Operations Support Systems
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Operations support systems (OSS), operational support systems in British usage, or Operation System (OpS) in NTT are computer systems used by telecommunications service providers to manage their networks (e.g., telephone networks). They support management functions such as network inventory,
service provisioning In telecommunications, provisioning involves the process of preparing and equipping a network to allow it to provide new services to its users. In National Security/Emergency Preparedness telecommunications services, ''"provisioning"'' equates to ...
, network configuration and
fault management In network management, fault management is the set of functions that detect, isolate, and correct malfunctions in a telecommunications network, compensate for environmental changes, and include maintaining and examining error logs, accepting and ...
. Together with
business support system Business support systems (BSS) are the components that a telecommunications service provider (or telco) uses to run its business operations towards customers. Together with operations support systems (OSS), they are used to support various end-to ...
s (BSS), operations support systems support various end-to-end telecommunication services. BSS and OSS have their own data and service responsibilities. The two systems together are often abbreviated OSS/BSS, BSS/OSS or simply B/OSS. The acronym OSS is also used in a singular form to refer to all the Operations Support Systems viewed as a whole
system A system is a group of interacting or interrelated elements that act according to a set of rules to form a unified whole. A system, surrounded and influenced by its open system (systems theory), environment, is described by its boundaries, str ...
. Different subdivisions of OSS have been proposed by the
TM Forum TM Forum is a global industry association for service providers and their suppliers in the telecommunications industry. Members include communications and digital service providers, telephone companies, cable operators, network operators, clo ...
, industrial research labs, or OSS vendors. In general, an OSS covers at least the following five functions: * Network management systems * Service delivery *
Service fulfillment Fulfillment of telecommunications services involves a series of supply chain activities responsible for assembling and making services available to subscribers. These activities delineate an operational infrastructure whose efficiency relies upon i ...
, including the network inventory, activation and
provisioning Provisioning may refer to: * Provisioning (technology), the equipping of a telecommunications network or IT resources * Provisioning (cruise ship), supplying a vessel for an extended voyage ** Provisioning of USS ''Constitution'' * Provisionin ...
*
Service assurance Service assurance, in telecommunications, is the application of policies and processes by a Communications Service Provider (CSP) to ensure that services offered over networks meet a pre-defined service quality level for an optimal subscriber exper ...
*
Customer care Customer service is the assistance and advice provided by a company to those who buy or use its products or services, either in person or remotely. Customer service is often practiced in a way that reflects the strategies and values of a firm, and ...


History

Before about 1970, many OSS activities were performed by manual administrative processes. However, it became obvious that much of this activity could be replaced by
computer A computer is a machine that can be Computer programming, programmed to automatically Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (''computation''). Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic set ...
s. In the next 5 years or so, the
telephone companies A telecommunications company is a kind of electronic communications service provider, more precisely a telecommunications service provider (TSP), that provides telecommunications services such as telephony and data communications access. Many t ...
created a number of
computer system A computer is a machine that can be programmed to automatically carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (''computation''). Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as ''programs'', wh ...
s (or
software applications Application software is any computer program that is intended for end-user use not operating, administering or programming the computer. An application (app, application program, software application) is any program that can be categorized as ...
) which automated much of this activity. This was one of the driving factors for the development of the
Unix Unix (, ; trademarked as UNIX) is a family of multitasking, multi-user computer operating systems that derive from the original AT&T Unix, whose development started in 1969 at the Bell Labs research center by Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, a ...
operating system and the
C programming language C (''pronounced'' '' – like the letter c'') is a general-purpose programming language. It was created in the 1970s by Dennis Ritchie and remains very widely used and influential. By design, C's features cleanly reflect the capabilities of ...
. The
Bell System The Bell System was a system of telecommunication companies, led by the Bell Telephone Company and later by the AT&T Corporation, American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T), that dominated the telephone services industry in North America fo ...
purchased their own product line of
PDP-11 The PDP–11 is a series of 16-bit minicomputers originally sold by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) from 1970 into the late 1990s, one of a set of products in the Programmed Data Processor (PDP) series. In total, around 600,000 PDP-11s of a ...
computers from
Digital Equipment Corporation Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC ), using the trademark Digital, was a major American company in the computer industry from the 1960s to the 1990s. The company was co-founded by Ken Olsen and Harlan Anderson in 1957. Olsen was president until ...
for a variety of OSS applications. OSS systems used in the Bell System include
AMATPS AMATPS is an Operations Support System developed during the early 1980s by the Bell System and Bell Communications Research. AMATPS is an acronym that stands for Automatic Message Accounting Tele-Processing System. The purpose of this OSS and com ...
, CSOBS,
EADAS EADAS is an acronym for Engineering and Administrative Data Acquisition System created at Bell Laboratories in Columbus, Ohio and used in the Bell System during the 1970s. EADAS was an Operations Support System (OSS) developed for the AT&T long dis ...
, Remote Memory Administration System (RMAS),
Switching Control Center System The Switching Control Center System was an operations support system developed by Bell Laboratories and deployed during the early 1970s. This computer system was first based on the PDP-11 product line from Digital Equipment Corporation and used ...
(SCCS),
Service Evaluation System The Service Evaluation System (SES) was an operations support system developed by Bell Laboratories and used by telephone companies beginning in the late 1960s. Many local, long distance, and operator circuit-switching systems provided special ded ...
(SES),
Trunks Integrated Record Keeping System {{Business-software-stub Trunks Integrated Record Keeping System (TIRKS) is an operations support system from Telcordia Technologies (since acquired by Ericsson, Inc.), originally developed by the Bell System during the late 1970s. It was devel ...
(TIRKS), and many more. OSS systems from this era are described in the
Bell System Technical Journal The ''Bell Labs Technical Journal'' was the in-house scientific journal for scientists of Bell Labs, published yearly by the IEEE society. The journal was originally established as ''The Bell System Technical Journal'' (BSTJ) in New York by the Am ...
,
Bell Labs Record ''Bell Laboratories Record'' (BLR) was a publication of the ''Bureau of Publication'' of the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T) and Bell Laboratories. It commenced distribution as a house organ for the employees and associates of the ...
, and
Telcordia Technologies iconectiv supplies communications providers with network planning and management services. The company’s cloud-based information as a service network and operations management and numbering solutions span trusted communications, digital identi ...
(now part of
Ericsson (), commonly known as Ericsson (), is a Swedish multinational networking and telecommunications company headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden. Ericsson has been a major contributor to the development of the telecommunications industry and is one ...
) SR-2275. Many OSS systems were initially not linked to each other and often required manual intervention. For example, consider the case where a customer wants to order a new telephone service. The ordering system would take the customer's details and details of their order, but would not be able to configure the
telephone exchange A telephone exchange, telephone switch, or central office is a central component of a telecommunications system in the public switched telephone network (PSTN) or in large enterprises. It facilitates the establishment of communication circuits ...
directly—this would be done by a switch management system. Details of the new service would need to be transferred from the order handling system to the switch management system—and this would normally be done by a technician re-keying the details from one screen into another—a process often referred to as "swivel chair integration". This was clearly another source of inefficiency, so the focus for the next few years was on creating automated interfaces between the OSS applications—OSS integration. Cheap and simple OSS integration remains a major goal of most telecom companies.


Architecture

A lot of the work on OSS has been centered on defining its architecture. Put simply, there are four key elements of OSS: *Processes **the sequence of events *Data **the information that is acted upon *Applications **the components that implement processes to manage data *Technology **how we implement the applications During the 1990s, new OSS architecture definitions were done by the
ITU Telecommunication Standardization Sector The International Telecommunication Union Telecommunication Standardization Sector (ITU-T) is one of the three Sectors (branches) of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). It is responsible for coordinating Standardization, standards fo ...
(ITU-T) in its Telecommunications Management Network (TMN) model. This established a 4-layer model of TMN applicable within an OSS: *Business Management Level (BML) *Service Management Level (SML) *Network Management Level (NML) *Element Management Level (EML) A fifth level is mentioned at times being the elements themselves, though the standards speak of only four levels. This was a basis for later work. Network management was further defined by the
ISO The International Organization for Standardization (ISO ; ; ) is an independent, non-governmental, international standard development organization composed of representatives from the national standards organizations of member countries. Me ...
using the
FCAPS FCAPS is the ISO Telecommunications Management Network model and framework for network management. ''FCAPS'' is an acronym for fault, configuration, accounting, performance, security, the management categories into which the ISO model defines n ...
model—Fault, Configuration, Accounting, Performance and Security. This basis was adopted by the ITU-T TMN standards as the Functional model for the technology base of the TMN standards M.3000 – M.3599 series. Although the FCAPS model was originally conceived and is applicable for an IT enterprise network, it was adopted for use in the public networks run by telecommunication service providers adhering to ITU-T TMN standards. A big issue of network and service management is the ability to manage and control the network elements of the
access Access may refer to: Companies and organizations * ACCESS (Australia), an Australian youth network * Access (credit card), a former credit card in the United Kingdom * Access Co., a Japanese software company * Access International Advisors, a hed ...
and core networks. Historically, many efforts have been spent in standardization fora (ITU-T, 3GPP) in order to define standard protocol for network management, but with no success and practical results. On the other hand
IETF The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) is a standards organization for the Internet standard, Internet and is responsible for the technical standards that make up the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP). It has no formal membership roster ...
SNMP Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) is an Internet Standard protocol for collecting and organizing information about managed devices on IP networks and for modifying that information to change device behavior. Devices that typically su ...
protocol (Simple Network Management Protocol) has become the de facto standard for internet and telco management, at the EML-NML communication level. From 2000 and beyond, with the growth of the new broadband and VoIP services, the management of home networks is also entering the scope of OSS and network management. DSL Forum
TR-069 Technical Report 069 (TR-069) is a document by the Broadband Forum that specifies the CPE WAN Management Protocol (CWMP). CWMP is a SOAP-based protocol for communication between an internet service provider auto configuration server (ACS) and ...
specification has defined the CPE WAN Management Protocol (CWMP), suitable for managing home networks devices and terminals at the EML-NML interface.


TM Forum

The
TM Forum TM Forum is a global industry association for service providers and their suppliers in the telecommunications industry. Members include communications and digital service providers, telephone companies, cable operators, network operators, clo ...
, formerly the TeleManagement Forum, is an international membership organization of communications service providers and suppliers to the communications industry. While OSS is generally dominated by proprietary and custom technologies, TM Forum promotes standards and frameworks in OSS and BSS. By 2005, developments in OSS architecture were the results of the TM Forum's New Generation Operations Systems and Software (NGOSS) program, which was established in 2000. This established a set of principles that OSS integration should adopt, along with a set of models that provide standardized approaches. NGOSS was renamed Frameworx.


Frameworx models

*An
information model An information model in software engineering is a representation of concepts and the relationships, constraints, rules, and Operation (mathematics), operations to specify Semantic data model, data semantics for a chosen domain of discourse. Typica ...
(th
Shared Information/Data model, or SID
– now more commonly referred to as the Information Framework, *A
process model The term process model is used in various contexts. For example, in business process modeling the enterprise process model is often referred to as the ''business process model''. Overview Process models are processes of the same nature that ...
(th
enhanced Telecom Operation Map
or
eTOM The Business Process Framework is an operating model framework for telecom service providers in the telecommunications industry.Brenner, Michael, et al.Service Provisioning-Challenges, Process Alignment and Tool Support" Bergstra, J. und M. Burg ...
) – now more commonly known as the Business Process Framework, *An application model (th
Telecom Applications Map
– now known as the Application Framework, an architecture (the Technology Neutral Architecture) and a lifecycle model. The TM Forum describes Frameworx as an architecture that is: *"
loosely coupled In computing and systems design, a loosely coupled system is one # in which components are weakly associated (have breakable relationships) with each other, and thus changes in one component least affect existence or performance of another compo ...
" *distributed *component based The components interact through a common communications vehicle (using an information exchange infrastructure; e.g., EAI,
Web Services A web service (WS) is either: * a service offered by an electronic device to another electronic device, communicating with each other via the Internet, or * a server running on a computer device, listening for requests at a particular port over a n ...
,
EJB Jakarta Enterprise Beans (EJB; formerly Enterprise JavaBeans) is one of several Java APIs for modular construction of enterprise software. EJB is a server-side software component that encapsulates business logic of an application. An EJB web c ...
). The behavior can be controlled through the use of process management and/or policy management to orchestrate the functionality provided by the services offered by the components. The early focus of the TM Forum's NGOSS work was on building reference models to support a business stakeholder view on process, information and application interaction. Running in parallel were activities that supported an implementation stakeholder view on interface specifications to provide access to OSS capability (primarily MTNM). The MTNM work evolved into a set of Web Services providing Multi-Technology Operations System Interfaces MTOSI. Most recently, the OSS through Java initiative (OSS/J) joined the TMF to provide NGOSS-based BSS/OSS
API An application programming interface (API) is a connection between computers or between computer programs. It is a type of software interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that describes how to build ...
s.


Ongoing work - Open Digital Architecture (ODA)

Open Digital Architecture (ODA) offers an industry-agreed blueprint, language and set of key design principles to follow. It will provide pragmatic pathways for the journey from maintaining monolithic, legacy software solutions, towards managing nimble, cloud based capabilities that can be orchestrated using AI. It is a reference architecture that maps TM Forum’
Open APIs
against technical and business platform functions.


See also

*
Business support system Business support systems (BSS) are the components that a telecommunications service provider (or telco) uses to run its business operations towards customers. Together with operations support systems (OSS), they are used to support various end-to ...
*
COSMOS (telecommunications) COSMOS (Computer System for Main Frame Operations) was a record-keeping system for main distribution frames (MDFs) in the Bell System, the American Bell Telephone Company and then, subsequently, AT&T–led system which provided telephone services ...
* Loop maintenance operations system * OA&M *
Service Evaluation System The Service Evaluation System (SES) was an operations support system developed by Bell Laboratories and used by telephone companies beginning in the late 1960s. Many local, long distance, and operator circuit-switching systems provided special ded ...
*
Switching Control Center System The Switching Control Center System was an operations support system developed by Bell Laboratories and deployed during the early 1970s. This computer system was first based on the PDP-11 product line from Digital Equipment Corporation and used ...


References

{{reflist


External links


Video: What is OSS/BSS?TM ForumOSS through Java initiativeOSS News ReviewOSS Observer landing page of Analysys MasonPipeline Magazine InsideTelephony OSS/BSS (2017.05.20 via Wayback Machine)Billing & OSS WorldOSS LineTelecommunications OSS and BSSTelcordia SR-2275
Network management Telecommunications systems