Parlay / OSA - a new way to create wireless services
Author Zygmunt Lozinski compiled Chen Jiapeng 2003/12/16
summary
This paper briefly introduces Parlay / OSA-a joint interface that is jointly created by 65 IT and telecommunications industries. Parlay / OSA can develop fixed-network business, or it can be used to develop mobile data services and next-generation networks. Parlay / OSA provides various functions including strengthening mobile speed data services, positioning, terminal capabilities, online management, and billing.
Network operators and business providers are looking for new profitable means and new value-added services, and use it as a critical part of this communication revolution. PARLAY / OSA makes the development of telecom new business can use some fast applications in IT fields: open API, distributed computing, Java, and Web services. This article will describe the architecture of PARLAY / OSA and give some specific applications.
Keywords:
[3GPP, 3GPP2, mobile business development, open network API, OSA, open business architecture, parlay, parlay apis, parlay group, parlay-x, parlay web service, business creation, web service]
What is PARLAY / OSA?
PARLAY / OSA is an application interface (API) that allows IT developers to quickly create telecommunications services.
The PARLAY / OSA application interface is defined by the Parlay group (http://www.parlay.org/), which is a non-profit organization that is commonly involved in 65 communications and IT fields. Founded in 1999, the Parlay team has released four versions of Parlay specifications. Parlay Group companies include Alcatel, British Telecom, Ericsson, Fujitsu, HP, IBM, Incomit, Lucent, NTT, Siemens, Sun, Telcordia Technology, Italy Telecom, Teltier and other 50 North America, Europe and Asia companies. OSA is open service interface, which is referenced in 3GPP (third-generation mobile communication partner project, http://www.3gpp.org/) and 3GPP2 mobile service body association, and parlay is part of the OSA .
PARLAY / OSA also enables automation of FFA, FIELD FORCE Automation, Sales Automation (SFA, Sales Force Automation, and Banking Automation) to use existing wireless network networks and advanced intelligent networks (AIN) Resources.
PARLAY / OSA is a group of technologically unrelated APIs: they mainly designed to develop Parlay, developers, using a wide variety of languages, such as C, C, C and Java, developers. / OSA application.
Parlay / OSA is based on a variety of open standards, including CORBA, IDL, Java, UML, and Web services (SOAP, XML, and WSDL).
PARLAY / OSA architecture
The purpose of the PARLAY team is mainly to promote the integration of computer and communications, and simplify and accelerate communication applications by using development technologies in IT.
Communication and networks, hierarchical protocols play a very important role. A protocol stack puts different network functions in different hierarchies, which defines the way communication between NEs. The famous protocol stack has TCP / IP, which includes HTTP, TCP, IP and other protocols; in the field of communication, SS7 protocol stacks all corners of communication network, it is made from ISUP, TUP, MTP-3, MTP-2 and MTP -1 and other protocols. The definition and standardization of the communication protocol ensures interoperability between NEs, allowing operators to build a network with different vendors. For software development, focus on interfaces between different levels. The generic programming interface includes POSIX (APIs used in all UNIX and Linux systems) and WIN32 (APIs adopted by Microsoft WIN95 / 98/2000 systems), which are often referred to as an application interface (API). The benefit of using a general API is that the application can be independent of hardware and vendors and easily transplanted to new platforms. There are 3 million software developers worldwide. From this number, we can see the benefits of using this way, and the formation of stark contrast is that there is only 10,000 telecom business developers in the world. Prior to Parlay / OSA, standardized telecommunications development organizations such as TIA, ITU-T and ETSI mainly concentrated development agreement.
In the field of communication, general API means that we can write applications that can run on various underlying protocols without modification. For example, we can develop a Parlay / OSA app for a conference call, and software personnel can do without paying that the program runs on the IS-41 network, GSM, or SIP-based network.
PARLAY / OSA Application Interface (API)
Parlay / OSA includes a complete set of telecommunications applications, including: mobile features, positioning, on seats and availability management, call control, user interaction, messaging, content, billing, policy management. The features provided by these APIs are:
General data definition: Objects and types throughout the PARLAY specification
Frame: How to authenticate; how to find the functionality of the network; fault and load management.
Mobility: How does the application discovers the location of the terminal, how to notify the application when the terminal location changes
Terminal Function: How does the application identifies the characteristics of the terminal?
Data Session Control: How to manage terminal data sessions in GPRS and other 2.5G services is mainly used in GPRS and other 2.5G services.
In the seat and availability management: Application management expresses "Online / Leave" in the status of "meeting idle", usually used in instant messaging and wireless instant information
Account Management: Query account and billing history information
Billing: Requires content based on the business
Call Control: How to establish a normal call and multi-party call (conference), how to choose call routing and how to build multimedia calls
General Message: How the application interacts with the message system, such as voice, fax, and mail
Online Management: Management Service Quality (QoS) and Virtual Professional Network (VPN) configuration
Policy Management: How applied how the application is driven by the policy
PARLAY / OSA Framework
From PARLAY / OSA, a network operator and business provider is most concerned about how to ensure that network resources are not accessed by unauthorized users and how to defend against security. These are guaranteed by the Parlay / OSA framework. The Parlay Frame is implemented in the Parlay / OSA gateway section, which will be specifically described below. All applications and services If you want to call the Parlay / OSA API, you will need to register on the Parlay / OSA framework. The PARLAY / OSA framework is a software component that authenticates the application, returns an object reference to the Parlay / OSA function. The Parlay framework mainly solves the problem of security and availability. [Figure 1. PARLAY technology framework]
See the third part of [Parlay V2], [Parlay V3] and [Parlay V4] for the Parlay / OSA framework. How to embed communication network PARLAY / OSA
Figure 2. Parlay / OSA in the network
Parlay / OSA is equivalent to a strengthened network, or is a network specializing in business providers. The role PARLAY / OSA model of the Parlay / OSA gateway introduces a new NE-PARLAY / OSA gateway. By it, the application can use the Parlay / OSA API to deal with existing network elements. Network operators and business providers control the Parlay / OSA gateway, which is the only channel interact with Parlay / OSA. This means that the application is separated from the protocol inside the network, which can intervene in the network without affecting existing applications and services. The PARLAY / OSA gateway also implemented a Parlay framework. This provides a flexible gateway implementation, many manufacturers adopt independent gateways and various network elements such as SSP, location information servers, and policy management using local protocols (SS7 / INAP, LIF in SS7 / IP, LIF in the above case) The engine is dealing with. Ericsson's network resource gateway, Lucent's Milife Parlay Gateway and Aepona's Causeway Parlay Gateway use this implementation. This flexibility in the Parlay Gateway makes other vendors can also integrate the Parlay gateway into the existing smart network platform, such as you can put it directly in the SCP. Marconi's application media gateway is a component of the System-X SCP, and Telcordia's telephone development service gateway is also a component as an ISCP. From the operator's perspective, the PARLAY / OSA gateway that uses SS7 and IP to deal with existing network elements to provide them with more choices, they can choose different gateway products, without any modifications, they can directly and existing equipment. interconnection. Connect the application server in the enterprise to the network enterprise application adopts the IT industry standard mode, customer software (web, running on the PC) and the enterprise application interacts on the web application server, the background uses the mainframe system Database. Application Server is a key element of this solution, which is a high availability software system that supports multiple web applications at the same time. PARLAY / OSA envisionation application runs on the application server, connects to the Parlay / OSA gateway via TCP / IP. There are two scenarios for two applications. Applications and application servers reside in the same data center, support business applications, using communication service providers network devices, and query a truck or a field engineer through the Parlay / OSA API; second, application Managed by third-party ASP (application provider) manufacturer, they also interact with the network of business providers through PARLA / OSA. The role business provider of the application server in the network can use the advantages of PARLAY / OSA to provide users with satisfactory service. Many business providers are deployed in the network to run third-party business. This brings convenience to management, because our business and third-party business use a unified interface-PARLAY / OSA API. PARLAY / OSA and other industrial standards relationships in the new way to open up communication services and application interfaces, the Parlay group plays a pioneer role that keeps contact with other standards organizations and industrial groups to avoid repetitions, thus issuing a unified specification. The Parlay team provides links to other forums and industrial groups, keeping contact with them, avoiding work repeated and industrial chaos. A joint working group is set up by Parlay, 3GPP and ETSI to coordinate the work of the tripartite. 3GPP is an organization that develops third-generation mobile network specifications, and its final specification is jointly published by PARLAY and ETSI. In North America and Far East, 3GPP2 is a standard organization that is committed to transitioning existing networks to CDMA and ANSI41 networks, 3GPP2 also absorbed some technologies that are not related to the underlying network and some wireless access networks.
The Parlay team maintains a long-term cooperation with the Availability Management Forum (PAM), and the Parlay Group contains the PAM API interface in the Parlay API specification of the fourth edition. In April 2003, the PAM Forum was incorporated into the Parlay team. Paycircle is an organization that focuses on mobile billing and e-commerce technology, Paycircle and Parlay cooperation created a billing Web service specification, which is published as part of the PARLAY-X specification in April 2003. The Development-American Union (OMA) is an organization that has been established. The goal is to simplify the creation of mobile applications and services. In May 2003, Parlay and Oma signed an agreement between two parties. The Parlay specification was also introduced to China and was adopted by the Ministry of Information Industry in 2002. Parlay / OSA's benefits quickly create business PARLAY / OSA enables software developers to create commercial communication software based on the same manner. They can use different software development and development environments and combine existing development tools, such as Borland JBuilder and IBM WebSphere for Java, to create a Parlay / OSA application. Many vendors, like Ai Lixin, also equipped with Parlay / OSA test tools, which means they can test Parlay applications on a portable that runs Linux or Windows. Ericsson, IBM and TELENOR already have Parlay's actual operation experience. They found that Parlay / OSA has greatly accelerated the development of communication software compared to traditional business creation. Network-independent PARLAY / OSA API is designed to be network-independent. For a mobile data service, developers may not understand how the following networks are positioned, they just know where the position coordinates and errors are. Moreover, the developed application is easy to run on different networks, and the same procedure can even be transplanted to the fixed web. In this way, the application does not need to pay attention to how to obtain location information, but only need to handle location data. Other features are the same, such as establishing calls, content or business billing, users do not need too much understanding of internal implementation details. Vendors have nothing to do with Parlay / OSA API technology and network-independent inevitable results, that is, his vendor is unrelated. Business providers can support different equipment platforms as long as they use the same set of APIs, making it very convenient to deploy. A large number of developer standard software technology is used, meaning that people who have mastered C , Corba, or Java and EJBs can quickly learn Parlay / OSA development. There are approximately 1.5 million C and Java programmers in the world, only less than a few of the senior intelligent network (AIN) developers, and they also need very professional training to develop new business. Third-party independent software vendor (ISVS, Third Party Independent Software Vendors) A result is a result of standard software development technology that has produced a lot of independent third-party software vendors, they developed, selling Parlay / OSA business. The Parlay team officially provides a display hall, software vendors can demonstrate Parlay / OSA business programs. Parlay / OSA can do what kind of business is to look at the three application examples below, they have been successfully developed by third-party business developers. The first example in the wireless network, the first example of the seat and availability management: "Alice is meeting, can not answer the phone, but can receive text information, once the system receives a request similar to this, will automatically Establish other communication forms, such as meeting calls. This service is positioned in the business users with advanced mobile terminals, which combines the functions of the Internet and immediate messaging applications.
Users can see the status of other members of their group on its mobile terminal, know if they are currently called. Once all members are free, the user can arrange a meeting call. This service relies on PARLAY / OSA: in the seat and usability management, positioning, call control, and user interaction. Parlay business companies in the enterprise want to strengthen their brand image in conventional business contacts with users. They can use such a business, and after the user call is completed, a custom-made web page is sent to the user's phone. For example, the user ordered pizza by phone, as a prompt, he will receive a "telephone page", which gives the latest price and order quantity. This business is also suitable for business users, they can send an e-commerce card that indicates the address and the phone to a telephone customer. Parlay business in the operation network can also be used in fixed networks, many wholesale operators are planning to use it to develop new business and provide business vendors. The KPN network in the Netherlands is a good example. They provide functions such as "Will Afolded to B, and by C-Party". Many communications services to the government are based on it. The PARLAY PARLAY team consists of 65 communications and IT industries, established in 1999. The Parlay team developed and published an open API of a series of telecommunications networks that covered various telecommunications network function like call control, user interface, SMS, positioning and location alarm, billing, in the seat and availability management, and policy management. . The Parlay API interface is independent of network and technology: they are designed to use IP-based next-generation networks, as well as fixed and wireless networks currently used. The Parlay API is also used in 3GPP2 organization and the China Information Department in 3GPP open service interface (OSA). Since the Parlay / OSA specification, many manufacturers have developed support or use the Parlay API. These manufacturers from large network equipment suppliers (Alcatel, Ericsson, Lucent, Siemens, Telcordia), IT companies (HP / Compaq, IBM, Sun) to professional communication developers. By May 2003, the market has been more than 150parlay / OSA products. Figure 3. Parlay / OSA Products]
Like BT, KPN Operator, Meteor, NTT, Orange, Italy Telecom, Telia Skanova and Telsim are deploying PARLAY in their network for new business development. Parlay / OSA is a very important part of Hutchison's 3G wireless network, which is currently in use in 6 countries. More than 40 networks in the world use PARLAY / OSA V3, including Sprint of the United States. PARLAY / OSA allows operators to choose some new business models to deploy network services: it makes the core network equipment manufacturer and value-added business providers easier. PARLAY / OSA implementation
Parlay Evolution Standard Development Deployment
[Figure 4. Evolution of PARLAY]
At the end of May 2003, 45 business providers in the world were using PARLAY 3.0 or is preparing to adopt PARLAY technology. Orange Orange is a mobile operator worldwide. They said Parlay is an important element to deploy mobile data services and voice services. Orange provides these features: • Call Control [Voice Call] · User Interface [Voice Menu, Web Browse] · Mobile [Location, Availability] · Terminal Function [Handset Make, Type Etc.] • Data Session Control [GPRS, 3G session] · News [SMS, voice mail, email] · Online [connection service quality] · Account / billing [payment, prepaid, etc.] In April 2003, Orange announced that they will be with Aepona around the world Deploy the Parlay / OSA platform. Meteor Communication Meteor is a third-party operator with a mobile license in Ireland. Therefore, they need to improve market share, they are ready to achieve this with innovation business, reducing the time and increasing ARPU (average per user income). They have implemented this platform under JNETX, is preparing to speed up new business development. Meteor's experience shows that the Parlay / OSA platform can quickly establish, starting from project to providing business only 6 weeks, which is a quick development of new business. BT BT is one of the founders of the Parlay team, and he is the main NGN operator and mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) in the UK. In April 2003, BT announced that the support of Parlay / OSA will be added to the SCP to strengthen the intelligent network (IN) architecture. The aim is to simplify the development of new business and improve the manufacturer's equipment. BT Bar Parlay / OSA envisaged the key part of the 21st century network platform. Parlay / OSA's future PARLAY / OSA's specifications are still in development, while strengthening the already specified is compatible. Parlay Web Services At the same time, the Parlay team explores better web services-based, more advanced programming interfaces because the underlying facilities of the communication environment also require support for web services. In November 2002, the Parlay 4.0 specification released a WSDL binding. In November 2002, November 2002 Parlay Group issued a series of white paper-oriented white paper for Web. PARLAY-X April 2003, a Web Service Standard for Building Telecom Applications is released, which is mainly used to simplify the current web service specification. Parlay-X integrates some common communication functions that can be processed by a single SOAP message, which is mainly for those non-professional programmers. Parlay-x function is defined in a separate XML DTD interface document [PARLAY 2003]. Development of Web Services has triggered contact with other organizations such as Paycircle and OMA. Summary Under the leadership of an international organization consisting of equipment manufacturers and operators, Parlay / OSA specifications have experienced more than five years, and has now become an important part of the third generation mobile system. They are an important component for existing wireless networks and future 3G networks. PARLAY / OSA can also be used in the fixed network and IP network. Regardless of the type of network, Parlay enables them to create business faster, and can also achieve greater advantages in ease of use. Parlay / OSA allows network operators and business providers to use existing applications and services, and quickly deploy them to reduce profitable cycles. Since Parlay / OSA is based on the same application development technology, it is also very easy to connect corporate applications and telecom applications. There are 50 Palarits in the world to successfully deploy and experimental cases. Super 150 mature products, we believe that Parlay / OSA will become an important in mobile data business and fixed-line business in future telecom applications. Platform.
