AnintroductiontotheLTEMACScheduler

PostedonJuly30,2015byYateTeam
LTEbroughtacompletelynewnetworkarchitectureandmanagedtorevolutionizethedatacapabilities
everachievedonamobilenetwork.LTEalsobroughtanewtypeofradionetwork,muchsimplerinits
organization.InapreviouspostwediscussedaboutOFDM(hps://blog.yate.ro/2015/05/20/ofdmthe
sciencebehindlte/)beingthemainreasonbehindLTEshighdataspeed.Todaywelookintoan
essentialcomponentoftheLTEradionetwork:theMACScheduler.
SiingjustabovethePhysicallayer,theMACSchedulerassignsbandwidthresourcestouserequipment
andisresponsiblefordecidingonhowuplinkanddownlinkchannelsareusedbytheeNodeBandthe
UEsofacell.ItalsoenforcesthenecessaryQualityofService
(hps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_of_service)forUEconnections.QoSisasetofrulesthatcome
fromthePolicyandChargingRulesFunction
(hps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Policy_and_charging_rules_function)(PCRF)inthecorenetwork.These
rulesdenepriority,bitrateandlatencyrequirementsfordierentconnectionstotheUE.Theyis
usuallybasedonthetypesofapplicationsusingtheUEconnection.Forexample,theQoSrequirements
foraVoLTEcallaredierentfromthoseforcheckingtheemail.
Asseenintheimagebelow,theMACschedulerhascontrolovertheOFDMmodulationinthesensethat
itdecides,accordingtoinformationreceivedfromotherLTEnetworkcomponents,howmuch
bandwidtheachUEreceivesatanygivenmoment.Inthisgure,theresourceelement(subcarrier)is
representedonthefrequencyaxis,whilethesubframesarerepresentedonthetimeaxis.

(hps://yateblog.les.wordpress.com/2015/07/mac_scheduler1.png)Thisgureshowsdownlink

(hps://yateblog.les.wordpress.com/2015/07/mac_scheduler1.png)Thisgureshowsdownlink
scheduling,buttheMACSchedulercontrolsuplinkschedulinginasimilarway.
Inordertotakeitsresourceallocationdecisions,theMACSchedulerreceivesinformationsuchas:
QoSdatafromthePCRF:minimumguaranteedbandwidth,maximumallowedbandwidth,packet
lossrates,relativepriorityofusers,etc.
messagesfromtheUEsregardingtheradiochannelquality,thestrengthorweaknessofthesignal,
etc.
measurementsfromtheradioreceiverregardingradiochannelquality,noiseandinterference,etc.
buerstatusfromtheupperlayersabouthowmuchdataisqueuedupwaitingfortransmission

(hps://yateblog.les.wordpress.com/2015/07/mac_scheduler21.png)
Typically,aMACSchedulercanbeprogrammedtosupportoneschedulingalgorithmwithmany
parameters.
Herearesomeexamplesofschedulingalgorithms:
RoundRobinusedfortestingpurposesandusesequalbandwidthforallUEswithoutaccounting

RoundRobinusedfortestingpurposesandusesequalbandwidthforallUEswithoutaccounting
forchannelconditions
ProportionalFairnesstriestobalancebetweentheQoSprioritiesandtotalthroughput,usually
preferredincommercialnetworks
SchedulingforDelayLimitedCapacityguaranteesthattheMACSchedulerwillalwaysprioritize
applicationswithspeciclatencyrequirements
MaximumC/IguaranteesthattheMacSchedulerwillalwaysassignresourceblockstotheUEwith
thebestchannelquality
OneofthekeyfeaturesofLTEistheabilitytocontrolandprioritizebandwidthacrossusers.Itisthe
MACschedulerthatgivesLTEthiscapability.
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