A Software Toolkit for Developing Telecommunications Application Components

To be effective, application developers must understand the data available to their applications, the operations required to access the data, and the steps required to turn their understanding into an implementation. A prototype development environment has been built that helps the developer explore and understand the data in the Management Information Base (MIB) and construct and deploy pieces of TMN management applications. by Alasdair D. Cox Telecommunications network operators own the largest distributed computing systems in the world. Their networks carry enormous volumes of traffic, much of which is highly valuable. Maintaining service is essential. The penalties for failure are great, and not just financial—emergency services and some air traffic control transmissions use the same telephone network. Not surprisingly, network operators have considerable systems and network management needs. The ability to provide new services is becoming vital in the telecommunications business. Speed and flexibility are key requirements, not only of the initial implementation and its deployment, but also of the management systems that ensure that service continues to operate efficiently. The rapid development of effective management systems is therefore a majo