Advanced Technologies and Services, Inc. (ATS) is pleased to present our 'Network Integrity Model'.
I. Overview:
The ATS Network Integrity Model is conceptually constructed to provide
customers with a comprehensive set of functional capabilities that are
tailored to define, to provision to validate and to analyze all aspects of
its switched services environment.
These functionalities can be exercised in whole or in part and they can be customized to meet very specific individual needs.
The ATS intent is to develop a customer plan during a consultative sales meeting that will meet, if not exceed, all customer requirements for network integrity.
ATS will then utilize its existing products and tool-sets that it has at its disposal in combination with custom-developed applications and other vendor products to solve the customer need in a seamless approach.
II. Service Definition
The ATS Network Integrity Model starts with the creation of three basic
building blocks that clearly and concisely capture the customer's network
operating universe. The three elements that make up this category are
documentation of network routing and charging expectations, definition of
local and extended area service calling areas and the detailing of the
basic topography elements that act as a backdrop for everything that is
put into place in the customer's network. Once this information is in
place, ATS can assist the customer in ways that may not be intuitively
obvious but have far-reaching ramifications in terms of benefit.
- A. Routing and Charging Manager (RCM)
The Routing and Charging Manager is a web-based tool that leads the customer through an intense but thoroughly necessary exercise of defining for every service type (class of service or Line Class Code) all of the various call types that can be exercised using every possible prefixing scheme. The bottom line here is to create an easy to access, reliable and most importantly machine-readable source of corporate information. This data source will spell out exactly what the user's routing and charging expectations are for every customer who initiates a call into its network and beyond.
B. Local Calling Area Manager (LCAM)
The Local Calling Area Manager, like RCM, is a web-based tool that is
designed to capture the terminating local and extended service area
calling scope of all originating points in the customer network by service
type. LCAM can be populated with customer-provided data feeds or can be
established to function with vendor-provided definitions.
C. Network Topography Mapper
The ATS Network Topography Mapper relies on industry standard inputs such
as Telcordia's Local Exchange Routing Guide to develop a complete picture
of all valid working and non-working NPANXX code combinations and their
associated data elements. This information runs the gamut from code
activation date to rate center vertical and horizontal geographical
coordinates and is critical to a thorough delineation of the various
operational parameters that the customer's network must support.
- A. Mechanized Translation Platform (MTP)
The Mechanized Translations Platform is a modular approach to automating complex trunk and switch-level translations input work. Currently, ATS is focusing development effort on implementing modules that will open NPA and NXX codes and activate Carrier Interconnect Codes (CICs). Additional modules are being scheduled for trunk group initialization and the creation of ISDN and Centrex groups within a switch environment. The thrust of these efforts is to reduce the demand on highly trained translations experts through automation such that these resources can be dedicated to more complex and potentially more profitable business needs. Elements of the Service Definition portion of the ATS Network Integrity Model are used extensively to drive MTP automation efforts.
Ultimately, ATS intends to link its service definition, testing and usage analysis portions of its network integrity model directly to MTP such that ATS can offer customers a "self-healing" environment. This will enable ATS to become proactive in resolving switch translations problems rather than merely identifying problem conditions in a timely manner. The intent is to create a process that will not only automate testing but also provide for programmed correction of problem conditions and an assessment of the financial impact of the finished product.
As a result, ATS will have freed up valuable translations experts through automating basic repetitive complex translations work plus will have established an ongoing automated repeatable method of ensuring network integrity.
The Mechanized Translations Platform is centered on two main components, a database and a queuing system. The database provides for configuration and order management, and data interchange between processes in the system. The functions of reporting and archiving also make use of the database. The queuing system allows for inter-process communication, load balancing, expandability and performance monitoring. The system is composed of a collection of processes operating within a Unix environment. A particular process or a group of identical processes will perform specific functions within the MTP system. Multiple instantiations of processes will be used for load balancing and multi-threading communication links. The system will operate on a standard mid-range Unix server, such as an HP 9000 or Sun Enterprise server, and will scale to handle the required number of switches in the network. This system may operate on a stand-alone platform, or coexist with other applications on a common server platform.
Communication between processes is provided via a queuing subsystem.. The queuing subsystem will safe-store the state of the system and provide recovery in the event of a system failure. While the system is not expected to operate in a fault-tolerant mode, it will be capable of recovering to a known state, and to continue processing requests automatically, upon system restart.
There are three basic components that comprise the ATS Testing infrastructure. One is an existing application known as SimCall. The other two parts of the puzzle for testing part of the ATS Network Integrity Model are GenCall and the ATS Switch Crawler.
- A. SimCall
SimCall is an application that automates the analysis and validation of complex switch translations that govern the basic routing and charging of all calls that are processed by a Local Exchange Carrier (LEC) switch. The intent here is to compare copies of all relevant switch translation data to expectations that are established in the Service Definition area of the ATS Network Integrity Model. The comparison then yields a determination of what meets expectation and what does not. Individual SimCall testing configurations can be tailored to meet user requirements for depth and breadth of what is to be examined. Also, the SimCall output is made available to the user through a web-based GUI that enables detailed sorting and filtering. In addition, the user can create, save and even Email pieces of the larger report as sub-reports.
SimCall can simulate the routing and charging of millions of calls within periods of less than five minutes. Every possible dialing scenario for all valid call types can be exercised for every service type provisioned in a given switching machine without impacting switch throughput during network busy hours.
Today, SimCall supports wireline services provisioned in the Lucent 5ESS and the Nortel Network's DMS 100 family of switching products. If used on a regular, proactive basis, SimCall has the power to dramatically decrease the total effort required to maintain quality complex switch translations as well as to reduce the time presently employed to troubleshoot switching anomalies reported by end-users. Currently, ATS has plans to immediately expand the reach of this product to cover all switch types and switched services. The new product, SimCall Plus, will be made possible through a close linkage of pieces of the existing SimCall application to Service Definition, Usage Analysis and an outgrowth of MTP referred to as the Switch Crawler. The new application will also directly interface with call generation systems such as The Board Room Inc.'s PAT product.
As discussed in the Automation section of this paper, the ATS long-run objective is to incorporate SimCall Plus into an end-to-end network integrity process that will take on a "self-healing" character. The bottom-line will be that SimCall Plus will eventually not only be able to identify switching anomalies in a timely manner but also be in a position to correct the underlying translations errors and give the user an accurate assessment of the financial gain to the customer's business revenue stream.
B. The ATS Switch Crawler
The ATS Switch Crawler is an outgrowth of the ATS Mechanized Translation
Platform. It is designed to periodically access switch translations and to
gather pertinent information about how the switch is handling NPA and NXX
code additions and CIC activations. Additionally, the Switch Crawler can
be used to gather up-to-the minute administrative information such as
number of presubscribed lines by CIC plus the numbers of assigned office
equipment and Directory Numbers by service type.
Furthermore, the ATS Switch Crawler can be programmed to gather whatever else would be meaningful to the individual user.
ATS has developed a unique software application that is capable of providing in-depth call analysis on AMA formatted call detail records. This product is called AMA Dynamic Examiner of Usage Statistics (AMADEUS). This application forms the core of the ATS usage analysis part of the Network Integrity Model.
AMADEUS groups calls together in high-level summaries, and displays the data in a variety of meaningful ways. Summaries by Carrier Interconnect Code (CIC) or Operating Company Number (OCN), switching entity, and even an individual trunk group are common examples of the granularity that is possible to achieve in the product outputs. AMADEUS can examine massive amounts of AMA statistics and filter them down into subsets based on user-defined characteristics like answer indicator, originating and terminating NPA/NXX, structure code, call code, MBI (Message Billing Index), and elapsed time. Furthermore, AMADEUS allows the user to have "drill-down" access to the individual call detail records that have been summarized by the application.
Alternatively, AMADEUS can be utilized to quickly and accurately isolate records for hand-off to other customer applications such as billing and customer care systems. In the same vein, AMADEUS can also be used in a real-time environment to substantiate bulk-billed charges that are disputed by customers.
In addition, AMADEUS has the ability to generate all types of detailed reports that satisfy every aspect of a customer's business needs. Validation of the revenue aspects of interconnection agreements between Local Exchange Carriers has been a primary driver for many of the reports that are ready for immediate customer use today. Nevertheless, there are a number of other AMADEUS reports that target business areas such as network management, capacity planning and engineering, product management, marketing and sales.
Provided by: Advanced Technologies and Services, Inc.