Telephonic communications – Plural exchange network or interconnection
Reexamination Certificate
1999-10-19
2003-07-15
Tieu, Benny Q. (Department: 2642)
Telephonic communications
Plural exchange network or interconnection
C379S221080, C379S229000, C709S241000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06594355
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates generally to intelligent network systems for providing telecommunications services, and specifically, to a methodology for performing services in response to service requests received at a switch associated with an intelligent communications network.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
A network service is a function performed by a communications network, such as data or telephony, and its associated resources in response to an interaction with one or more subscribers. For example, a telephony network resident service, such as call forwarding or voice mail access, can be invoked by a subscriber by dialing a special sequence of digits. Other network services may be directed at assisting a network owner with security, validation, and authentication. Adding or modifying a service requires changes to be made in the communications network.
Most conventional telecommunication networks are composed of interconnected switches and communication services. These switches are controlled by integrated or imbedded processors operated by proprietary software or firmware designed by the switch manufacturer. Typically, the switch manufacturer's software or firmware must support all functional aspects of service processing, call processing, facility processing and network management. This means that when a network owner wishes to implement a new service or modify an existing service, the software of every switch in the network must be revised by the various switch manufacturers.
The fact that the network contains different switch models from different manufacturers requires careful development, testing and deployment of the new software. The time required to develop, test and deploy the new software is lengthened because the code size at each switch grows larger and more complex with each now revision. Thus, this process can take several years. In addition, this increased complexity further burdens the switch processors, increases the chances for switch malfunction, and may require the modification or replacement of the switch.
Moreover, the fact that multiple network owners depend upon a common set of switch manufacturers results in two undesirable situations that limit competition. First, a manufacturers' software release may attempt to incorporate changes requested by several network owners, thus preventing the network owners from truly differentiating their services from the services provided by their competition. This also forces some network owners to wait until the manufacturer incorporates requests from other network owners into the new release. Second, a switch software release incorporating a function as requested by one network owner to implement a new service can unintentionally become accessible to other network owners.
These problems have become intolerable as the demand for new network services has increased exponentially over the last five to ten years due to increased subscriber mobility, increased variety and bandwidth of traffic, dissolution of traditional numbering plans, more sophisticated services and increased competition. Thus, it is widely recognized that new network architectures need to incorporate a more flexible way of creating, deploying and executing service logic. In order to fully appreciate the novel architecture of the present invention hereinafter described, the following description of the relevant prior art is provided with reference to
FIGS. 1-4
.
Referring to
FIG. 1
, a logical representation of various switching architectures, including the present invention, is shown. A monolithic switch, which is denoted generally as
20
, contains service processing functions
22
, call processing functions
24
, facility processing functions
26
and a switch fabric
28
. All of these functions
22
,
24
,
26
and
28
are hard-coded, intermixed and undifferentiated, as symbolized by the group
30
. Moreover, functions
22
,
24
,
26
and
28
are designed by the switch manufacturer and operate on proprietary platforms that vary from manufacturer to manufacturer. As a result, these functions
22
,
24
,
26
and
28
cannot be modified without the aid of the manufacturer, which slows down service development and implementation, and increases the cost of bringing a new service to market. The development of new and innovative services, call processing, data processing, signal processing and network operations are, therefore, constrained by the manufacturer's control over their proprietary switch hardware and software, and the inherent difficulty of establishing and implementing industry standards.
The service processing functions
22
are encoded within the monolithic switch
20
and only allow local control of this process based on local data contents and the number dialed. This local information is interpreted by a hard-coded process engine that carries out the encoded service function. The call processing functions
24
are hard-coded and provide call origination and call termination functions. This process actually brings up and takes down individual connections to complete a call. Likewise, the facility processing functions
26
are also hard-coded and provide all data processing relating to the physical resources involved in a call. The switch fabric
28
represents the hardware component of the switch and the computer to run the monolithic software provided by the switch manufacturer, such as Northern Telecom, Inc. The switch fabric
28
provides the physical facilities necessary to establish a connection and may include, but is not limited to, bearer devices (Tl's and DSO's), switching matrix devices (network planes and their processors), link layer signal processors (SS
7
, MTP, ISDN, LAPD) and specialized circuits (conference ports, audio tone detectors).
In an attempt to address the previously described problems, the International Telecommunications Union and the European Telecommunication Standards Institute endorsed the ITU-T Intelligent Network Standard (“IN”). Similarly, Bellcore endorsed the Advanced Intelligent Network Standard (“AIN”). Although these two standards differ in presentation and evolutionary state, they have almost identical objectives and basic concepts. Accordingly, these standards are viewed as a single network architecture in which the service processing functions
22
are separated from the switch.
Using the IN and AIN architectures, a network owner could presumably roll out a new service by creating and deploying a new Service Logic Program (“SLP”), which is essentially a table of Service Independent Building Blocks (“SIBB”) to be invoked during a given type of call. According to this approach, a number of specific element types inter-operate in conjunction with a SLP to provide services to network subscribers. As a result, any new or potential services are limited by the existing SIBBS.
The In or AIN architecture, which is denoted generally as
40
, logically separates the functions of the monolithic switch
20
into a Service Control Point (“SCP”)
42
, and a Service Switching Point (“SSP”) and Switching System
44
. The SCP
42
contains the service processing functions
22
, whereas the SSP and Switching System
44
contain the call processing functions
24
, facility processing functions
26
and the switch fabric
28
. In this case, the call processing functions
24
, facility processing functions
26
and the switch fabric
28
are hard-coded, intermixed and undifferentiated, as symbolized by the group
46
.
The Service Switching Point (“SSP”) is a functional module that resides at a switch in order to recognize when a subscriber's signaling requires more than simple routing based solely upon the number dialed. The SSP suspends further handling of the call while it initiates a query for correct handling of the call to the remote SCP
42
, which essentially acts as a database server for a number of switches. This division of processing results in the offloading of the infrequent, yet time consuming task of handling special service calls, from the sw
Deo Ajay P.
Porter Kelvin R.
Wang Henry
Tieu Benny Q.
WorldCom, Inc.
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