UEs not appearing in 5G-EmPOWER Web Interface and not possible to attribute UEs to a slice via Web Interface

Question

UEs not appearing in 5G-EmPOWER Web Interface and not possible to attribute UEs to a slice via Web Interface

branchereaua opened this issue 4 years ago · comments

Hello,

We are trying to setup 5G-EmPOWER and perform LTE RAN slicing.
Our configuration is based on srsENB and srsEPC (20.04.2).

We have successfully connected different COTS UEs (Honor View20, LG Nexus 5, Motorola Moto G 4G) to srsLTE and they have access to the Internet.

After creating a project in the Empower-runtime Web Interface, we wanted to attribute UEs to different slices.
But we faced 2 issues:

Connected UEs doesn't appear in the Clients > UEs section, except for the LG Nexus 5
From the project page, we can manage slices (creation, modification,...) but we didn't manage to find how to attribute UEs to a specific slice.

Could you please help us to overcome these issues?

Best regards,
Alan B. & Ehsan EK.

Roberto Riggio · Answer 1 · Mon Nov 09 2020 19:24:19 GMT+0800 (China Standard Time)

Regarding point (1) this must be due to the fact that empower asks the UE identity, meaning the IMSI. If the UE does not provide it then the UE is not added to the controller. Regarding point (2) the support for slicing is not available for the open-source version. A new version could be available in the future but for now, if you are interested please contact me via email.

Alan Branchereau · Answer 2 · Wed Nov 11 2020 00:57:22 GMT+0800 (China Standard Time)

Thank you for your response.

Regarding point (1), the UEs are correctly sending their IMSI because srsENB and srsEPC are able to see them. So I don't think the issue is coming from the UE identity side. For some reason the Agent correctly adds the Nexus 5 to the controller database after its connection, but not the other UEs.

Regarding LTE Slicing, do you mean that it is available under a commercial version ?

Best regards,
Alan B. & Ehsan EK.

Roberto Riggio · Answer 3 · Wed Nov 11 2020 03:58:21 GMT+0800 (China Standard Time)

Hi, the IMSI is obtained by the controller by forcing the eNB to send an identity request message. According to the standard this message should be sent only by the core network. Empower triggers this message and intercepts the reply. It is possible that some UE refuse to reply with their IMSI. However, since I only have a nexus 5 I do not have a way to test this. Regarding point (2) we could in principle provide you with the lte slicing feature under a commercial license if you are interested. R.

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On Tue, 10 Nov 2020 at 17:57, Alan Branchereau ***@***.***> wrote: Thank you for your response. Regarding point (1), the UEs are correctly sending their IMSI because srsENB and srsEPC are able to see them. So I don't think the issue is coming from the UE identity side. For some reason the Agent correctly adds the Nexus 5 to the controller database after its connection, but not the other UEs. Regarding LTE Slicing, do you mean that it is available under a commercial version ? Best regards, Alan B. & Ehsan EK. — You are receiving this because you modified the open/close state. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#173 (comment)>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AADXGTEN6AJFDJLCEYXRTBLSPFWIFANCNFSM4TI6ONLA> .

Alan Branchereau · Answer 4 · Thu Nov 12 2020 18:59:07 GMT+0800 (China Standard Time)

Hi, thank you for your response.

Indeed, I think this is the reason why only the Nexus 5 can be added to the controller.
As can be seen in the attached PCAPs, the Nexus 5 sends an Identity Response, but the Honor View20 and The Motorola Moto G do not.
Do you think there is another way for the controller to obtain the IMSIs from UEs?

Best regards,
Alan B. & Ehsan EK.

UEpcap.zip

Roberto Riggio · Answer 5 · Thu Nov 12 2020 19:02:16 GMT+0800 (China Standard Time)

I will check the pcaps, indeed without having the phones it is hard to make trial. Maybe you can look into the code and see if you can find a workaround. Another ID to use is the GUTI but I never looked at it. Meaning I do not know if it can be collected. TMSI could also be a valid ID. The RNTI is unstable because it can change very often.

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On Thu, 12 Nov 2020 at 11:59, Alan Branchereau ***@***.***> wrote: Hi, thank you for your response. Indeed, I think this is the reason why only the Nexus 5 can be added to the controller. As can be seen in the attached PCAPs, the Nexus 5 sends an Identity Response, but the Honor View20 and The Motorola Moto G do not. Do you think there is another way for the controller to obtain the IMSIs from UEs? Best regards, Alan B. & Ehsan EK. UEpcap.zip <https://github.com/5g-empower/empower-runtime/files/5530073/UEpcap.zip> — You are receiving this because you modified the open/close state. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#173 (comment)>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AADXGTDQNE5S5CQBHHVNVULSPO5YTANCNFSM4TI6ONLA> .

k20065133 · Answer 6 · Fri Aug 13 2021 09:10:30 GMT+0800 (China Standard Time)

Hi:

I am trying to use 5G-EmPOWER to perform LTE RAN slicing. But I am facing the same issue, the UE does not appear in the UE list in the web interface. Is there any suggestion for that?

Thanks
Tony