a range of AIDs associated with STAs scheduled to respond to the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame according to at least an AID Start field of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame; and when the AID of the STA is within the range of scheduled AIDs: encode, for transmission to the AP, an NDP feedback report response in response to a request of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame; and determine a resource block (RB) assigned to the STA by the AP according to the AID of the STA and the trigger frame, the RB being represented by a resource unit (RU) together with a spatial stream (SS).

[00121] In Example 2, the subject matter of Example 1 optionally includes wherein when the AID of the STA is not within the range of scheduled AIDs, the processing circuitry is configured to refrain from encoding an NDP feedback report response.

[00122] In Example 3, the subject matter of Example 2 optionally includes wherein the NDP feedback report response comprises a single bit represented by the presence or absence of transmission within the RB.

[00123] In Example 4, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 2-3 optionally include wherein the SS includes a P-matrix time-domain spreading code.

[00124] In Example 5, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 2-4 optionally include wherein the NDP feedback report response is a high efficiency (HE) uplink (UL) trigger-based Physical (PHY) Layer Convergence Procedure (PLCP) Protocol Data Unit (PPDU) without a data payload.

[00125] In Example 6, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 2-5 optionally include wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to control transceiver circuitry to transmit the NDP feedback report response at a short interframe space (SIFS) time boundary after an end of a received PPDU that included the trigger frame.

[00126] In Example 7, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 2-6 optionally include wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to control transceiver circuitry to refrain from transmitting the NDP feedback report response according to a value of the NDP feedback report response when the request in the trigger frame is regarding a type of the NDP feedback.

[00127] In Example 8, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 2-7 optionally include wherein the STA determines whether the AID assigned to the STA is within the range of scheduled AIDs specified within the trigger frame by determining whether the STA's AID is equal or greater than the AID start value and lower than an AID start value added to a number of scheduled AIDS (NAIDS) value calculated from a bandwidth (BW) value decoded from the BW field, a Feedback Size value decoded from the Feedback Size field, and a Number of Users Per Set of Tones value decoded from a Number of Users Per Set of Tones field of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame according to the following equation: if BW=0 or 1 : NAIDS =

18 x(BW+l) (Number of Users per Set of Tones)/(Feedback Size+1); if BW=2: NAIDS = 72x(Number of Users per Set of Tones)/(Feedback Size+1); if BW=3: NAIDS = 144x(Number of Users per Set of Tones)/(Feedback Size+1).

[00128] In Example 9, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 2-8 optionally include wherein the RB is determined at least in part by an RU allocation offset field within the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame.

[00129] In Example 10, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 2- 9 optionally include wherein the STA and the AP each comprise one from the following group: an Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) 802.1 lax access point, an IEEE 802.1 lax station, an IEEE 802.11 station, and an IEEE 802.11 access point. [00130] In Example 11, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 2- 10 optionally include transceiver circuitry coupled to the processing circuitry.

[00131] In Example 12, the subject matter of Example 11 optionally includes one or more antennas coupled to the transceiver circuitry.

[00132] Example 13 is an apparatus of a wireless access point (AP), the apparatus comprising memory; and processing circuitry coupled to the memory, the processing circuity configured to: encode, for transmission to one or more STAs, a null data packet (NDP) feedback report poll variant trigger frame with a request and a range of association identifiers (AIDs) associated with wireless stations (STAs) scheduled to respond to the request based on at least an AID start field; receive, from a STA having an AID within the range of AIDs, an NDP feedback report response comprising a response to the request within a resource block (RB) assigned to the STA by the AP according to the AID of the STA and the trigger frame, the RB being represented by a resource unit (RU) and a spatial stream (SS); and determine the response to the request from the NDP feedback report response.

[00133] In Example 14, the subject matter of Example 13 optionally includes wherein the RB is uniquely assigned to the STA among all STAs within the range of scheduled STAs by each combination of RU and SS being assigned to a maximum of one STA among the STAs scheduled to respond to the request.

[00134] In Example 15, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 13-14 optionally include wherein the processing circuity is further configured to determine the AID of the STA from the NDP feedback report response.

[00135] In Example 16, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 13-15 optionally include wherein the NDP feedback report response is decoded from a high efficiency (HE) uplink (UL) trigger-based physical layer (PHY) Layer Convergence Procedure (PLCP) Protocol Data Unit (PPDU) without a data payload.

[00136] In Example 17, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 13-16 optionally include wherein the AP encodes a number of scheduled AIDs (NAIDS) value in the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame as a bandwidth (BW) value encoded in the BW field, a Feedback Size value encoded in the Feedback Size field, and a Number of Users Per Set of Tones value encoded in a Number of Users Per Set of Tones field of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame according to the following equation: if BW= 0 or 1 : NAIDS = 18x(BW+l) (Number of Users per Set of Tones)/(Feedback Size+1); if BW=2: NAIDS = 72x(Number of Users per Set of Tones)/(Feedback Size+1); if BW=3: NAIDS = 144x(Number of Users per Set of Tones)/(Feedback Size+1).

[00137] Example 18 is a method performed by a wireless station (STA), the method comprising: decoding a null data packet (NDP) feedback report poll variant trigger frame received from an access point (AP); determining whether an association identifier (AID) of the STA is within a range of AIDs associated with STAs scheduled to respond to the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame according to at least an AID Start field of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame; and when the AID of the STA is within the range of scheduled AIDs: encoding, for transmission to the AP, an NDP feedback report response in response to a request of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame; and determining a resource block (RB) assigned to the STA by the AP according to the AID of the STA and the trigger frame, the RB being represented by a resource unit (RU) together with a spatial stream (SS).

[00138] In Example 19, the subject matter of Example 18 optionally includes wherein the RB is uniquely assigned to the STA among the STAs scheduled to respond to the request by each combination of RU and SS being assigned to a maximum of one STA among the STAs scheduled to respond to the request.

[00139] Example 20 is a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium that stores instructions for execution by one or more processors of a wireless access point (AP), to perform operations to configure the one or more processors to: encode, for transmission to one or more STAs, a null data packet (NDP) feedback report poll variant trigger frame with a request and a range of association identifiers (AIDs) associated with wireless stations (STAs) scheduled to respond to the request based on at least an AID start field; receive, from a STA having an AID within the range of AIDs, an NDP feedback report response comprising a response to the request within a resource block (RB) assigned to the STA by the AP according to the AID of the STA and the trigger frame, the RB being represented by a resource unit (RU) and a spatial stream (SS); and determine the response to the request from the NDP feedback report response.

[00140] In Example 21, the subject matter of Example 20 optionally includes wherein the RB is uniquely assigned to the STA among all STAs within the range of scheduled STAs.

[00141] In Example 22, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 20-21 optionally include wherein the medium further stores instructions for execution by the one or more processors of the AP to perform operations to determine the AID of the STA from the NDP feedback report response.

[00142] In Example 23, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 20-22 optionally include wherein the AP encodes a number of scheduled AIDs (NAIDS) value in the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame as a bandwidth (BW) value encoded in the BW field, a Feedback Size value encoded in the Feedback Size field, and a Number of Users Per Set of Tones value encoded in a Number of Users Per Set of Tones field of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame according to the following equation: if BW= 0 or 1 : NAIDS = 18x(BW+l) (Number of Users per Set of Tones)/(Feedback Size+1); if BW=2: NAIDS = 72x(Number of Users per Set of Tones)/(Feedback Size+1); if BW=3: NAIDS = 144x(Number of Users per Set of Tones)/(Feedback Size+1).

[00143] In Example 24, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 20-23 optionally include wherein the NDP feedback report response comprises a single bit represented by the presence or absence of transmission detected within the RB.

[00144] In Example 25, the subject matter of any one or more of Examples 20-24 optionally include wherein the RB is assigned at least in part by an RU allocation offset field within the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame.

[00145] As used herein, the term "circuitry" may refer to, be part of, or include an Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC), an electronic circuit, a processor (shared, dedicated, or group), and/or memory (shared, dedicated, or group) that execute one or more software or firmware programs, a combinational logic circuit, and/or other suitable hardware components that provide the described functionality. In some embodiments, the circuitry may be implemented in, or functions associated with the circuitry may be implemented by, one or more software or firmware modules. In some embodiments, circuitry may include logic, at least partially operable in hardware. Embodiments described herein may be implemented into a system using any suitably configured hardware and/or software.

[00146] Various embodiments may be implemented fully or partially in software and/or firmware. This software and/or firmware may take the form of instructions contained in or on a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium. Those instructions may then be read and executed by one or more processors to enable performance of the operations described herein. The instructions may be in any suitable form, such as but not limited to source code, compiled code, interpreted code, executable code, static code, dynamic code, and the like. Such a computer-readable medium may include any tangible non- transitory medium for storing information in a form readable by one or more computers, such as but not limited to read only memory (ROM); random access memory (RAM); magnetic disk storage media; optical storage media; flash memory, etc.

[00147] The Abstract is provided to allow the reader to ascertain the nature and gist of the technical disclosure. It is submitted with the understanding that it will not be used to limit or interpret the scope or meaning of the claims. The following claims are hereby incorporated into the detailed description, with each claim standing on its own as a separate embodiment.

Claims

What is claimed is: 1. An apparatus of a wireless station (STA), the apparatus comprising memory; and processing circuitry coupled to the memory, the processing circuity configured to:

decode a null data packet (NDP) feedback report poll variant trigger frame received from an access point (AP);

determine whether an association identifier (AID) of the STA is within a range of AIDs associated with STAs scheduled to respond to the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame according to at least an AID Start field of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame; and

when the AID of the STA is within the range of scheduled AIDs:

encode, for transmission to the AP, an NDP feedback report response in response to a request of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame; and

determine a resource block (RB) assigned to the STA by the AP according to the AID of the STA and the trigger frame, the RB being represented by a resource unit (RU) together with a spatial stream (SS).

2. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein when the AID of the STA is not within the range of scheduled AIDs, the processing circuitry is configured to refrain from encoding an NDP feedback report response.

3. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the NDP feedback report response comprises a single bit represented by the presence or absence of transmission within the RB.

4. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the SS includes a P-matrix time- domain spreading code.

5. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the NDP feedback report response is a high efficiency (HE) uplink (UL) trigger-based Physical (PHY) Layer

Convergence Procedure (PLCP) Protocol Data Unit (PPDU) without a data payload.

6. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to control transceiver circuitry to transmit the NDP feedback report response at a short interframe space (SIFS) time boundary after an end of a received PPDU that included the trigger frame.

7. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to control transceiver circuitry to refrain from transmitting the NDP feedback report response according to a value of the NDP feedback report response when the request in the trigger frame is regarding a type of the NDP feedback.

8. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the STA determines whether the AID assigned to the STA is within the range of scheduled AIDs specified within the trigger frame by determining whether the STA's AID is equal or greater than the AID start value and lower than an AID start value added to a number of scheduled AIDS (NAIDS) value calculated from a bandwidth (BW) value decoded from the BW field, a Feedback Size value decoded from the Feedback Size field, and a Number of Users Per Set of Tones value decoded from a Number of Users Per Set of Tones field of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame according to the following equation:

if BW=0 or 1 : NAIDS = 18 x(BW+l)x(Number of Users per Set of Tones) /(Feedback Size+1);

if BW=2: NAIDS = 72x(Number of Users per Set of Tones) /(Feedback Size+1);

if BW=3: NAIDS = 144x(Number of Users per Set of Tones) /(Feedback

Size+1).

9. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the RB is determined at least in part by an RU allocation offset field within the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame.

10. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the STA and the AP each comprise one from the following group: an Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) 802.11 ax access point, an IEEE 802.1 lax station, an IEEE 802.11 station, and an IEEE 802.11 access point.

11. The apparatus of claim 1 , further comprising transceiver circuitry coupled to the processing circuitry.

12. The apparatus of claim 11, further comprising one or more antennas coupled to the transceiver circuitry.

13. An apparatus of a wireless access point (AP), the apparatus comprising memory; and processing circuitry coupled to the memory, the processing circuity configured to:

encode, for transmission to one or more STAs, a null data packet (NDP) feedback report poll variant trigger frame with a request and a range of association identifiers (AIDs) associated with wireless stations (STAs) scheduled to respond to the request based on at least an AID start field;

receive, from a STA having an AID within the range of AIDs, an NDP feedback report response comprising a response to the request within a resource block (RB) assigned to the STA by the AP according to the AID of the STA and the trigger frame, the RB being represented by a resource unit (RU) and a spatial stream (SS); and

determine the response to the request from the NDP feedback report response.

14. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the RB is uniquely assigned to the STA among all STAs within the range of scheduled STAs by each combination of RU and SS being assigned to a maximum of one STA among the STAs scheduled to respond to the request.

15. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the processing circuity is further configured to determine the AID of the STA from the NDP feedback report response.

16. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the NDP feedback report response is decoded from a high efficiency (HE) uplink (UL) trigger-based physical layer (PHY) Layer Convergence Procedure (PLCP) Protocol Data Unit (PPDU) without a data payload.

17. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the AP encodes a number of scheduled AIDs (NAIDS) value in the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame as a bandwidth (BW) value encoded in the BW field, a Feedback Size value encoded in the Feedback Size field, and a Number of Users Per Set of Tones value encoded in a Number of Users Per Set of Tones field of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame according to the following equation: if BW=0 or 1 : NAIDS = 18 x(BW+l)x(Number of Users per Set of Tones) /(Feedback Size+1);

if BW=2: NAIDS = 72x(Number of Users per Set of Tones) /(Feedback Size+1);

if BW=3: NAIDS = 144x(Number of Users per Set of Tones) /(Feedback Size+1).

18. A method performed by a wireless station (STA), the method comprising:

decoding a null data packet (NDP) feedback report poll variant trigger frame received from an access point (AP);

determining whether an association identifier (AID) of the STA is within a range of AIDs associated with STAs scheduled to respond to the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame according to at least an AID Start field of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame; and

when the AID of the STA is within the range of scheduled AIDs:

encoding, for transmission to the AP, an NDP feedback report response in response to a request of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame; and

determining a resource block (RB) assigned to the STA by the AP according to the AID of the STA and the trigger frame, the RB being represented by a resource unit (RU) together with a spatial stream (SS).

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the RB is uniquely assigned to the STA among the STAs scheduled to respond to the request by each combination of RU and SS being assigned to a maximum of one STA among the STAs scheduled to respond to the request.

20. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium that stores instructions for execution by one or more processors of a wireless access point (AP), to perform operations to configure the one or more processors to:

determine the response to the request from the NDP feedback report response.

The medium of claim 20, wherein the RB is uniquely assigned to the among all STAs within the range of scheduled STAs.

22. The medium of claim 20, wherein the medium further stores instructions for execution by the one or more processors of the AP to perform operations to determine the AID of the STA from the NDP feedback report response.

23. The medium of claim 20, wherein the AP encodes a number of scheduled AIDs (NAIDS) value in the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame as a bandwidth (BW) value encoded in the BW field, a Feedback Size value encoded in the Feedback Size field, and a Number of Users Per Set of Tones value encoded in a Number of Users Per Set of Tones field of the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame according to the following equation:

if BW=2: NAIDS = 72x(Number of Users per Set of Tones) /(Feedback Size+1);

if BW=3: NAIDS = 144x(Number of Users per Set of Tones) /(Feedback

Size+1).

24. The medium of claim 20, wherein the NDP feedback report response comprises a single bit represented by the presence or absence of transmission detected within the RB.

25. The medium of claim 20, wherein the RB is assigned at least in part by an RU allocation offset field within the NDP feedback report poll variant trigger frame.