Communication services are evolving at an unprecedented rate. No longer limited to interpersonal vocal communication, they now integrate functions such as address books, content sharing and messaging. The emergence of social networks – which may also include these features – is an important element of this transformation. Content services are becoming flagship services themselves, and are sometimes paired up with conversation services. The boundaries between different services are becoming less and less distinct. This book meets the need for a better understanding of communication services, and for a general framework of their description. A detailed overview on service architecture in the Telco, Web and IT worlds is presented, offering a roadmap with explanations on how to improve the architecture and governance of communication service architectures by exploiting the syntax and semantics that are common to different services is clearly outlined. This book also responds to recurring questions about service design, such as the functional scope of enablers or SOA (Service Oriented Architecture) services, the relevance of service composition to the user and collaboration between different services in a converged environment. Many concrete examples from telecoms service providers’ operations illustrate these concepts.

Contents

1. Describing Service Architectures.
2. Convergence of Service.
3. Building an Architectural Framework for Telecom Services.
4. Modeling and Case Study.
5. Organizational and Software Applications.

About the Authors

Emmanuel Bertin is senior service architect at Orange Labs in France. He is the author of more than 40 research papers, and holds more than 10 patents in the area of communication services.
Noël Crespi worked at Bouygues Telecom, France Telecom R&D, and then at Nortel Networks where he led the Telephony Programme. He is currently Professor and Head of the Service Architecture Laboratory at Institut Mines-Telecom, Telecom SudParis in France and is the author/co-author of more than 160 research papers and 140 contributions in standardization.

Foreword ix

Introduction xi

Acknowledgements  xv

Chapter 1. Describing Service Architectures 1

1.1. The telecommunications community 2

1.1.1. The service and global functional planes of the intelligent network 2

1.1.2. From TINA to the NGN 8

1.1.3. The OMA and the concept of the enabler 11

1.2. The Web community 16

1.2.1. Web services as fundamental structural units 16

1.2.2. Semantic description of resources 18

1.2.3. Semantic description of Web services 19

1.3. The IT community 23

1.3.1. Service-oriented architectures 23

1.3.2. The concept of view 26

1.3.3. Enterprise architecture and urbanization 28

1.4. Summary 33

Chapter 2. Convergence of Service 35

2.1. Overview of communication services 35

2.1.1. Telecoms services and the NGN 35

2.1.2. The NGN 36

2.1.3. Towards convergence 47

2.1.4. Implementation of convergent services 50

2.2. Common developments of the service sector 52

2.2.1. The service production viewpoint: from need to service 54

2.2.2. The service use viewpoint: customer, consumer and user 58

2.2.3. From service to service system 61

2.3. Application to telecoms services 63

2.3.1. Telecoms services from the point of view of production? 63

2.3.2. Telecoms services from the point of view of use? 66

2.3.3. How to structure telecoms services? 68

2.4. Summary 74

Chapter 3. Building an Architectural Framework for Telecom Services 77

3.1. A business reference view for telecom services 78

3.1.1. Activities from the business view 78

3.1.2. Service processes 84

3.1.3. Application to telecom services 90

3.2. A functional reference view for telecom services 91

3.2.1. Components of the functional view 91

3.2.2. Functional patterns 94

3.2.3. Application to telecom services 96

3.3. A technical reference view for telecom services 99

3.3.1. The elements of the technical view 99

3.3.2. Technical roles and reference points 102

3.4. Summary 104

Chapter 4. Modeling and Case Study 107

4.1. The business reference view 108

4.1.1. Modeling 108

4.1.2. Illustrations 109

4.2. Functional reference view 116

4.2.1. Modeling 116

4.2.2. Illustration 128

4.3. The technical reference view 142

4.3.1. Modeling 142

4.3.2. Illustration 144

4.4. Functional view of a service  157

4.4.1. Modeling 158

4.4.2. Illustration 164

4.5. The technical view of a service 175

4.5.1. Modeling  176

4.5.2. Illustration 179

4.6. The applicative view of a service 185

4.6.1. Modeling 187

4.6.2. Illustration 194

4.7. Summary 208

Chapter 5. Organizational and Software Applications 211

5.1. An aid for the construction of service offers 211

5.1.1. Service design 211

5.1.2. Evaluation and comparison of services 212

5.1.3. Service management 216

5.2. An aid for the rationalization of services 218

5.2.1. The case of enablers 218

5.2.2. The case of software service 220

5.2.3. The case of semantic services 222

5.3. An aid for achieving service convergence 223

5.3.1. A technical pattern for the Web/IMS convergence 224

5.3.2. Unified access to services 228

5.3.3. Inter-service communication 233

5.4. Summary 238

Conclusion 239

Appendix 245

Bibliography 249

List of Figures and Tables 263

Index 269