Quality of Service (QoS) and policy aspects of 3GPP - Wirless Local Area Network (WLAN) interworking
Some 3GPP PS based services (e.g. VoIP over IMS, PS streaming, etc) require strict QoS provisioning. In order to support such services over I-WLAN, QoS Provisioning in 3GPP-WLAN Interworking is required.
IEEE 802.11 WLAN standards are currently not supporting QoS mechanisms, therefore QoS provisioning was not considered in Rel-6 work for 3GPP-WLAN Interworking. As IEEE is currently finalizing QoS amendments to 802.11 WLAN standards, QoS-related aspects of the 3GPP-WLAN architecture should be studied.
In the context of end-to-end QoS provisioning being studied in TR 23.802, provisioning of QoS within I-WLAN as an IP-CAN is important. It shall be defined if and how QoS provisioning in I-WLAN can interact with the end-to-end QoS framework.
Flow based charging and service/subscription based policy control are studied in TR 23.803 as generic features to support the access to PS based services from different IP-CANs. In order to leverage the generic charging and service/subscription based policy control within I-WLAN as another IP-CAN, the Gateway element in case of 3GPP-WLAN Interworking has to provide the needed functionalities, e.g. for Policy Enforcement.
The followings are objectives of the document.
- investigate the necessity and reliability of the applicable QoS mechanism between the WLAN UE and PDG, and the possible impacts to the 3GPP-WLAN interworking entities;
- ensure that the architecture for 3GPP/WLAN Interworking defined by TS 23.234 is supported by the following QoS-related mechanisms being developed in 3GPP:
a. E2E QoS architecture being studied in TR 23.802;
b. Policy and charging evolution capabilities being studied in TR 23.803.