A multilevel framework for the attribute description of telecommunication services

Abstract

AbstractTelecommunication services are traditionally described from the terminal viewpoint, including the user interaction with the service, as well as the specific terminal characteristics to the network that it is meant for. Also traditionally the instance of the telecommunication service was a call and a connection as a one‐to‐one couple.Nowadays networks with powerful multimedia/multiconnection/multiparty capabilities require that a telecommunication service should not be described any more as a conglomerate, but by its main service elements, which in turn are supported by other service elements, so that a service may be built up by building blocks in a levelled model.The criteria to be considered to find these elements are the user viewpoint, the information coding (or terminal) viewpoint and the network access viewpoint. This leads to the telecommunication service, party, party edge, user service module and abstract service module as pure user‐dependent service elements, the service module for the terminal aspect, and the access connection element for transfer of the information over the network.All these basic service elements are ordered in a levelled structure called a multilevel framework. Each level or co‐level represents a service element type which may be instantiated as a service object, and which is described statically by a table of attributes. Attributes for each level are listed and clarified.An example describing a well‐known service is given to illustrate the use of the framework.The views expressed in this document have been developed by the RACE 2044 MAGIC.RACE: Research into Advanced Communication Technologies for Europe. MAGIC: Multi‐service Applications Governing Integrated Control. The concepts presented are related to Release 2 and 3 for BISDN as defined in ITU‐T.