Distributed scheduling for wireless networks

We pose a network-wide scheduling problem for cellular wireless networks in which users are capable of being served by several schedulers on the downlink, though not jointly. We present a distributed algorithm, with limited communication across servers, that solves this problem optimally, in that it gives the network-wide proportional fair solution. An idealized version is presented first, in which all users are capable of being served by all schedulers and in which all the decision-making takes place among the schedulers alone. A practical version is also presented, in which users play a role in choosing their servers and servers decide how to allocate resources to the users that choose them. The practical version can achieve the same optimum as the idealized one and gives gains up to 60% in typical network deployments. This version can be implemented on any wireless technology to achieve optimal network scheduling. We have focused particularly on LTE, HSPA and 1xEV-DO and the first commercial deployment will soon occur on the 1xEV-DO system, based on the 3GPP2 standard, under the rubric of `Smart Networks.