Abstract: This disclosure provides systems, methods, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer-readable media, for implementing a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) protocol in a wireless local area network (WLAN). In some aspects, a first WLAN device may transmit a first HARQ frame to a second WLAN device. The first WLAN device may determine whether a first feedback message received from the second WLAN device includes HARQ acknowledgement information or non-HARQ acknowledgment information. The first feedback message may be a HARQ Block Acknowledgement (H-BA) message having a multi-station Block ACK (M-BA) frame format that includes HARQ acknowledgment information. The first WLAN device may transmit a second HARQ frame to the second WLAN device in response to determining the first feedback message includes the HARQ acknowledgment information. The first WLAN device may transmit a non-HARQ frame in response to determining the first feedback message includes non-HARQ acknowledgement information.

Abstract: This disclosure provides systems, methods, and apparatuses for associating a wireless communication device such as a wireless station (STA) of a STA multi-link device (MLD) with an access point (AP) MLD that includes a first AP associated with a first communication link of the AP MLD and includes one or more secondary APs associated with one or more respective secondary communication links of the first AP MLD. The first AP includes one or more virtual APs, and the first AP and the one or more virtual APs of the first AP belong to a first multiple basic service set identifier (BSSID) set associated with the first communication link.

Abstract: This disclosure provides systems, methods and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for group formation and sounding for distributed multi-user multiple input multiple output (MU-MIMO). Some implementations include a method of wireless communication. The method includes a sounding preparation phase that includes transmitting, to the plurality of access points, a first frame inviting the plurality of access points to perform a beamformed distributed transmission from the plurality of access points to a group of stations; receiving a second frame from at least one of the plurality of access points based on transmitting the first frame, the second frame including at least one identifier of at least one station in a different basic service set than a basic service set of the first access point; and identifying the group of stations based on the at least one identifier included in the second frame.

Abstract: This disclosure provides methods, devices and systems for sharing time resources of a wireless medium. Particular implementations relate more specifically to coordinated AP (CAP) time-division-multiple-access (TDMA) techniques for sharing the time resources of a transmission opportunity (TXOP). According to such techniques, a coordinated AP that wins contention and gains access to the wireless medium for the duration of a TXOP may share its time resources with other coordinated APs. To share its time resources, the winning AP may partition the TXOP into multiple TXOP segments each including respective time resources representing a sub-duration of the TXOP. For example, the winning AP may assign, grant or allocate (hereinafter used interchangeably) itself one or more of the time resources and also allocate each of one or more remaining time resources to one or more other ones of the coordinated APs.

Abstract: This disclosure provides systems, devices, apparatus and methods, including computer programs encoded on storage media, for high efficiency (HE) beacons. HE supported access points (APs) and stations (STAs) may operate on resource deployments used for Wi-Fi technology and without support for legacy devices, also referred to as a greenfield deployment. An AP may identify updated capability information and transmit a HE physical layer convergence protocol (PLCP) protocol data unit (PPDU) including a beacon frame. A STA may receive, from the AP, the HE or EHT PPDU and identify an indication of change to a content or format of the beacon frame relative to a reference beacon frame. Based on the identified indication, the STA may then determine an updated content or format for the beacon frame and process the beacon frame or skip processing for one or more portions of the beacon frame.

Abstract: This disclosure provides systems, methods and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for multi-link aggregation in wireless communications. In one aspect, an apparatus includes a multi-link operation device configured to generate and output for transmission a message indicating a mapping of each of a plurality of traffic identifiers (TIDs) to one or more parameters associated with each of a plurality of wireless links. In some aspects, another apparatus may obtain a message via at least one of a plurality of wireless links indicating a mapping of each of a plurality of TIDs to one or more parameters associated with each the plurality of wireless links, obtain a sequence of packets associated with at least one of the plurality of TIDs via one or more of the plurality of wireless links, and process the sequence of packets based on the mapping indicated via the message.

Abstract: Some embodiments include an apparatus, method, and computer program product for Extremely High Throughput (EHT) medium reservation. Some embodiments include a first station configured to exchange EHT-Request to Send (RTS) and/or EHT-Clear to Send (CTS) capabilities with a second station, and determine CTS response mode (e.g., rules) for the first station based at least on the RTS and CTS capabilities of the first and the second stations. Some embodiments include transmitting RTS frames and receiving CTS frames in the presence of punctured channels, implementing a flexible channel reservation scheme, reserving punctured bandwidths, and receiving CTS frames even when a primary channel is busy. Some embodiments include an RTS or an CTS frame that includes an EHT bandwidth puncture (BnP) signaling address and/or a modified scrambler seed that enable channel reservations for an EHT bandwidth.

Abstract: This disclosure provides systems, methods and apparatuses for indicating a data rate of a packet. The transmitting device may select the data rate of a data field of the packet to be transmitted to the receiving device, and may select a pattern to embed within a preamble of the packet based on the selected data rate. In some implementations, the transmitting device may select a first structure including a first number of instances of a sequence or its logical complement if the selected data rate is a low data rate, and may select a second structure including a second number of instances of the sequence or its logical complement if the selected data rate is a high data rate.

Abstract: This disclosure provides systems, devices, apparatus and methods, including computer programs encoded on storage media, for high efficiency (HE) beacons. HE supported access points (APs) and stations (STAs) may operate on resource deployments used for Wi-Fi technology and without support for legacy devices, also referred to as a greenfield deployment. An AP may identify updated capability information and transmit a HE physical layer convergence protocol (PLCP) protocol data unit (PPDU) including a beacon frame. A STA may receive, from the AP, the HE or EHT PPDU and identify an indication of change to a content or format of the beacon frame relative to a reference beacon frame. Based on the identified indication, the STA may then determine an updated content or format for the beacon frame and process the beacon frame or skip processing for one or more portions of the beacon frame.

Abstract: During operation, an electronic device may encrypt an A-control subfield. Then, the electronic device may provide the frame addressed to a second electronic device, where the frame includes a media access control (MAC) header and the MAC header includes the A-control subfield that is encrypted. Note that the encrypted A-control subfield may be jointly encrypted with data in a payload in the frame. Moreover, the encrypted A-control subfield may be separated from the payload in the frame by one or more additional subfields or may be adjacent to the payload in the frame. Furthermore, the MAC header may include an indicator that indicates whether the A-control subfield is encrypted. Additionally, the frame may include a preamble that indicates whether the A-control subfield is encrypted. The frame may be received by the second electronic device. After receiving the frame, the second electronic device may decrypt the A-control subfield.

Abstract: Techniques for trigger-based transmission in a wireless network include receiving, at a first wireless device, a trigger signal including an indication of a first value for a parameter of a trigger-based physical layer protocol data unit (TB PPDU) transmission to a second wireless device, selecting, by the first wireless device, a second value for the parameter of the TB PPDU transmission, wherein the second value for the parameter is different from the first value for the parameter, and transmitting, by the first wireless device and to the second wireless device, the TB PPDU transmission using the second value for the parameter.

Abstract: Methods and apparatuses are disclosed for high-bandwidth stations in a WiFi environment. In embodiments, a bandwidth of communications supported by the access point is divided into multiple frequency segments. In an embodiment, bandwidths up to 320 MHz are supported, which can be subdivided into four frequency segments of 80 MHz each. Different stations park on different frequency segments, whereas the access point has its primary channel located on the first frequency segment. With this configuration, uplink and downlink channel access can be provided to the different stations using a primary channel hopping pattern, which is provided to the stations from the AP. This pattern provides time windows for each frequency segment, during which the stations in that segment are able to freely communicate. Several other aspects of the disclosure further support this configuration and other high-bandwidth configurations.

Abstract: This disclosure provides systems, devices, apparatus and methods, including computer programs encoded on storage media, for null data packet (NDP) based implicit sounding and calibration for a wireless local area network (WLAN). An AP may perform a calibration procedure with one or more stations (STAs) that involves NDP transmissions. The AP may calibrate an effective downlink channel response to an effective uplink channel to compensate for transmit and receive chain differences. The AP may initiate implicit sounding by transmitting a downlink message that includes an uplink NDP announcement frame to the one or more STAs, prompting uplink multi-user (MU) NDP transmission. The AP may estimate the uplink channel based on measuring the received NDPs and mirror the estimated uplink channel for reciprocal downlink channel estimation and precoding generation. The AP may perform MU multiple input multiple output (MIMO) downlink transmission that is precoded based on the channel estimation.

Abstract: Techniques for control signaling in extreme high throughput (EHT) environments are described. A message transmitted by an access point (AP) may allocate resources to a plurality of stations (STAs). The AP may be configured to allocate up to 320 MHz of total bandwidth or up to sixteen spatial streams to one or more STAs. In some multiple-user multiple-input multiple-output (MU-MIMO) cases, the spatial configuration field may include a starting spatial stream field and a spatial stream number field. In some non-MU-MIMO cases, the spatial configuration field may be expanded by one bit or more. In some cases, content channels of a resource unit (RU) allocation table may span a frequency segment of 40 MHz.

Abstract: A method for communicating over a wireless network includes broadcasting, by a Multi-Link Device (MLD) device, service data indicative of one or more services for wireless communication with a client device; wherein the service data indicates that a service type is differentiated based on a type of the client device; establishing a security association with the client device; and in response to establishing a security association with the client device, granting access by the client device to a subset of the one or more services based on the type of the client device.

Abstract: This disclosure provides systems, methods and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for adjusting a packet duration for triggered uplink (UL) transmissions to an access point (AP) from one or more stations (STAs). In one aspect, the AP may estimate an amount of data that a STA has queued for UL transmission and select the packet duration based on the estimated amount of queued UL data. The AP may transmit a trigger frame that solicits UL data from the STA and indicates the selected packet duration. In response, the AP may receive an UL packet from the STA and determine an amount of UL data queued in the STA based on the UL packet. In some implementations, the AP may selectively adjust the packet duration for UL transmissions based on the UL packet, the determined amount of UL data queued in the STA, or both.

Abstract: Methods, systems, and devices for wireless communications are described for coordination between multiple access points (APs) for communications within a transmission opportunity (TxOP). A first AP may gain channel access for a TxOP, and may coordinate with at least a second AP to allow both the first AP and the second AP to transmit and receive wireless communications during the TxOP. The first AP, upon gaining channel access following a successful contention-based channel access procedure, may initiate a scheduling phase with the second AP to schedule of resources within the TxOP for the first and second APs. The first AP may initiate a multi-AP coordinated transmission phase following the scheduling phase, during which both the first AP and second AP may communicate with one or more associated STAs.

Abstract: This disclosure provides systems, methods, and apparatuses for associating a wireless communication device such as a wireless station (STA) of a STA multi-link device (MLD) with an access point (AP) MLD that includes a first AP associated with a first communication link of the AP MLD and includes one or more secondary APs associated with one or more respective secondary communication links of the first AP MLD. The AP MLD transmits a frame including an advertising information element carrying discovery information for the first AP of the AP MLD, including a first portion carrying discovery information for each secondary AP of the one or more secondary APs of the AP MLD, and including a second portion carrying common attributes of the one or more secondary APs of the AP MLD.

Abstract: Various aspects of the disclosure relate to communication using a data unit that includes a payload with synchronization information. In some aspects, a first apparatus may transmit a data unit that includes at least one synchronization symbol in the payload. A second apparatus that receives the data unit may thereby recover synchronization information from the data unit even if interference at the second apparatus prevents the second apparatus from recovering synchronization information in a preamble of the data unit. In some aspects, the second apparatus may determine, based on information in the at least one synchronization symbol, whether and/or when to conduct a spatial reuse transmission. In some aspects, the second apparatus may determine, based on information in the at least one synchronization symbol, an amount of time to defer transmission.

Abstract: An electronic device may receive a frame associated with a second electronic device. This frame may include a MAC header with information specifying a request for a trigger or a trigger frame, and the information may include a suggested time interval during which the trigger or the trigger frame is to be provided and a requested resource allocation. For example, the MAC header may include an A-control field, and the A-control field may include the information or may include multiple A-MPDUs and one or more of the A-MPDUs (such as a last A-MPDU or all of the A-MPDUs) may include the information. Moreover, the time interval may begin at a previous transmission associated with the second electronic device, and the requested resource allocation may include a capacity. In response to the request, the electronic device may provide the trigger or the trigger frame addressed to the second electronic device.