Alcatel Business Communications - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Alcatel Business Communications (ABC) is a proprietary communications protocol

Communications protocol

A communications protocol is a system of digital message formats and rules for exchanging those messages in or between computing systems and in telecommunications...

written by Alcatel-Lucent

Alcatel-Lucent

Alcatel-Lucent is a global telecommunications corporation, headquartered in the 7th arrondissement of Paris, France. It provides telecommunications solutions to service providers, enterprises, and governments around the world, enabling these customers to deliver voice, data, and video services...

that is based on QSIG

QSIG

QSIG is an ISDN based signaling protocol for signaling between private branch exchanges in a Private Integrated Services Network . It makes use of the connection-level Q.931 protocol and the application-level ROSE protocol...

. ABC is supported over a variety of network

Computer network

A computer network, often simply referred to as a network, is a collection of hardware components and computers interconnected by communication channels that allow sharing of resources and information....

types: IP

Internet Protocol

The Internet Protocol is the principal communications protocol used for relaying datagrams across an internetwork using the Internet Protocol Suite...

, ATM

Asynchronous Transfer Mode

Asynchronous Transfer Mode is a standard switching technique designed to unify telecommunication and computer networks. It uses asynchronous time-division multiplexing, and it encodes data into small, fixed-sized cells. This differs from approaches such as the Internet Protocol or Ethernet that...

, frame relay

Frame relay

Frame Relay is a standardized wide area network technology that specifies the physical and logical link layers of digital telecommunications channels using a packet switching methodology...

, PSTN

Public switched telephone network

The public switched telephone network is the network of the world's public circuit-switched telephone networks. It consists of telephone lines, fiber optic cables, microwave transmission links, cellular networks, communications satellites, and undersea telephone cables, all inter-connected by...

, ISDN

Integrated Services Digital Network

Integrated Services Digital Network is a set of communications standards for simultaneous digital transmission of voice, video, data, and other network services over the traditional circuits of the public switched telephone network...

, or leased line

Leased line

A leased line is a service contract between a provider and a customer, whereby the provider agrees to deliver a symmetric telecommunications line connecting two or more locations in exchange for a monthly rent . It is sometimes known as a 'Private Circuit' or 'Data Line' in the UK or as CDN in Italy...

.

The ABC protocol is based on four modules and offers the following services:

ABC-F: Telephone
Telephone
The telephone , colloquially referred to as a phone, is a telecommunications device that transmits and receives sounds, usually the human voice. Telephones are a point-to-point communication system whose most basic function is to allow two people separated by large distances to talk to each other...

Features. Provides telephone feature transparency; features available in a single system are available across the entire network.
ABC-A: Applications
Application software
Application software, also known as an application or an "app", is computer software designed to help the user to perform specific tasks. Examples include enterprise software, accounting software, office suites, graphics software and media players. Many application programs deal principally with...

. Offers network-wide applications as both centralized
Centralized system
In telecommunications, a centralized, or centralised system, is one in which most communications are routed through one or more major central hubs. Such a system allows certain functions to be concentrated in the system's hubs, freeing up resources in the peripheral units...

and distributed
Distributed computing
Distributed computing is a field of computer science that studies distributed systems. A distributed system consists of multiple autonomous computers that communicate through a computer network. The computers interact with each other in order to achieve a common goal...

solutions.
ABC-R: Routing
Routing
Routing is the process of selecting paths in a network along which to send network traffic. Routing is performed for many kinds of networks, including the telephone network , electronic data networks , and transportation networks...

. An adaptive routing mechanism that optimizes the size of network links and improves security
Network security
In the field of networking, the area of network security consists of the provisions and policies adopted by the network administrator to prevent and monitor unauthorized access, misuse, modification, or denial of the computer network and network-accessible resources...

. Designed to use: least-cost routing, automatic route selection
Automatic Route Selection (telephony)
Automatic route selection is a private branch exchange feature that allows a system to route a telephone call over the most appropriate carrier and service offering based on factors such as the type of call , the user's class of service , the time of day, and the day of the week .ARS can be used to...

, forced on-net, break-in, break-out, and link optimization on transfer.
ABC-M: Management
Network management
Network management refers to the activities, methods, procedures, and tools that pertain to the operation, administration, maintenance, and provisioning of networked systems....

. Guarantees consistency of database
Database
A database is an organized collection of data for one or more purposes, usually in digital form. The data are typically organized to model relevant aspects of reality , in a way that supports processes requiring this information...

s among all Alcatel OmniPCXs. It is used to inform the whole network about configuration changes and provides centralized alarms.

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