4 Managing Application Service Providers

This chapter explains the framework for managing service providers and applications that Oracle Communications Services Gatekeeper (Services Gatekeeper) provides.

Overview

Managing partner relationships is key to the successful convergence of third-party application services and telecom network operations. Services Gatekeeper provides a partner administration model to help operators handle the needs and demands of their partners in a flexible and powerful way:

Application service providers are registered with Services Gatekeeper, by service provider account and application account.
Each account type is associated with a group that is tied to an SLA that defines its access to both Services Gatekeeper and underlying network nodes.

The service provider and application registration are performed either internally through the Services Gatekeeper Administration Console or through external management systems integrated using the Services Gatekeeper Partner Relationship Management Interfaces or JMX.

The Administration Model

The Services Gatekeeper administration model allows operators to manage application-service-provider access at increasingly granular levels of control. An application service provider registers with Services Gatekeeper and is given a service provider account. To support tiering, service provider accounts belong to account groups. These account groups are then associated with their own Services Gatekeeper SLAs.

Within a service provider account are individual application accounts, registered on their respective service provider accounts. As in the case of service provider accounts, these application accounts belong to account groups, each of which is associated with its own SLA.

Services Gatekeeper SLAs on the service-provider and application level regulate, for example, the type of service capability made available and the maximum bandwidth use allowed. They may also specify access to charging capabilities and revenue sharing schema. Services Gatekeeper provides support for standard versions of SLAs of both these types. Custom SLAs of both types can also be created by the operator or integrator. See Figure 4-1 for more information.

Using the Platform Development Studio, integrators can extend this model to include subscribers as well. For more information, see Oracle Communications Services Gatekeeper Platform Development Studio Developer's Guide, another document in this set.

Figure 4-1 Service Provider and Application Administration Model

Description of "Figure 4-1 Service Provider and Application Administration Model"

In addition to these account SLAs, Services Gatekeeper supports two types of traffic SLAs: Service Provider Node SLAs and Global Node SLAs. Global Node custom SLAs can also be created. These are contracts designed to protect the underlying telecom network.

Service provider node SLAs regulate the relationship between a service provider group and the network nodes to which it has access. See Figure 4-2 for more information.

Figure 4-2 Service Provider Traffic SLAs

Description of "Figure 4-2 Service Provider Traffic SLAs"

In Figure 4-2 above, service providers in service provider group 1 are allowed to access all network nodes because their service provider node SLA (valid for all service providers within the group) contains node contracts for all nodes.

Service providers in service provider group 2 are allowed to access only network nodes 1 and 3 because their service provider node SLA contains node only contracts for node 1 and 3.

The second type of traffic SLA, the Global Node SLA, regulates the overall relationship between Services Gatekeeper and the underlying nodes.

Partner Relationship Management Interfaces

The Services Gatekeeper Partner Relationship Management Interfaces provide support for the automation of the traditionally work-intensive tasks related to service provider and application administration (including supporting on-boarding workflows) using request/approve. Most of the work of registration can be shifted to the service provider, allowing the operator's role to change from that of entering registration data to that of approving the registration. Large numbers of service provider and application accounts can be managed without increasing administration overhead. Service providers are also provided with a defined and structured channel to communicate desired account changes and to retrieve usage statistics for the accounts.

For a detailed description of the Partner Relationship Management Interfaces, see Oracle Communications Services Gatekeeper Partner Relationship Management Guide, another document in this set.

Other Tasks Associated with Administering Service Providers

For an application to use Audio Call-based services, announcements must be recorded and installed in the network. For more information on these areas, see Oracle Communications Services Gatekeeper System Administrator's Guide, another document this set.