Accounting Configuration for QoS

This section explains how to configure the account configuration and account servers so you can use the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller in conjunction with external RADIUS (accounting) servers to generate CDRs and provide billing services requires.

QoS Accounting Configuration

To configure the account configuration and account servers:

In Superuser mode, type configure terminal and press Enter.
```
ORACLE# configure terminal
```
Type session-router and press Enter.
```
ORACLE(configure)# session-router
```
Type account-config and press Enter. The system prompt changes to let you know that you can begin configuring individual parameters.
```
ORACLE(session-router)# account-config
ORACLE(account-config)#
```

To configure account server parameters (a subset of the account configuration parameters, type account-servers and press Enter. The system prompt changes to let you know that you can begin configuring individual parameters.

ORACLE(account-config)# account-servers
ORACLE(account-server)#

The following example shows both the account config and account server parameters.

account-config
        hostname                       acctserver1
        port                           1813
        strategy                       Hunt
        state                          enabled
        max-msg-delay                  60
        max-wait-failover              100
        trans-at-close                 disabled
        generate-start                 OK
        generate-interim
                                       OK
                                       Reinvite-Response
account-server
                hostname                       192.168.2.2
                port                           1813
                state                          enabled
                min-round-trip                 100
                max-inactivity                 100
                restart-delay                  100
                bundle-vsa                     enabled
                secret                         testing
                NAS-ID                         acme-accounting
last-modified-date             2005-01-15 02:23:42

Account Configuration

You set the account configuration parameters to indicate where you want accounting messages sent, when accounting messages you want them sent, and the strategy you want used to select account servers.

To configure the account configuration:

hostname—Enter a name for the host associated with the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller in hostname (FQDN) format. The default value is the name of the local host.

The value you enter here must match the configured phy-interface’s operation type control or maintenance, to determine on which network to send RADIUS messages.
port—Enter the number of the UDP port associated with the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller from which RADIUS messages are sent.The default value is 1813. The valid range is:
- Minimum—1025
- Maximum—65535
strategy—Indicate the strategy you want used to select the accounting servers to which the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller will send its accounting messages. The default value is hunt. The following table lists the available strategies:
- hunt—Selects accounting servers in the order in which they are listed.
  
  If the first accounting server is online, working, and has not exceeded any of the defined constraints, all traffic is sent to it. Otherwise the second accounting server is selected. If the first and second accounting servers are offline or exceed any defined constraints, the third accounting server is selected. And so on through the entire list of configured servers
- failover—Uses the first server in the list of predefined accounting servers until a failure is received from that server. Once a failure is received, it moves to the second accounting server in the list until a failure is received. And so on through the entire list of configured servers.
- roundrobin—Selects each accounting server in order, distributing the selection of each accounting server evenly over time.
- fastestrtt—Selects the accounting server that has the fastest round trip time (RTT) observed during transactions with the servers (sending a record and receiving an ACK).
- fewestpending—Selects the accounting server that has the fewest number of unacknowledged accounting messages (that are in transit to the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller).
state—Enable this parameter if you want the account configuration active on the system. Disable it if you do not want the account configuration active on the system. The default value is enabled. The valid values are:
- enabled | disabled
max-msg-delay—Indicate the length of time in seconds that you want the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller to continue trying to send each accounting message. During this delay, the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller can hold a generic queue of 4096 messages. The default value is 60.
- Minimum—zero (0)
- Maximum—4294967295
max-wait-failover—Indicate the maximum number of accounting messages the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller can store its message waiting queue for a specific accounting server, before it is considered a failover situation.

Once this value is exceeded, the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller attempts to send it accounting messages, including its pending messages, to the next accounting server in its configured list. The default value is 100. The valid range is:
- Minimum—1
- Maximum—4096
trans-at-close—Disable this parameter if you do not want to defer the transmission of message information to the close of a session. Enable it if you want to defer message transmission. The default value is disabled. The valid values are:
- disabled—The Oracle Communications Session Border Controller transmits accounting information at the start of a session (Start), during the session (Interim), and at the close of a session (Stop). The transmitted accounting information for a single session might span a period of hours and be spread out among different storage files.
- enabled—Limits the number of files on the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller used to store the accounting message information for one session. It is easiest to store the accounting information from a single session in a single storage file.
generate-start—Select the type of SIP event that triggers the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller to transmit a RADIUS Start message. The default value is ok. The valid values are:
- start—RADIUS Start message should not be generated
- invite—RADIUS Start message should be generated once the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller receives a SIP session INVITE.
- ok—RADIUS Start message is generated once the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller receives an OK message in response to an INVITE.
generate-interim—Retain the default value reinvite-response to cause the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller to transmit a RADIUS Interim message. (A RADIUS Interim message indicates to the accounting server that the SIP session parameters have changed.)

To disable interim message generation, enter a pair of quotes as the value for this parameter. Otherwise, select one or more than one of the following values:
- ok—RADIUS Interim message is generated when the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller receives an OK message in response to an INVITE.
- reinvite—RADIUS Interim message is generated when the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller receives a SIP session reINVITE message.
- reinvite-response—RADIUS Interim message is generated when the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller receives a SIP session reINVITE and responds to it (for example, session connection or failure).
- reinvite-cancel—RADIUS Interim message is generated when the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller receives a SIP session reINVITE, and the Reinvite is cancelled before the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller responds to it.
account-server—Create the account server list to store accounting server information for the account configuration. Each account server can hold 100 accounting messages.

Account server entries are specific to the account configuration. They cannot be viewed or accessed for editing outside of the account configuration.

Note:
RADIUS will not work if you do not enter one or more servers in a list.

Account Server

You must establish the list of servers to which the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller can send accounting messages.

hostname—Name of the host associated with the account server as an IP address.
port—Enter the number of the UDP port associated with the account server to which RADIUS messages are sent. The default value is 1813. The valid range is:
- Minimum—1025
- Maximum—65535
state—Enable or disable the account servers on the system. The default value is enabled. The valid values are:
- enabled | disabled
min-round-trip—Indicate the minimum round trip time of an accounting message in milliseconds. The default value is 250. The valid range is:
- Minimum—10
- Maximum—5000
  
  A round trip consists of the following:
  
  The system sends an accounting message to the account server.
  
  The account server processes this message and responds back to the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller.
  
  If the fastest RTT is the strategy for the account configuration, the value you enter here can be used to determine an order of preference (if all the configured account servers are responding in less than their minimum RTT).
max-inactivity—Indicate the length of time in seconds that you want the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller with pending accounting messages to wait when it has not received a valid response from the target account server. The default value is 60. The valid range is:
- Minimum—1
- Maximum—300
  
  Once this timer value is exceeded, the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller marks the unresponsive account server as disabled in its failover scheme. When a server connection is marked as inactive, the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller attempts to restart the connection and transfers pending messages to another queue for transmission. RADIUS messages might be moved between different account servers as servers become inactive or disabled.
restart-delay—Indicate the length of time in seconds you want the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller to wait before resending messages to a disabled account server. The default value is 30. The valid range is:
- Minimum—1
- Maximum—300
bundle-vsa—Retain the default enabled if you want the account server to bundle the VSAs within RADIUS accounting messages. Enter disabled if you do not want the VSAs to be bundled. (Bundling means including multiple VSAs within the vendor value portion of the message.) The valid values are:
- enabled | disabled
  
  In a bundled accounting message, the RADIUS message type is vendor-specific, the length is determined for each individual message, and the vendor portion begins with a 4-byte identifier, and includes multiple vendor type, vendor length, and vendor value attributes.
secret—Enter the secret passed from the account server to the client in text format. Transactions between the client and the RADIUS server are authenticated by the shared secret; which is determined by the source IPv4 address of the received packet.
NAS-ID—Enter the NAS ID in text format (FQDN allowed). The account server uses this value to identify the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller for the transmittal of accounting messages.

The remote server to which the account configuration sends messages uses at least one of two potential pieces of information for purposes of identification. The Oracle Communications Session Border Controller accounting messages always includes in the first of these:
- Network Access Server (NAS) IP address (the IP address of the Oracle Communications Session Border Controller’s SIP proxy)
- NAS ID (the second piece of information) provided by this value. If you enter a value here, the NAS ID is sent to the remote server.