METHODS, SYSTEMS AND DEVICES FOR DYNAMIC CONTEXT-BASED ROUTING USING A TOPOLOGY TREE

• US 20120158994A1
• Filed: 12/01/2011
• Published: 06/21/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 12/16/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Openet Telecom Limited (Amdocs Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Openet Telecom Limited (Amdocs Ltd.)
• Inventors: McNamee, Alan, Dunne, Cameron Ross, McCann, Fergus, O'Sullivan, Michael, Byrne, Niall, Hogan, Joe
• Granted Patent: US 8,880,726 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/238
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/12 Discovery or management of network topologies
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/02 Topology update or discovery
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/04 Interdomain routing, e.g. hierarchical routing
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/24 Multipath
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/306 Route determination based on the nature of the carried application
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/48 Routing tree calculation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/488 using root node determination
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/56 Routing software
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 40/24 Connectivity information management, e.g. connectivity discovery or connectivity update

Abstract

Methods, servers and systems for communicating signaling information in a telecommunications signaling network may involve using a topology tree categorizing network nodes into groups, receiving a first message encoding signaling information from a source, decoding the received first message into an internal representation of the message, determining if the internal representation identifies a destination component in the topology tree, performing application level routing operations by hierarchy to determine if information contained in the internal representation identifies a destination component in the topology tree, packaging the information contained in the internal representation into a second message encoding signaling information, and sending the second message encoding signaling information to the identified destination component. The topology tree may include one or more domains as root nodes, a peer-group as an internal node for each of the one or more domains, and a peer as a terminal node for the at least one peer-group.

Claims

1. A method of communicating signaling information in a telecommunications signaling network, comprising:

receiving, in a first processor, a topology tree that categorizes components within the telecommunications signaling network into hierarchical groups;

receiving, in the first processor, a first message encoding signaling information from a source component;

decoding the received first message into an internal representation of the message;

performing application level routing operations using contextual information derived from the internal representation to identify a root node in the topology tree;

identifying a terminal node destination component using the identified root node and the hierarchical groups of the topology tree;

encoding the signaling information contained in the internal representation into a second message; and

sending the second message to the identified terminal node destination component.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the topology tree includes one or more domains as root nodes, at least one peer-group as an internal node for each of the one or more domains, and at least one other peer-group as another internal node or at least one peer as a terminal node for the at least one peer-group.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein identifying a terminal node destination component using the identified root node and the hierarchical groups of the topology tree comprises:

identifying and selecting the root node by performing business rule operations;

identifying and selecting internal nodes by performing at least one of partitioning operations and availability operations; and

identifying and selecting the terminal node based on load balancing requirements.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein identifying and selecting internal nodes by performing at least one of partitioning operations and availability operations comprises ordering one or more internal nodes according to a property and selecting internal nodes from the ordered internal nodes based upon a ranking.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein choosing the internal nodes based on at least one of partitioning and availability comprises performing hunting operations.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising adding components to locations within the topology tree based upon a policy.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein at least one of the first message and the second message is a Diameter message.

8. A server configured for use in a telecommunications signaling network, comprising:

a processor configured with processor-executable instructions to perform operations comprising;

receiving a topology tree that categorizes components within the telecommunications signaling network into hierarchical groups;

receiving, in the first processor, a first message encoding signaling information from a source component;

decoding the received first message into an internal representation of the message;

performing application level routing operations using contextual information derived from the internal representation to identify a root node in the topology tree;

identifying a terminal node destination component using the identified root node and the hierarchical groups of the topology tree;

encoding the signaling information contained in the internal representation into a second message; and

sending the second message to the identified terminal node destination component.

9. The server of claim 8, wherein the processor is configured with processor-executable instructions to perform operations such that the topology tree includes one or more domains as root nodes, at least one peer-group as an internal node for each of the one or more domains, and at least one peer as a terminal node for the at least one peer-group.

10. The server of claim 8, wherein the processor is configured with processor-executable instructions to perform operations such that identifying a terminal node destination component using the identified root node and the hierarchical groups of the topology tree comprises:

identifying and selecting the root node by performing business rule operations;

identifying and selecting internal nodes by performing at least one of partitioning operations and availability operations; and

identifying and selecting the terminal node based on load balancing requirements.

11. The server of claim 10, wherein the processor is configured with processor-executable instructions to perform operations such that identifying and selecting internal nodes by performing at least one of partitioning operations and availability operations comprises ordering one or more internal nodes according to a property and selecting internal nodes from the ordered internal nodes based upon a ranking.

12. The server of claim 10, wherein the processor is configured with processor-executable instructions to perform operations such that choosing the internal nodes based on at least one of partitioning and availability comprises performing hunting operations.

13. The server of claim 8, wherein the processor is configured with processor-executable instructions to perform operations further comprising adding components to locations within the topology tree based upon a policy.

14. The server of claim 8, wherein the processor is configured with processor-executable instructions to perform operations such that at least one of the first message and the second message is a Diameter message.

15. A non-transitory server-readable storage medium having stored thereon server-executable instructions configured to cause a server to perform operations comprising:

receiving a topology tree that categorizes components within the telecommunications signaling network into hierarchical groups;

receiving, in the first processor, a first message encoding signaling information from a source component;

decoding the received first message into an internal representation of the message;

performing application level routing operations using contextual information derived from the internal representation to identify a root node in the topology tree;

identifying a terminal node destination component using the identified root node and the hierarchical groups of the topology tree;

encoding the signaling information contained in the internal representation into a second message; and

sending the second message to the identified terminal node destination component.

16. The non-transitory server-readable storage medium of claim 15, wherein the stored server-executable instructions are configured to cause a server to perform operations such that the topology tree includes one or more domains as root nodes, at least one peer-group as an internal node for each of the one or more domains, and at least one peer as a terminal node for the at least one peer-group.

17. The non-transitory server-readable storage medium of claim 15, wherein the stored server-executable instructions are configured to cause a server to perform operations such that identifying a terminal node destination component using the identified root node and the hierarchical groups of the topology tree comprises:

identifying and selecting the root node by performing business rule operations;

identifying and selecting internal nodes by performing at least one of partitioning operations and availability operations; and

identifying and selecting the terminal node based on load balancing requirements.

18. The non-transitory server-readable storage medium of claim 17, wherein the stored server-executable instructions are configured to cause a server to perform operations such that identifying and selecting internal nodes by performing at least one of partitioning operations and availability operations comprises ordering one or more internal nodes according to a property and selecting internal nodes from the ordered internal nodes based upon a ranking.

19. The non-transitory server-readable storage medium of claim 17, wherein the stored server-executable instructions are configured to cause a server to perform operations such that choosing the internal nodes based on at least one of partitioning and availability comprises performing hunting operations.

20. The non-transitory server-readable storage medium of claim 15, wherein the stored server-executable instructions are configured to cause a server to perform operations further comprising adding components to locations within the topology tree based upon a policy.

21. The non-transitory server-readable storage medium of claim 15, wherein the stored server-executable instructions are configured to cause a server to perform operations such that at least one of the first message and the second message is a Diameter message.