Control of Real Time Services

• US 20090276386A1
• Filed: 03/30/2007
• Published: 11/05/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 04/07/2006
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Markport Limited (Mavenir Group Holdings Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Markport Limited (Mavenir Group Holdings Ltd.)
• Inventors: Smith, Simon, Spann, David, Woodman, Ralph, Greening, Mark, Jones, Nicholas
• Application Number:
  US12/226,054
• Publication Number:
  US 20090276386A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 706/47
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/15 in relation to multipoint traffic arrangements for broadcast or multicast in data networks H04L12/18
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/70 Admission control; Resource allocation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/762 triggered by the network
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/801 Real time traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/808 User-type aware
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/83 based on usage prediction
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/77 involving multiple accounts per user
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/775 Account specifications on parallel communications
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/78 Redistributing amount between accounts

Abstract

A real time monitoring and control system (101) interfaces with service supply entities such as SMSC, MSC, GGSN, SGSN, and IP probe entities. A data manager (104) maintains account resource data associating each of a plurality of accounts with one or more services, in which at least one account is associated with a plurality of services. Each account may have multiple pots, each associated with a type of resource such as bytes, packets, or time. A session manager (102) monitors concurrent service usage in real time and generates messages or control instructions for account modification and for account resource re-allocation across services in real time according to service usage. The session manager (102) dynamically re-distributes available account resources to sessions as the sessions occur, including resource re-allocation during a plurality of sessions including scalar and event-based sessions.

Claims

1-31. -31. (canceled)

32. A real time service supply monitoring and control system comprising:

a data manager comprising means for maintaining account resource data associating each of a plurality of resource accounts with one or more services, in which at least one account is associated with a plurality of services; and

a session manager comprising;

functions for interfacing with a plurality of service supply entities;

functions for processing requests from said entities for resources to establish and maintain service supply sessions;

functions for monitoring concurrent sessions in real time;

a rule base for, in real time, re-allocating resources from said accounts to concurrent sessions according to service usage; and

functions to notify service supply entities of re-allocation of resources.

33. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the service supply entities are communication network entities and the service usage is in communication sessions.

34. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the service supply entities are communication network entities and the service usage is in communication sessions;

and wherein the data manager maintains accounts for scalar and event-based resources.

35. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the session manager maintains a running estimate of total resources for concurrent sessions, and allocates resources to each session to minimise number of requests for fresh resources.

36. The system as claimed in claim 35, wherein the session manager generates a resource requirement estimate upon commencement of a fresh session.

37. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the session manager comprises means for using historical data to calculate an initial resource allocation for a session.

38. The system as claimed in claim 37, wherein the historical data is per subscriber and the session manager calculates the initial resource allocation upon detection of subscriber identity.

39. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the session manager comprises means for using historical data to calculate an initial resource allocation for a session;

and wherein the historical data is per service and the session manager calculates the initial resource allocation according to the service.

40. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the session manager generates a message for a service entity to either request additional resources for an account if it estimates that the resources will be exhausted during a current session or informs the entity of a new quota of resources.

41. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the session manager interfaces with a service supply entity for resource allocation negotiation.

42. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the data manager maintains at least one pot for each account, wherein each pot is associated with a resource unit.

43. The system as claimed in claim 42, wherein the units include time, volume of bytes, number of messages, and number of program or content downloads.

44. The system as claimed in claim 42, wherein at least one pot is associated by the session manager with a plurality of service types.

45. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the session manager associates a resource account with a group of subscribers.

46. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the session manager determines priorities for resource allocation, and uses the priorities to determine the order in which pots are to be exhausted according to the priority.

47. The system as claimed in claim 46, wherein the data manager associates a priority with each pot.

48. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the session manager comprises means for dynamically re-evaluating all current instances upon commencement of a fresh session, and determining according to said re-evaluation if there are sufficient resources for the fresh instance.

49. The system as claimed in claim 48, wherein the session manager comprises means for denying a service request if it determines that there are insufficient resources to satisfy all sessions.

50. The system as claimed in claim 48, wherein the session manager re-allocates all concurrent sessions according to a policy which determines a target end time for the sessions.

51. The system as claimed in claim 48, wherein the session manager re-allocates all concurrent sessions according to a policy which determines target data volumes for sessions.

52. The system as claimed in claim 48, wherein the re-allocation is performed on the basis that all concurrent sessions end at approximately the same time.

53. The system as claimed in claim 48, wherein the session manager comprises means for interfacing with service supply entities according to a reserve-capture scheme.

54. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the session manager comprises means for flagging resources which are amenable to modification for re-allocation.

55. The system as claimed in claim 54, wherein the session manager does not flag some software downloads as being amenable to modification as they are atomic in nature.

56. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the data manager comprises means for dynamically modifying accounts during sessions drawing resources from said accounts.

57. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the session manager comprises means for interfacing with service entities in parallel.

58. The system as claimed in claim 32, wherein the session manager comprises a session controller object linked with a resource re-allocation policy object having at least one re-allocation algorithm, method, and the session controller object has methods for calling the re-allocation policy object for making decisions for resource re-allocation.

59. The system as claimed in claim 58, wherein the session controller object contains a plurality of session objects, each containing at least one reservation token object, and the session controller object dynamically performs resource re-allocation by instructing a session object to modify a contained reservation token object.

60. The system as claimed in claim 58, wherein the session controller object contains a plurality of session objects, each containing at least one reservation token object, and the session controller object dynamically performs resource re-allocation by instructing a session object to modify a contained reservation token object;

and wherein the session object modifies the reservation token object by modifying an attribute of the reservation token object.

61. The system as claimed in claim 58, wherein the session manager comprises an interface for modification of attributes of the session controller and policy objects to implement configuration settings.

62. The computer readable medium comprising software code for performing operations of a system as claimed in claim 32 when executing on a digital processor.