SS7 gateway
First Claim
1. A gateway for enabling telecommunications service providers having different signaling protocols to effectively communicate with each other, comprising:
- first interface means adaptable to send and receive, respectively, messages of a first signaling protocol to and from a telecommunications network to which a first service provider utilizing said first protocol for its call transmission is connected;
management means for controlling the environment under which said gateway operates so that said first interface means can either send or receive said first signaling protocol messages to or from, respectively, said telecommunications network;
second interface means communicatively connected to a second telecommunications service provider for enabling said second service provider to transmit messages of a second signaling protocol between said second service provider and said gateway; and
means for translating and converting said first signaling protocol messages into messages of said second protocol and second protocol messages into messages of said first protocol so that said respective messages may be routed between said first and second service providers.
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Accused Products
Abstract
The present invention telecommunications system provides validation of authorization codes input by a user for placing a call from a service area of a first telecommunications service provider with a calling card issued by another telecommunications service provider. The present invention allows the subscriber to place a special service call irrespective of whether the signaling protocol of the first service provider is different from the service provider to which the subscriber is a customer of. If the protocol of one telecommunications service provider is indeed different from the other service provider, a gateway residing in an intelligent service network node would convert the signaling protocol of the first service provider into a signaling protocol that is compatible with the other service provider. Consequently, the first service provider can quickly validate the authorization code provided by the subscriber by sending a query to the service provider that issued the calling card to the caller by referencing the LIDB database of the latter service provider. To achieve the conversion of one protocol to another, a system that includes an ISN node having gateways, file servers, a monitoring system, and mainframes is used. The gateway inside the ISN node has a client application program interface (API) component, a translate/convert component, a transaction capabilities part (TCAP) component and a SS7 API component. These various components, together with other controlling and interface components, are able to convert a first signaling protocol, for example a SS7 protocol, into a second protocol, for example a network information distributed service (NIDS) sequenced packet protocol.
272 Citations
16 Claims
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1. A gateway for enabling telecommunications service providers having different signaling protocols to effectively communicate with each other, comprising:
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first interface means adaptable to send and receive, respectively, messages of a first signaling protocol to and from a telecommunications network to which a first service provider utilizing said first protocol for its call transmission is connected; management means for controlling the environment under which said gateway operates so that said first interface means can either send or receive said first signaling protocol messages to or from, respectively, said telecommunications network; second interface means communicatively connected to a second telecommunications service provider for enabling said second service provider to transmit messages of a second signaling protocol between said second service provider and said gateway; and means for translating and converting said first signaling protocol messages into messages of said second protocol and second protocol messages into messages of said first protocol so that said respective messages may be routed between said first and second service providers. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)
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9. A method of effecting a gateway through which communication across a telecommunications network can be established between telephone service providers having different signaling protocols, comprising the steps of:
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(a) establishing a first interface to said telecommunications network so that messages of a first signaling protocol can be received from and sent, respectively, to a first telephone service provider utilizing a first protocol for its call transmission through said telecommunications network; (b) controlling the environment under which said gateway operates to either send or receive said first signaling protocol messages to or from, respectively, said telecommunications network; (c) establishing a second interface to a second telephone service provider for enabling said second telephone service provider to transmit to and receive from said gateway messages of a second signaling protocol; and (d) translating and converting said first signaling protocol messages into messages of said second protocol and second protocol messages into messages of said first protocol so that said respective messages may be routed between said first and second telephone service providers. - View Dependent Claims (10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16)
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Specification