T1: Where we need to be: NMF priorities for the coming year

Abstract:

What are the current burning issues for service providers? Achieving end-to-end process flow-through, linking their systems with those of their customers and peer providers, and managing unprecedented network demand with greater efficiency than in the past.

What does this mean for NMF? A three-pronged attack on the key shortcomings preventing effective automation and systems integration:

• business and technical agreements on what information should be exchanged between management systems in order to better manage service fulfillment, service assurance and billing,
• technology selections that are fit for purpose and take advantage of off-the-shelf offerings as service providers and suppliers build a new OSS structure, and
• a comprehensive approach to unlocking the software development industry for telecom, including an emphasis on object-oriented information modeling, and identification of key reusable application components that can speed development of management systems.

This tutorial will cover NMF's direction, its current programs, and what it has achieved to date, including the implementation of breakthrough concepts:

• Solution Sets and Component Sets: making the business connection to standards
• Business Process Models for service and network management: looking at end-to-end linkage
• Technology-neutral information modeling: a way to future-proof hard-won business agreements
• The application of procurement muscle to drive vendor behavior

NMF is a global consortium where service providers and suppliers develop practical solutions for cost-effective integration of support systems for improved management of services and networks.

Recommended Audience: Senior and middle level business, technical and planning executives from both service providers and their suppliers who are responsible for service strategy and delivery or product strategy and development.

Level: Intermediate

T2: Web-based Systems and Network Management

Abstract:

Today's enterprise networks are composed of interconnected networks of various devices, systems and services supporting a wide variety of applications within an organization. Providing a secure, reliable and efficient operating environment to support the organization's daily activities and its business is the most challenging task faced by the operations and management staff today. Current management practices typically involve using separate, incompatible tools and techniques for managing networks, systems and applications. What is desperately needed is a simple, uniform framework for managing not only networks but also systems and applications. Web-based management is a promising approach that can provide a truly integrated management solution.

This tutorial will include an overview of emerging technologies involved in Web-based system and network management. Technologies such as HTTP, HTML, Java, and Web server operational considerations are introduced and explored. Representative shipping products as well as analysis of emerging Web-based management standards and frameworks, such as WBEM and WBEM PDK, Advent Java SNMP Package, JMAPI and Solstice Workshop, and MRTG will be examined. We will discuss how all these will impact the future of system and network management.

Recommended Audience: The audience includes network managers, application vendors, and programmers considering developing or developing Web-based management systems for their networks and products.

Level: Intermediate

T3: PCS/Mobility Management

Mehmet Ulema (Daewoo Telecom, USA)

Wireless Personal Communications Services (PCS), a family of telecommunications Services supporting personal, handset, and service mobility, is the fastest growing segment of the telecommunications industry. After providing an overview of the architectures, interfaces, and protocols being implemented for wireless communications, the tutorial will concentrate on the network management aspects of the PAS. The mobility management issues (e. g., handover, roaming) will be discussed in detail. The network management related issuers including TMN architecture and information modeling for wireless networks, will be presented in more details with examples. The tutorial is suitable for managers, system planners, designers and those with general interest in wireless communications in general and network management for wireless communication networks in particular. Some basic knowledge of wireless communications and network management issues will be assumed.

Level: Intermediate

T4: Building Integrated TMN Solutions Using Multiple Technologies

Graham Chen (CiTR Pty Ltd, Australia)

The world wide competition and deregulation in the Telco industry has increased the need for building a management system, where the service offering, creation, provisioning, management, and implementation based on the network management functions are all integrated in a single architecture. Similar to other industries, Telco industry cannot take the approach to break with its past to invent a holy grail solution, instead, it must take the direction to protect and leverage the existing investment in the management technology to re-engineer, reuse and integrate the existing processes, solutions and technologies.

This tutorial addresses the issues of building such integrated system. We propose an integrated TMN management system with a Java-based user environment, a CORBA-based distributed service management environment and an OSI-based network and element management environment. To demonstrate the concept of the integrated architecture, we will share with you CiTR's experiences of building integrated service, network and element management systems using platforms such as:

• agent development tools
• network management platforms such as HP OpenView
• CORBA-based management platforms such as HP OpenView CORBA and its services
• Java and web-based development environment

We will demonstrate our effort to build the following systems:

• the customer management system based on the NMF's SMART program,
• the service management system based on the SMART Ordering, Configuration and Performance management, and
• the distributed network management systems for SDH and ATM connection management based on ATMF and ETSI specifications

The tutorial will cover the following material:

• The analysis of the requirements and characteristics of different TMN management domains
• The analysis of different management technologies and their roles in different TMN management domain
• The approaches and analysis of different integration strategies for building distributed and scalable TMN management solutions, in particular, the integration of CORBA and OSI
• The case studies of using these strategies to build integrated solutions such as SDH/ATM connection management, SMART service management systems, etc.

Recommended Audience: Technical Managers and Professionals concerned with building integrated TMN applications for multiple domains (EML, NML, SML) and using multiple management technologies (OSI, CORBA, etc.), and who wish to find out the different integration approaches and learn from author's experiences and lessons from building such integrated systems.

Level: Intermediate

T5: ATM/B-ISDN Network Management

Young-Tak Kim (Yeungnam Univ., Korea)

This tutorial will cover the up-to-date technologies for ATM/B-ISDN network management. First, the TMN (Telecommunications Management Network) architecture for the management of B-ISDN is explained. The functional requirement and procedure of configuration management, connection management, performance management, and fault management of B-ISDN are explained in detail. The OAM (Operation, Administration and Maintenance) functions of layer management in ATM protocol are also explained in relation to the TMN management functions.

Recommended Audience: Network Operator, Network Manager, ATM/B-ISDN Network Equipment Developer, Network System Developer

Level: Intermediate

Takaaki Matsumoto (NTT/Japan)

As a telecommunications service provider, NTT has a primary responsibility to provide various network services. Many IT systems are used to maintain these functions. Most of these systems must interact to achieve the desired goals. So different specifications of IT platforms provided by different vendors cause us a great disadvantage. In 1988, NTT started a very aggressive open systems initiative, the MIA initiative, and has developed standard-based procurement specifications for a computing platform including programming languages, transaction processing, communications, and system management. Many service providers in the world began to possess the same feeling. Then, in 1993, worldwide telecommunication service providers and vendors established the SPIRIT initiative under the NMF umbrella to enable the procurement of off-the-shelf computers from a wide variety of vendors. Then, NMF has launched the Platform/Technology program to assess and position technologies including distributed processing, object-oriented, and Internet, and to develop and enhance specifications including the SPIRIT specifications.

In this tutorial, I will discuss the followings:

Recommended Audience: Senior and middle level business and technical people from both service providers and vendors

Level: Intermediate