Automated Testing of Session Border Controller in Simulated Production Environment

Abstract

Abstract: A Session Border Controller plays a crucial role in Unified Communications, Contact Centre Modernization and Cloud communication Services. Therefore, testing the functionality of SBC is extremely critical to the modern communication infrastructure. Testing various call scenarios through the SBC by manually making call through devices is cumbersome, timeconsuming and error-prone. Session Border Controller (SBC) devices sit in between a lot of traffic in a service provider or VoIP infrastructure and thus testing the SBC to see if all most relevant call scenarios are tested is a must in today’s production SBC environment. To enable an automated tested approach, we have simulated the setup of a real production environment SBC and tested the calls using SIPp scripts to test all the relevant VoIP call scenarios. This paper covers a methodology on how to test Session Border Controllers to be robust and reliable to be deployed in enterprise and service provider customers. This paper demonstrates how to make these simulated calls using automated scripts using an XML (eXtensibke Markup Language) based scripting tool called SIPp. To verify these tests, an opensource and free packet sniffer like Wireshark is used to follow through and check if all the intended calls have taken place. In this paper, we perform thirteen of the most relevant SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) calls by running scripts at the endpoints of our setup. The proposed approach of testing SBC makes the overall process of testing easier through automating via scripts and also allows a novice with basic understanding of the Session Initiation Protocol to test and debug issues related to the SBC faster