Signaling System No.7: a tutorial

A tutorial overview of the salient features of SS7 is provided. Its history is briefly reviewed, and the SS7 network services part (NSP), which corresponds to the first three layers of the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) Reference Model, is described. Signaling network structures that, in conjunction with the NSP, provide integrated services digital network (ISDN) nodes with a highly reliable and efficient means of exchanging signaling messages are discussed. The nodal capabilities of connection (call) control and remote process invocation and management and other functions of the user parts of SS7 are examined. The very stringent performance requirements of signaling systems, which reflect the critical nature of signaling functions and their real-time exigencies, are stressed. A broad outline of the likely evolution of ISDN signaling systems in the remaining years of this century is sketched     

Signaling System No.7 in corporate networks

Corporate network user requirements are identified. The significance of Signaling System No.7 (SS7), in corporate network as a separate backbone signaling system for implementing a robust, flexible and transparent communication network is discussed. The architecture for a corporate network utilizing enhanced signaling is described. The use of SS7 instead of the integrated services digital network primary rate interface (ISDN PRI) is explored. Some SS7 applications in corporate networks are examined     

Current role and future evolution of the ISDN Signaling system inNTT's network

The current role of the integrated services digital network (ISDN) Signaling System is examined, covering general features of the ISDN protocol, functionalities supporting ISDN services, and functionalities supporting existing services. The Signaling System No.7 (SS7) network and its operation are described. The future evolution of the ISDN signaling system is discussed     

Routing and congestion control in common channel Signaling SystemNo.7

The routing and congestion control function of Signaling System No.7 (SS7) are described. The elements of the SS7 protocol functional division include message transfer part (MTP), signaling correction control part (SCCP), ISDN user part (ISUP), and transaction capabilities (TC). The routing function, which takes place at the MTP and SCCP, and the congestion control function, which is present in multiple layers, are discussed. This includes MTP level 2, MTP level 3 by signaling traffic flow control procedures, and flow control for connection-oriented services of SCCP. To illustrate the unique capabilities present in SS7, the routing and congestion control functions in SS7 are compared to other common connectionless network layers. Performance considerations in routing and congestion control are discussed     

Evolving intelligent interexchange network-an SS7 perspective

The role of common channel signaling, referred to as Signaling System No.7 (SS7), in the evolution of services in an interexchange carrier environment is discussed. The importance of SS7 in evolving the intelligent network necessary to support these services is addressed. Interworking with virtual private networks via the out-of-band ISDN messaging channel (D-channel) to extend the capabilities of SS7 network signaling to customer networks is also discussed. For ubiquitous support of ISDN, CLASS, and future services, the interworking of interexchange SS7 with domestic local exchange carriers as well as foreign administrations is critical. This service and intelligent network evolution is described. Emphasis is placed on services and the anticipated migration to those types of services which demand an intelligent interaction and close coupling of both virtual private networks and local public switched networks to the interexchange network     

Common channel signaling for international service applications

The message transfer, telephone user, and integrated services digital network (ISDN) user parts of CCITT Signaling System No.7 (SS7) are described. The introduction of SS7 to provide control of international circuits is described. The intent is to provide a perspective on the advantages of using common channel signaling for ISDN     

Common channel signaling in the AT&T US 5ESS switch

A brief history of the evolution that has led to the development of Signaling System No.7 (SS7) capabilities on the 5ESS switch is presented, and the hardware and software components that provide the SS7 functionality for the 5ESS switch are described. Specifically, the functionality provided by the Common Network Interface (CNI) ring, which has been used on several AT&T SS7 products is discussed. The 5ESS switch-specific common channel signaling (CCS) transport software (which is responsible for the transport of SS7 messages among 5ESS switch processing elements), the user interfaces (which provide customer administration of switch data, color display of status information, reports on the state of the SS7 network, and the tests to verify message routing through the network), and message routing itself are discussed. The SS7 ISDN user part (ISUP) and transaction capabilities application (TCAP) functionalities implemented in 5ESS switch software are described in terms of how they fit into the 5ESS switch architecture. SS7 call handling capacities and the ways in which reliability challenges are met are described     

Implementation of SS7: Italtel's experience

Field results in implementing Signaling system No.7 (SS7) in preparation for the introduction of intelligent network (IN) services are reported. Besides implementing SS7 for interexchange trunk signaling, Italtel has adapted it for communications with remote units, i.e. remote switching modules and subscriber multiplexers and concentrators. IN implementation in a distributed system is discussed. The distributed architecture of the Linea UT intelligent network is described     

Congestion and flow control in Signaling System No. 7-impacts ofintelligent networks and new services

Focuses on the transient performance analysis of the congestion and flow control mechanisms in CCITT Signaling System No. 7 (SS7). Special attention is directed to the impacts of the introduction of intelligent services and new applications, e.g., Freephone, credit card services, user-to-user signaling, etc. In particular, the authors show that signaling traffic characteristics like signaling scenarios or signaling message length as well as end-to-end signaling capabilities have a significant influence on the congestion and flow control and, therefore, on the real-time signaling performance. One important result of the performance studies is that if, e.g., intelligent services are introduced, the SS7 congestion and flow control does not work correctly. To solve this problem, some reinvestigations into these mechanisms would be necessary. Therefore, some approaches, e.g., modification of the signaling connection control part (SCCP) congestion control, usage of the SCCP relay function, or a redesign of the message transfer part (MTP) flow control procedures are discussed in order to guarantee the efficacy of the congestion and flow control mechanisms also in the future     

Signaling System No.7, IS-41 and cellular telephony networking

Globally, the common channel Signaling System No.7 (SS7) has grown and matured over the past five years in two directions. Outside of the US, the development of CCITT Signaling System No.7 (C7) has grown largely due to the need for modern call completion capabilities in national telephone networks. Within the US, SS7 has evolved from the need to provide fast and reliable database services to the support of the custom calling features to the local exchange carrier (LEC) networks. The 1990s will further accelerate the requirements for network solutions to customer needs, especially in the rapidly growing cellular telephony industry. These network solutions are forcing the merger of call delivery and database services in both the SS7 and C7 worlds. The issues, concerns, and difficulties with the merger of these functions are discussed     

Assuring SS7 dependability: a robustness characterization ofsignaling network elements

Current and evolving telecommunication services will rely on signaling network performance and reliability properties to build competitive call and connection control mechanisms under increasing demands on flexibility without compromising on quality. The dimensions of signaling dependability most often evaluated are the rate of call loss and end-to-end route unavailability. A third dimension of dependability that captures the concern about large or catastrophic failures can be termed network robustness. The paper is concerned with the dependability aspects of the evolving Signaling System No. 7 (SS7) networks and attempts to strike a balance between the probabilistic and deterministic measures that must be evaluated to accomplish a risk-trend assessment to drive architecture decisions. Starting with high-level network dependability objectives and field experience with SS7 in the U.S., potential areas of growing stringency in network element (NE) dependability are identified to improve against current measures of SS7 network quality, as per-call signaling interactions increase. A sensitivity analysis is presented to highlight the impact due to imperfect coverage of duplex network component or element failures (i.e., correlated failures), to assist in the setting of requirements on NE robustness. A benefit analysis, covering several dimensions of dependability, is used to generate the domain of solutions available to the network architect in terms of network and network element fault tolerance that may be specified to meet the desired signaling quality goals     

Signaling System No.7 local exchange deployment

The author examines the deployment of Signaling System No.7 (SS7) from the viewpoint of the local exchange carrier. The three phases of local exchange deployment-service planning and design, local exchange network design, and interconnection design-are discussed in sequence. SS7 is a fundamental change to the infrastructure of the local exchange telecommunications network. The author describes how the backbone network, centered on the signaling transfer points (STPs), is installed first, followed by the local exchange network, and then interconnection to interchange and other networks     

The role of ISDN signaling in global networks

A historical context is provided for integrated services digital network (ISDN) to give some perspective on how the current signaling capabilities have evolved. A communications architecture is introduced and used to organize the discussion of the ISDN protocols (i.e. DSS1 and SS7) and to highlight the role of signaling in the overall architecture. The architecture defines a functional partitioning of the capabilities of ISDN, which is used to compare and contrast the DSS1 and SS7 protocols and to discuss the interfaces that support global intelligent networks. The purpose is to illustrate the similarity between the DSS1 and SS7 control protocols. The likely evolution of the ISDN protocols is discussed, showing their convergence toward a single control protocol based on the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) protocols     

Analysis of the link error monitoring protocols in the commonchannel signaling network

Motivated by the excessive link status changes observed in some field operations of the common channel signaling (CCS) network, the authors provide a detailed analysis of the signaling link error monitoring algorithms in the Signaling System No. 7 (SS7) protocol. These algorithms determine when to fail a link due to excessive error rates and when to put a failed link back into service. The analysis shows that, under current SS7 specifications of the error monitoring algorithms, the probability of a signaling link oscillating in and out of service could be high, depending on the traffic load, signal unit size, and the statistical nature of errors (bursty or random). The link oscillation phenomenon could become worse as longer Transaction Capability Application Part (TCAP) messages for transaction-based services (e.g., 800 Service) are carried in the CCS networks. While the risk to the existing network may not be high due to the light loads carried at present, there is still a need to study the error monitoring issues thoroughly     

Common channel signaling interface for local exchange carrier tointerexchange carrier interconnection

Issues associated with the interconnection of common channel signaling (CCS) networks are identified. Protocol additions to support exchange access services are discussed. Possible extensions for circuit-switched services beyond basic exchange access, as well as further extensions of Signaling System No.7 to support non-circuit-associated signaling between carriers, are described     

A control mechanism to prevent correlated message arrivals fromdegrading Signaling No. 7 network performance

Signaling System No. 7 (SS7) is designed to provide a connectionless transfer of signaling messages of reasonable length. Customers having access to user signaling bearer capabilities as specified in the ANSI T1.623 and CCITT Q.931 standards can send bursts of correlated messages (e.g., by doing a file transfer that results in the segmentation of a block of data into a number of consecutive signaling messages) through SS7 networks. These message bursts with short interarrival times could have an adverse impact on the delay performance of the SS7 networks. A control mechanism, credit manager, is investigated in this paper to regulate incoming traffic to the SS7 network by imposing appropriate time separation between messages when the incoming stream is too bursty. The credit manager has a credit bank where credits accrue at a fixed rate up to a prespecified credit bank capacity. This paper presents simulation results showing delay performance of the SS7 ISUP and TCAP message traffic with a range of correlated message traffic, and control parameters of the credit manager (i.e., credit generation rate and bank capacity) are determined that ensure the traffic entering the SS7 network is acceptable. The results show that control parameters can be set so that for any incoming traffic stream there is no detrimental impact on the SS7 ISUP and TCAP message delay, and the credit manager accepts a wide range of traffic patterns without causing significant delay     

PROMS: a PRO‐active Monitoring System for SS7 networks

In this paper, we propose a PRO‐active Monitoring System (PROMS) for SS7 networks, which actively monitors all signaling network management messages of SS7 networks, alerts operators when there is a potential network error, and provides intelligent diagnosis based on fuzzy logic and neural networks. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Multipoint multimedia conferencing

The development of multipoint multimedia services for conferencing is described. The use of integrated services digital network (ISDN) as part of the work carried out in the European collaborative projects Multipoint Interactive Audiovisual Communication (MIAC) and Multipoint Interactive Audiovisual System (MIAS) is emphasized. The history of multipoint teleconferencing, the different types of multipoint conferencing systems, and protocol requirements for multipoint multimedia conferencing systems are also discussed