The evolving role of telecommunications switching

The impact of technology changes on the capabilities of telecommunications switching systems is discussed. It is argued that to obtain a combination of rapid response to market needs, ultra-high network integrity, and continued choice of software and hardware providers, network operators will move toward the increased use of distributed communications, computing, and management environments, using a slowly evolving core transport layer and a rapidly evolving services layer in their network architectures. The emergence of broadband in the mass market will challenge physical designers to use innovative physical technologies in large switches to realize the needed interconnects and to control power consumption and dissipation. Declining transmission costs and powerful database technologies will continue to push the trend toward fewer numbers of larger switches and increased utilization of network reconfiguration at the path and facilities level     

推进差异化电信服务

介绍了电信企业推进差异化电信服务的意义,阐述了服务差异化的核心是以客户为中心、基础是客户细分,提出了推进差异化服务重在加强服务管理,关键是执行创新的建议.     

Guest editorial- Web services in telecommunications

The five articles in this special section focus on Web services in telecommunications. This feature topic provide the readership with a representative snapshot of the state of the art for innovations in Web services for telecommunication and with some concepts that may be immediately applicable to their telephony R&D programs.     

智能业务光网络的发展演进及体系结构研究

对智能业务光网络发展演进的趋势进行了分析,对演进过程中存在的主要因素进行了讨论,在此基础上提出了业务光网络的平台结构框架,并基于功能分割对业务光网络的功能框架进行了构建,对业务光网络业务层功能元件进行了提取和分析,给出了一种业务层面功能向网络技术层面功能映射的思路,对业务光网络的体系架构的研究具有参考作用.     

Trends in the standardization of telecommunications on GII,multimedia, and other network technologies and services

Global standardization is becoming more and more important in achieving a global information infrastructure (GII). Telecommunication and information standardization organizations such as the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) and International Organization for Standardization/International Electrotechnical Commission (ISO/IEC) Joint Technical Committee (JTC) have each set up special groups to focus on determining standards for GII. This article presents the activities of these organizations as they relate to GII. It also reviews the current status of standards for multimedia, asynchronous transfer mode (ATM)/broadband integrated services digital network (B-ISDN), Universal Personal Telecommunications (UPT), Future Public Land Mobile Telecommunication System (FPLMTS), and telecommunications management network (TMN), which are all key elements in GII     

RACE telecommunications management network architecture

An implementation architecture for a telecommunications management network (TMN) suitable for the management of integrated broadband communications in the CEC RACE programme is described. The architecture is intended to support the future implementation of TMN systems within Europe and elsewhere. Having outlined some of the motivations for the development of a TMN architecture, the paper introduces the various functions associated with a TMN. An overview is given of the functional and physical views of the TMN. One of the major components of any network management system is the management information base. This is described in some detail because of its central role in the architecture. Finally a list of some of the open issues still remaining concludes the paper     

An approach to the pricing of broadband telecommunications services

In this paper, we describe two cost allocation methodologies which may be used to determine prices for a regulated telecommunications supplier offering heterogeneous services on a broadband network. Both methodologies can be characterized by sets of plausible axioms that one could argue should be satisfied by any pricing rule. One of the approaches leads to the Aumann-Shapley pricing rule, which is well known in the literature. The other approach leads to a pricing rule based on the Shapley value of a related cooperative game. While these approaches are similar in motivation, they differ in the technical requirements which must be imposed on the underlying cost function, and we argue that Shapley value pricing is more appropriate in a telecommunications context. We are able to explicitly determine Shapley value prices for customers who differ from one another in terms of their arrival rates, service rates, costs of lost work, and the number of simultaneous channels which they require.     

A view of telecommunications network evolution

While deployment of new network technologies has not been steady over the years, it is useful to take a long-term view of how major new telecommunications infrastructures evolve. Since the beginning of this decade, we have witnessed the emergence of new generations of three major communication networks. This article addresses the market conditions, technology innovations, and services driving the need for intelligent all-optical, 3G wireless, and QoS-based packet networks. Market forces such as traffic and subscriber growth, equipment cost reduction, and new technology penetration have a deep impact on network buildouts. Technology innovations abound, especially in the optical domain. For example, Raman amplification, pure optical switches, and tunable lasers have had a major impact on the architecture of optical networks. Many key services, such as streaming audio and high-quality image transfer, were not possible using wireless access because of its limited bandwidth and performance. With 3G wireless technology, a true mobile Internet will become a reality. Businesses have shied away from the use of the public Internet because of service quality. Thanks to advances in MPLS and service intelligence, this is expected to change. For each type of network, we survey the key factors shaping its evolution and implications on network architectures.     

Transmission quality of evolving telephone services

Various aspects of transmission quality in evolving telephone services are reviewed and summarized from the customer's point of view. The evolution of the public switched telephone network is described. Quality specification methodology is examined, covering transmission standards, the room environment, and quality measures. Transmission quality in mixed analog and digital operation and in advanced telephone services are considered. Future telephone services are discussed     

I'll be seeing you [telecommunications services]

The face of telecommunications services for the future is taking shape now. Here, the author predicts that although the development of telecommunications has not been slow, the rapid advance of key technologies, along with increasing competition, will produce conditions in future years closer to revolution than evolution. Market opportunities will be huge and the impact all-pervasive. Besides the obvious benefits for the IT industry, an intelligent broadband network could bring major benefits to all aspects of the UK economy     

Communications network planning in the evolving information age

Communications networks are undergoing major changes in equipment technologies, network architectures, and service offerings. These changes reflect the new capabilities of the evolving information age: high bandwidth technologies, flexible and controllable networks utilizing advanced database and signaling systems, and intelligent network elements. Planning these new communications networks presents a major challenge. However, information age technologies also allow the design of efficient and flexible processes and systems to plan new modern networks. In fact, these new database oriented, intelligent planning systems must evolve in synchronism with the new information age communications networks. In the long term, as the networks increase in flexibility and intelligence, the networks themselves can take over many of the responsibilities of network planning and administration, leaving planners to study business strategies and new network architectures and services. In any event, planning decisions, whether made by the network or the planner, will be based on large amounts of information that are efficiently organized and quickly processed by the integrated network and operations support systems.     

电信新业务对通信业的影响

根据电信企业经营业务的时间长短,电信业务可分为传统业务和新业务。其中电信传统业务是指普通电话业务（本地网电话、国内长途电话和国际长途电话）。电信新业务是电信企业为适应社会使用电信服务的需要和通信技术的发展而兴办不久的业务。现有的电信新业务主要有：电话信息服务台业务、智能电话业务、个人通信业务、计算机数据互联业务、可视图文业务、电子信箱业务、会议电视业务和虚拟专用网业务等。可以预见,随着通信技术的进一步发展,电信业务的种类将会越来越多。电信新业务和传统业务的现状及发展趋势我国电信新业务发展迅速,而…     

On the evaluation of telecommunications network reliability usingrouting models

A reliability measure that takes into account routing and rerouting policies after failures as well as the capacity of the network to satisfy its demand is proposed. The measure, based on the evaluation of the lost call traffic, needs resolution of a routing model for the states of perfect functioning as well as the most probable failure states. A type of routing model useful for network planning is also proposed. The model is closer to reality and easier to implement than the other classical multicommodity formulations. A convex-simplex implementation with a reoptimization feature explicitly adapted to the proposed model is used     

Business and residential services for the evolving subscriber loop

The role of new loop technologies in providing new and valuable services from increasingly dynamic and intelligent networks is examined. Important market trends in business services are discussed, and the needs of large business customers are considered. Evolutionary service opportunities for the low-end market are identified. It is shown that meeting the total communications needs of large corporate enterprises necessarily involves providing much improved communications capabilities to the low end of the market. The role of the advanced intelligent network is considered     

Present state and future plans of telecommunications services inHungary

The paper reviews the current state and the development strategies of telecommunications in Hungary. Telephone systems are predominantly analog, with a relatively low main-line penetration ratio (14.5% by the end of 1993) and several years waiting time. Advanced telecommunications services are scarcely established. However, the significance of telecommunications has been recognized, therefore intensive development and modernization plans were formed, the legislative environment has been liberalized, the state-owned network operator has been partly privatized, and the full restructuring of the telecommunication sector is in process. Over the last several years, Hungary focused on the basic network infrastructure and fixed telephone service, but mobile telephony was also urgently required for the rapid satisfaction of business needs. The need to join Europe accelerates the pace of digitalization and the introduction of new telecommunication services, as well as the establishment of international cooperation to harmonize the expansion of international links. The paper summarizes the general features and development goals for this decade     

Benders decomposition algorithms for the fixed-charge relay network design in telecommunications

In translucent networks, signal regenerators that operate based on optical/electrical/optical (O/E/O) conversion are employed to handle the problems of physical impairments and resulting signal quality issues in long-distance transmissions. Regenerators are placed at the relay nodes in a translucent network in such a way that the optical signals are not transmitted farther than a threshold distance without a 3R regeneration (reamplification-reshaping-retiming). In this study, we consider a fixed-charge relay network design (FCRND) problem whose applications are found mainly in long distance translucent optical telecommunication networks. From a modeling perspective, FCRND combines prominent features of the uncapacitated single-assignment hub location (location of relays points) and the fixed-charge network design problems (choice of transmission links in the network and routing of signals) while additionally considering distance-based coverage constraints. We devise Benders decomposition based solution methodologies in which the algorithmic performance is further enhanced by devising strengthened and disaggregated Benders cuts, surrogate constraints for the master problem, and an upper bound heuristic to both obtain and tighten optimality Benders cuts. We obtain solutions within 2.0 % of optimality in very reasonable times as we illustrate in our computational study.     

Web services in telecommunications, part II [guest editorial]

The five articles in Part II of this feature topic focus on practical articles covering web services in telecommunications. The articles are summarized here.