Service Convergence Based Service Creation For Next-Generation Networks

The demands for various telecommunication services are increasing and become moreand more strong. How to guarantee services to be created rapidly and even can be customizedis a problem to be solved immediately. Compared with traditional approaches, service creationin Next-Generation Networks (NGN) gives rise to new opportunities and challenges. One mainchallenge is to provide value-added services spanning heterogeneous networks;Anotherchallenge is to find a flexible and easy way for service creation. The purpose of this paper isjust to study such a framework that can suit for NGN service creation, deployment andimplementation. Thus the study has theoretical significance and practical foreground. Theoriginal results are as follows:(1) A service creation principle framework based on service convergence. The concept ofService is the key when studying next-generation service creation. This paper first proposes thedefinition of service and its characteristics. Next-generation service is not the composition orreplacement of current services, but the experience-oriented one. It is in the middle layerbetween bottom network and top application;and it is richer in its content. The currentresearchs on service creation models lack of formalized description and quantitative analysis.The paper proposes a service creation model based on service convergence. Compared with themodel based on network convergence, the complexity of the proposed model is O(n) below.We then define a coupling factor as a metric to evaluate our model on its open capability. Thecomplexity computation result shows that our model is more understandable, maintainable andreuseable than the model based on network convergence. Based on the proposed model, wepropose two criteria that NGN service creation should depend on: vertical openness andhorizontal integration;and the several attributes belonging to the two criteria are proposed.According to these principles, the paper proposes a hierarchical framework for service creation.The open ability is then further expanded and the ability for service creation is also increased.(2) Next-Generation service creation platform ParlayGS based on Parlay and OGSA.Based on the proposed principle framework, we study and compare the existing technologies.The paper imports open services capability standard Parlay, which screens network protocoldetails and opens network service capabilities. However, Parlay can't realize global servicesintegration and management. So we further study the current distributed computingtechnologies and import Open Grid Services Architecture (OGSA) as the integration criteria.Compared with the existing approaches, ParlayGS implements the open and integration criteriaall in one. It can better satisfy all the attributes of next-generation service creation.(3) The service creation mechanisms of ParlayGS. First, the mapping mechanism betweenParlay and the bottom network protocols. According to the general approaches includingaddress resolution, entity mapping, message mapping, the paper study the mapping betweenParlay and SIP. We solve the ambiguous mapping problems between Parlay entities and SIPentities and implement a Parlay-SIP call control gateway. The gateway is verified effective.Such mapping also provides basis for the network capabilities to be further opened to Gridplatform. Second, how to realize the communication collaboration between Parlay and OGSAis another key issue of ParlayGS. We propose a Service-Oriented Model,PGCOM. Third, thispaper proposes synchronization and integration mechanisms for services integration. Themechanisms can also support loose-coupled services integration. These studies can show that,as the supporting platform for service creation, ParlayGS is feasible.Compared with the traditional teleco-services creation, all the proposals in this paperimport a lot of new concepts and architectures. We carry out experiments on simulationplatform and real network respectively. On the simulation platform, we open a short messageservice through PGCOM, and integrate it with the other Grid services. So we implementvalue-added services based on ParlayGS. In the real network, we open SIP capabilities throughParlay-SIP gateway, and integrate them with a timer Grid service. So the open and integrationcharacteristics of ParlayGS are verified. Based on all the experiments, we compare theParlayGS with the service creation approaches in traditional telecommunication network,intelligent network, Parlay. We draw a conclusion: ParlayGS has better abilities in servicecreation and it can support traditional terminals.Service convergence based next-generation service creation provides flexible platform forservice open and integration. Through ParlayGS, traditional teleco-services can combine withricher Grid services and satisfy people's requirements better. And service development turns tobe easy, flexible and low cost. The research in this paper also discusses a new idea ofcombining the computer technologies and telecommunication technologies to solve theproblem of NGN service creation. To apply Grid technologies to the teleco-services creation isa new and significant attempt. It can be believed, next-generation networks will become thebasic force for the whole information development if the problems of service interworking besolved.