Hans Vanderstraeten

Definition and Implementation of a TINA Based Terminal Architecture

The TINA architecture promises the fast and cost effective introduction of a wide spectrum of services with advanced multimedia, multiparty and mobility features. The business model, that forms the basis of the architecture, is outlined, and the relation between the provider domain (the network) and the user domain (the terminal) is specifically worked out in this paper. The terminal architecture that has been implemented in the first phase of the VITAL project is described in detail. Within the terminal, functionality is foreseen to have an explicit access session, exploited to provide personal mobility, and a service session, during which the core service functionality is executed. During the use of the service, a Desktop Video Conferencing application, several point to point and point to multipoint connections can be dynamically added and removed. Through the concept of Session Graph, the end-user can add and remove parties in the conference call very flexibly, while the network maintains the information needed to express the control and connectivity relations between all parties involved. The need is recognised to have the possibility for terminal-network peer-to-peer negotiation at connection level.

Development and Deployment of a Heterogeneous Set of Services Challenging a TINA-Based Telecommunication Architecture

The objective of the ACTS VITAL project is to demonstrate and validate the development, deployment, management, and use of complex heterogeneous service features on an Open Distributed Telecommunication Architecture (ODTA) defined in terms of reusable components. The project refines, extends and implements the Telecommunication Information Networking Architecture (TINA). The focal point of the paper is reporting on the services provided by the second release of the VITAL demonstrator, how they are supported by the ODTA and the conclusions from the trial at the end of the 2nd project phase. The paper also presents an overview of the plans for the final phase of the VITAL project. The reader is assumed to be familiar with the TINA business model [1] and to have at least a high-level overview of the TINA service [2] and network resource architecture [3] concepts.

A TINA Based Prototype for a Multimedia Multiparty Mobility Service

The TINA architecture is emerging as an integrated approach to service and network control and management. The ACTS VITAL project aims to extend and refine the TINA architecture and validate it through the design, development and demonstration of a set of reusable components; the latter are used to realise services composed of multimedia, multiparty and mobility service features. This paper describes the results of the project’s first phase which resulted in field trials, focusing on the refinements and extensions with respect to TINA.

Specification and development of a multimedia conferencing call model using distributed object oriented techniques

This paper reports on the specification and development of an advanced, feature rich call handling mechanism. The conferencing call model, referred to as the service session graph, is heavily influenced by, and has significantly contributed to, the TINA service architecture informational viewpoint. It is shown that two new features of the model, implicit stream binding and control mechanisms, allow telecom services to incorporate advanced conferencing features in a very efficient way. A number of implementations are described, where the call model is extended with a series of end-user services and runs on top of ATM networks.

Implementation of Hidden Concurrency in CORBA Clients

This paper reports on the introduction of concurrency at the client side, as an engineering solution to improve performance. It is shown that, by combining a wait-by-necessity principle, where the calling process only blocks when a return value of a function call is needed, with the handle concept, used to control the access to an object, hidden concurrency can be introduced into CORBA-based client components. Concurrency is achieved by splitting sequential calls to servers through the creation of dedicated threads. Hidden signifies the fact that the split is hidden for the client code by including the thread creation in the serverStub, while the synchronisation needed at some point in the client process is done through the handle mechanism combined with the wait-by-necessity principle. The introduction of this kind of concurrency can be done transparently from the client and server application code. The principle of hidden concurrency through the introduction of multiple threads at the calling side has been contrasted with the single thread scenario through an example, which takes on the TINA (Telecommunication Information Networking Architecture) Connection Management Architecture as a particular case study.