Broadband Command Center Appliance: Features
With the introduction of new standards and the drastic growth in bandwidth demand, service provider infrastructure is increasing in both size and complexity. Subscriber friendly networks need a future-proofed device provisioning system which employs the latest standards and allows service providers to adapt to changes in technologies that is supported by the leader in provisioning software. Incognito’s Broadband Command Center 5.5’s rich feature set is developed with those needs in mind.
Broadband Command Center™ 5.5, Incognito’s automated 64 bit cable provisioning solution, was designed to help service providers grow their subscriber base with its range of extensible features. Click on the following to learn more about a specific feature:
Always-On Availability
Diagram 1: How Broadband Command Center fits into the network
Reliability is a critical requirement for successful service deployment. For example, VoIP services need 5-nines uptime to compete with the PSTN. The challenge is that implementations of DHCP failover and TFTP clustering vary widely across the industry, and even subtle differences can have a huge impact on reliability. Broadband Command Center delivers industry-leading availability across all its component servers.
In the case of DHCP, Broadband Command Center exceeds IETF specifications with 1:1 primary to secondary server backup – true hot standby instead of a 1:many architecture.
Broadband Command Center's Multimedia Provisioning Service (MPS) server pair, which performs VoIP provisioning and subscriber management, also provides load-balanced failover for maximum reliability.
The Configuration File Management (CFM) service, which administers TFTP, HTTP, HTTPS, or FTP services, offers reliability through its server clusters. If a CFM server is unavailable, the DHCP or MPS server that is controlling the cluster can assign another (redundant) CFM server to handle file transfers to Customer Premise Equipment (CPE).
Separation of Dynamic File Generation and Distribution
Diagram 2: In-service growth of the Configuration File Management and Configuration File Management Proxy
Broadband Command Center's ability to dynamically generate customized configuration files minimizes the operator's effort in creating personalized responses to activation requests. That's why dynamic file generation is one of the keys to profitable growth.
Broadband Command Center 5.5 separates dynamic file generation and distribution into two components: Configuration File Management (CFM) Service for generation of dynamic files and Configuration File Management Proxy Service, for delivery of data using FTPs, TFTP, HTTPs or FTP protocol. The Configuration File Management and Configuration File Management Proxy services supports integrated clustering to allow in-service growth. As the demand for file transfers increases, only additional Configuration File Management (CFM) proxy services need to be added and as the demand for dynamic file generation increases, only additional Configuration File Management services will need to be added. Thus allowing service providers to greatly reduce their capital costs during growth.
Dynamically Generated Files vs. Static Files
Diagram 3: Dynamic File Generation
Device configuration files are required during the provisioning process, whether it is auto-provisioning, where subscribers self-register devices after purchase, or pre-provisioning, where the operator registers device and service information before deployment to customers.
Especially for auto-provisioning on large networks, activating devices with dynamically generated configuration files is much more efficient and secure than using static files.
Broadband Command Center can dynamically generate files at the time of the subscriber's activation request, automatically applying a handful of rules to a variety of possible service combinations. Alternatively, the software can create massive numbers of static files in advance and store them until activation is required, but these static files are more labor-intensive and inflexible.
Using dynamic file generation, there's no need to track and store large numbers of static files, and the operator can easily change service features without any manual re-configuration of devices in the field.
Configuration File Management (CFM) for Final Activation
In order to ensure subscribers always get online quickly; the Configuration File Management (CFM) servers are load balanced. DHCP or Multimedia Provisioning Service (MPS) server always sends file requests to the most available CFM server. This allows the CFM to handle massive volumes of simultaneous file transfers, especially during peak periods when thousands of devices may come online simultaneously.
Special Event Handling
To handle customized provisioning flows, Broadband Command Center can automatically interpret and act on selected DHCP data or system incidents. It can do this using Event Triggers or SNMP Traps.
Easy OSS Integration
OSS Integration
For easy setup of data sharing with an OSS, BSS, or Customer Care Center, Broadband Command Center comes with an array of integration toolkits: CORBA APIs, XML APIs, SOAP API and a Command Line Interface (CLI). These toolkits allow direct integration with 3rd party OSS platforms and existing LDAP databases enabling simplified access to subscriber data for both data and voice device provisioning.
In addition, the Command Line Interface enables scripting and interfacing with other applications and can run on Windows, Linux and Solaris platforms.
To enhance the visibility of provisioning data and the management of subscribers, Broadband Command Center can track subscribers and their devices, IP addresses, and associated broadband services as well as allow the retrieval of that information. The solution can gather customer data in three ways: Data can be entered into its own database, transferred automatically from an OSS, BSS, or Customer Care Center or directly retrieved from a centralized backend database via integration with LDAP. The follow diagram illustrates the various ways Broadband Command Center can integrate with the OSS.
Subscriber, Device, and Service Data Sharing
Data transferred from the OSS, LDAP or manually entered into Broadband Command Center can include: subscriber data (contact information, devices owned), subscriber device data (MAC address, maximum number of CPEs, voice line configuration, call agent), or service options (speed, quality of service). The addition of XML API for lease data in Broadband Command Center 5.5 eases the retrieval of this information.
Flexible Device Support
Broadband Command Center leads the industry in provisioning an extensive variety of devices – SIP, PacketCable, or DOCSIS. The latest release also supports DOCSIS 3.0 devices operating in IPv4. You can choose the best device type for your business so you're not limited in any way by hardware.
Support for SIP NOTIFY and Softswitch Connectors
Broadband Command Center now enables ongoing provisioning updates to be delivered to SIP VoIP terminals via Softswitch integration. This includes both SIP Notify and API methods to trigger a remote device reboot action.
SIP Device User Configuration Decoupling
With consumers demanding more phone lines and possessing more devices than ever, service providers must be able to properly configure these users. Broadband Command Center supports the decoupling of SIP phone user configuration from a SIP device configuration. This allows a SIP user to be provisioned to multiple line appearances spanning multiple simultaneous devices.
Cost-Effective Growth and Maximized Efficiency
DHCP Failover
Broadband Command Center ensures the cost-effective growth of your business by offering vastly superior scalability and server efficiencies. It supports up to 1Million IP addresses per server, as well as an unlimited number of CMTSs per server.
The solution also maximizes efficiencies by incorporating a streamlined 1-to-many DHCP-to-CFM (or MPS-to-CFM) architecture, where dedicated file servers are focused on transferring configuration files to subscriber devices.
For the DHCP failover system, the primary and secondary DHCP servers use the same IP address range in order to make the most efficient use of available IP address space. In other systems, up to 50% of IP addresses may be reserved for the secondary server alone, where they sit idle most of the time.
High Security
Multi-level security includes secure administrator login, triple DES password encryption, granular user access privileges, access control lists, and delegation limits.
DHCP, DNS, Multimedia Provisioning Service (MPS) and Configuration File Management (CFM) components are highly secure, as they are not based on open source code. DNS is closely integrated with the DHCP services for DDNS FQDN mapping (as required by PacketCable), and provides a secure alternative to BIND.
Time Saving GUI
Broadband Command Center's intuitive GUI gives you one convenient interface for managing all functions. Wizards and templates ensure fast deployment and streamlined workflows, whether your job is system administration or customer service.
You can quickly access operational and configuration information through a tree structure of setup options, as well as network views based on region, department, subnet, or subscriber.
To help you resolve issues and analyze system design, Broadband Command Center provides a wealth of diagnostics and reporting tools:
- Auditing: tracking of all changes made by system administrators or operators
- Reporting: usage or auditing reports automatically triggered by specific data, actions, or requests
- Backups: automated scheduled backups of database and audit records
- Real-time, color-coded IP address usage statistics: designated as free, active, offered, static, reserved, or unused
- Security alerts
- 5 emergency notification methods: SNMP traps, system logs, email, event triggers, or pop-up messages. Emergency notifications can be initiated when an operator-specified threshold is reached. For example, you can receive alerts based on high-water marks when an IP address range is about to run out of addresses
64-bit Service
All Broadband Command Center services are now available in 64 bit, giving the system the ability to handle future technology capacity. The 64 bit system increases the capacity of Broadband Command Center’s DHCP service to 1,000,000 active leases and also allows an unlimited number of subscribers and lines to be managed by the solution’s Multimedia Provisioning Service.