Telecommunications – Radiotelephone system – Zoned or cellular telephone system
Reexamination Certificate
1999-07-16
2002-04-16
Trost, William (Department: 2683)
Telecommunications
Radiotelephone system
Zoned or cellular telephone system
C455S428000, C455S456500, C246S003000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06374107
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a service switching means for a mobile integrated intelligent network and further to a service control means for such a mobile integrated intelligent network.
In particular, the present invention relates to a mobile integrated intelligent network wherein the service switching means interacts with a local service control means in the event of international roaming.
TECHNICAL BACKGROUND OF INVENTION
Recently, a standard called EIRENE was created by a group of European railway operators in order to specify and standardize a pan-European universal railway communication system as private networks or virtual private networks with the intention to satisfy all operative railway communication means on a single mobile cellular network platform, e.g., the GSM platform.
A vital part of railway communication relates to a functional numbering and functional number registration. Here, the concept of functional numbers is introduced with the intention of releasing railway operative personnel of having to resort to temporary look-up tables when they want to contact a train currently roaming in the related railway operation range. Heretofore, there is specified a numbering plan based on train numbers and other running stock numbers. Typically, the mobile station number MSISDN assigned to a train driver is registered in relation to the train number he is currently driving.
FIG. 7
shows the concept of a gateway node initially introduced. In particular, it was proposed that a gateway node
100
would take over the task to translate the functional number supplied by a switch
102
into the actual routable mobile station number MSISDN of the destination. Thus, using the concept of a gateway node a call is routed to this gateway node
100
wherein a number of translations takes place to achieve a certain service. However, the use of such a gateway node arrangement quickly became obsolete due to various reasons including extra hardware costs and transmission costs.
An alternative to the concept of a gateway node relies on the implementation of mobile integrated intelligent networks, as will be shown in the following.
FIG. 8
shows a schematic diagram according to the general architecture of intelligent network communication systems. As shown in
FIG. 8
, there is provided a service control point
104
to control the switching of messages in the intelligent network communication system. Further, there are provided service switching functions
106
triggering calls/messages and invoking a re-routing of calls and messages to the service control point
104
for analysis.
As also shown in
FIG. 8
, the service switching function
106
is linked to an intelligent peripheral
108
or equivalently a terminal unit which implements specialized functions required for intelligent network communication services. The service control point
104
may also be linked to a service administration system
110
that provides the design environment for the creation of service logic.
During operation after a message has been triggered in the service switching function
106
a request for instructions is sent from the service switching function
106
to the service control point
104
. Then, the service control point
104
performs service control in response to the request with instructions back to the service switching function
106
forwarding the service to the intelligent peripheral
108
.
The general architecture of the intelligent network concept IN is, e.g., defined by ITU-TS in the recommendation Q.1204. While in the following, the functional entities are only described as far as the present invention is concerned, further details may be taken from references van Hal, P., van der Meer, J. and Salah, N.: “The Service Script Interpreter, an Advanced Intelligent Network Platform”, Ericsson Review 67 (1990): 1, pp. 12-22, Ljungblom, F.: “A Service Management System for the Intelligent Network”, Ericsson Review 67 (1990): 1, pp. 32-41, and Söderberg, L.: “Architecture for Intelligent Networks”, Ericsson Review 66 (1989): 1, pp. 13-22 and enclosed herein by reference.
The architecture of the intelligent network shown in
FIG. 8
may be integrated into a cellular mobile network, e.g., the GSM cellular mobile network, as explained in the following with respect to FIG.
9
.
Typically, each cellular mobile network allows its users to initiate and receive calls and services, respectively, at any geographical area within the radio coverage of the home public land mobile network HPLMN operated by the network operator selected through the subscriber and also within the radio coverage areas of partners of the network operator providing services in visited public land mobile networks VPLMN.
As shown in
FIG. 9
, a link between different public land mobile networks or to any other network, e.g., the public switched telephone network PSTN is achieved through a gateway mobile services switching center GMSC. This gateway mobile services switching center GMSC is connected to a functional unit called home location register HLR where both, subscriber information and mobile information, are stored to allow incoming calls to be routed to a mobile station MS. To this end, the gateway mobile services switching center GMSC is also connected to a mobile services switching center MSC through which the mobile station MS can receive a service. This mobile service switching center MSC performs the necessary switching functions required for mobile stations MS covered by this particular mobile services switching center MSC.
Heretofore, the mobile service switching center MSC is also connected to a visitor location register VLR that dynamically stores mobile station information, such as the location area in case the mobile station is located in the service area covered by the visitor location register VLR. Therefore, in case a roaming mobile station MS enters this service area, the mobile services switching center MSC informs the associated visitor location register VLR about this roaming mobile station MS.
As is also shown in
FIG. 9
, to realize the mobile integrated intelligent network the service switching function shown in
FIG. 8
may be integrated into the mobile services switching center MSC. Further, the mobile services switching center MSC is interfaced to the service control point
104
to achieve the transparent link between mobility support communication systems, i.e. the intelligent network IN and the mobile cellular network GSM. In other words, the service control point
104
may be implemented as stand-alone node and the service switching function SSF may be integrated into the mobile services switching center MSC.
FIG. 10
shows the impact of the mobile integrated intelligent network shown in
FIG. 9
onto the operation of a pan-European universal railway communication system.
As shown in
FIG. 10
, the current intelligent network functionality relies on a dedicated service control point
114
for each subscriber being located in the home public land mobile network HPLMN of the subscriber. To illustrate the impact of this approach onto the operation of the mobile integrated intelligent network,
FIG. 10
shows a typical example where a train is, e.g., roaming from Spain via France to Germany and is currently cruising France.
In such a case, it might be necessary that a traffic controller wishes to contact the personnel on the train via the local mobile cellular network which is a visitor public land mobile network for the cruising train. Typically, the traffic controller interacts with the train driver via a MSC/VLR and the service switching function integrated therein. Thereafter, the service switching function carries out an access to subscriber record storing the address gsmSPC according to the address of the service control point
114
being located in the home public land mobile network, i.e. in Spain. As this service control point
114
executes control over the services supplied to the train driver in France, this would force the railway operators in both countries to coo
Boylan Cornelius
Kobriger Peter
Ridder John den
Tran Congvan
Trost William
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