Configurations and diagnosis for ultra-dense heterogeneous networks: From empirical measurements to technical solutions

The intense demands for higher data rates and ubiquitous network coverage have raised the stakes on developing new network topologies and architectures to meet these ever-increasing demands in a cost-effective manner. The telecommunication industry and international standardization bodies have placed considerable attention on the deployment of ultra-dense heterogeneous small-scale cells over existing cellular systems. Those small-scale cells, although they provide higher data rates and better indoor coverage by reducing the distance between BSs and end users, have raised severe configuration concerns. As the deployments are becoming irregular and flexible, inappropriate configurations occur frequently and undermine the network reliability and service quality. We envision that the fine-grained characterization of user traffic is a key pillar to diagnosing inappropriate configurations. In this article, we investigate the fine-grained traffic patterns of mobile users by analyzing the network data containing millions of subscribers and covering thousands of cells in a large metropolitan area. We characterize traffic patterns and mobility behaviors of users and geospatial properties of cells, and discuss how the heterogeneity of these characteristics affects network configurations and diagnosis in future ultra-dense small cells. Based on these observations from our measurements, we investigate possible models and corresponding challenges, and propose a heterogeneity-aware scheme that takes into account the disparity of user mobility behaviors and geospatial properties among small cells.