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  • Business Choices and Evony

    - by Robert May
    Recently, I’ve been playing a game called Evony, and I finally decided to quit the game and thought I should warn others who might be tempted.  I also find a lot of insight with this game as an example.  A few of the companies that I’ve worked with or worked for have been like this and they are NOT good places to be. Evony is a joke designed to milk as much money out of people as possible.  As a professional software developer who mentors teams on how to build better software, here's what I see: They obviously offshore all development and have little oversight over that offshore development, and they probably have a small team at that.  Evidenced by the poor grammar throughout the game. They're seeking to maximize revenue and pushing to do as little development as possible, which would mean a small team. They're horribly understaffed in the customer support department as evidenced by never replying to this forum and never responding to bug reports or help requests (I've had one open with no response AT ALL for over a month . . .) They have way inadequate testing, no CI, and probably no automated unit tests.  You can see this by the poor grammar throughout the game and the type of bugs that show up. They aren't following a formal development process (no Agile, Waterfall, or anything else) as evidenced by their lack of predictable release cycle and lack of visibility. I'm guessing that the internal code base is terrible, otherwise, there wouldn't be an "Age II" that had nothing more than a new visual interface and a few rule tweaks.  This is also evidenced by the itty bitty scope of bug fixes and their inability to really fix bugs. Their Architect sucks.  Really, 42k user is all you can handle on a single server?  Could you REALLY not come up with a better way to scale to handle users?  They've built isolated worlds, instead of a single continuous world. Back to milking people for money--to really progress, you have to spend money. All of this adds up to knowing, deliberate actions on the part of management.  They CHOOSE to do this (like AOL choosing to send more discs instead of improve quality). So, what can we learn? This game will never really improve, since the bosses don't care, they're only in it for the money. The game will never have good support.  Again, the owners don't care. Giving them money only perpetuates this scam (and yes, I've given them money, way too much money. :() They don't care if you quit.  There's a new sucker born every day. Don't EVER go to work for them.  I've worked both with and for people like this and the culture is NEVER good. Ah well. Technorati Tags: Evony

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  • An innovative architecture to develop business web forms (3) - Configure GridView

    This is third article in the series to introduce an innovative architecture to develop web forms in enterprise software which is high performance, productivity, configurability and maintainability than writing ASPX/MVC code directly. The article introduces how to configure gridview for search result...Did you know that DotNetSlackers also publishes .net articles written by top known .net Authors? We already have over 80 articles in several categories including Silverlight. Take a look: here.

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  • I need a piece software to use with my HP F4280 scanner.

    - by D Connors
    So, I got this printer/scanner about a year ago, and I'm really happy with it. The only thing is that I never really liked the HP scanning software that came with it. A few months ago I reformatted and reinstalled windows 7. Then, once I plugged in the printer, I noticed that windows recognized it automatically, and offered to install all the drivers by itself. So instead of manually installing the driver that came in the CD, I simply let windows automatically install it from its servers, and so far it's great. Instead of HP's scanning software (that really wasn't pleasing me), I got a very simplified interface that is more than enough for my ocasional scanning habits. Until today. Today I had to scan a bunch of old pictures for my father. And that simple interface felt like it was lacking quite a few features to make this repetitive task a little easier. And that's why I'm now looking for a good software to use for scanning. By "good" I mean anything well thought out, and specially anything that will make my life easier when repetitive-scanning. It doesn't need to have professional tweaking options, but having them is not a problem either. You guys got anything?

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  • Unicenter Software Delivery 4 not able to connect to MS SQL 2000 Database after W2003 SP2 upgrade

    - by grub
    Hello Everyone Yesterday I installed the Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2 on a Windows Server 2003 which has Unicenter Software Delivery 4 installed. Prior to the installation I disabled every CA service on the server (Brightstor, SDO , RCO, TNG) and the MS SQL 2000 service. After the installation of the SP2 I enabled the services again but the Unicenter Service is not able to connect to the MS SQL 2000 Database anymore. The database itself is up and running and I can connect to it with the Enterprise Manager. A dbcc checkdb doesnt return any errors on the Unicenter database. The Unicenter service throws the following error messages during startup: IM[1] 27/05 10:38:31,272 Installation Manager in init phase IM[1] 27/05 10:38:31,694 Process IM(L) - [004152] failed to open database SDDATA. dbopen() call failed. IM[1] 27/05 10:38:31,694 sqls error details: IM[1] 27/05 10:38:31,694 (null) IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,069 ##EXCEPTION## TableError T@:PS_SQLS\isam_db.cxx:744. IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,069 ##EXCEPTION## TableError C@:TaskmgrL\ASMTML.CXX:596. IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,069 ##EXCEPTION## ErrorCode: 4711 in SDDATA:Isam::Isam. Process IM(L) - [004152] failed to open database SDDATA. dbopen() call failed. IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,069 sqls error details: IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,069 (null) IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,069 returned 0. IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,084 Persistent Storage could not be opened. Error cause is found in the ASM Event Log. Restart Task Manager. IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,084 Failed to open database. IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,084 Installation Manager ends> If I check the Unicenter configutation with *chkmib_l* the tool throws an exception and creates a small dump file. An Exception Occurred: Time: 27/05 09:49:38,928 Reason: ChkMIB_l.exe caused an UNKNOWN_EXCEPTION in module kernel32.dll at 7C82001B:77E4BEE7 Registers: EAX=0012F908 EBX=00000000 ECX=00000000 EDX=02410004 ESI=0012F998 EDI=0012F998 EBP=0012F958 ESP=0012F904 EIP=77E4BEE7 FLG=00000206 CS =7C82001B DS =B90023 SS =120023 ES =120023 FS =7C82003B GS =3F0000 Call Stack: 7C82001B:77E4BEE7 (0xE06D7363 0x00000001 0x00000003 0x0012F98C) kernel32.dll 7C82001B:77BB3259 (0x0012F9B8 0x2B017C50 0x2B024404 0x00B68C98) MSVCRT.dll 7C82001B:2B010C42 (0x00020003 0x010C00FE 0x003F0190 0x00B69050) PS.dll << SOFTWARE DELIVERY INSTANCE INFO >> TRIGGER 0(1) instances: JCE 0(1) instances: TM 0(1) instances: IM 0(1) instances: DM 0(1) instances: DPU 0(71) instances: NATF 0(1) instances: MIBCONV 0(0) instances: API 0(4) instances: DTSFT 0(0) instances: TNGPOP 0(0) instances: DGATE 0(0) instances: << FLUSHING MEMORY TRACES >> << STOP FLUSHING MEMORY TRACES >> I compared the configuration of the SDO service and the system configuration with another server on which the Windows Server 2003 SP2 is installed and SDO is working. The configuration is the same and the same driver and software versions are used. Do you have any idea what causes the connection issue? Should I deinstall the unicenter service and make a fresh installation on the server or should I remove the Windows Server 2003 SP2? I don't want to remove the SP2 because it's a requirement for WSUS3 SP2 and I really don't want to know how many possible exploits are possible in such an old system ;-) Thank you very much and have a nice day. Below you can find more detailed information about the system and the SDO service. psinfo output (system information) System information for \\CZZAAS1003: Uptime: 0 days 14 hours 38 minutes 50 seconds Kernel version: Microsoft Windows Server 2003, Multiprocessor Free Product type: Standard Edition Product version: 5.2 Service pack: 2 Kernel build number: 3790 Install date: 23.9.2004, 11:16:11s IE version: 6.0000 System root: C:\WINDOWS Processors: 2 Processor speed: 2.3 GHz Processor type: Intel(R) Xeon(TM) CPU Physical memory: 1024 MB Video driver: RAGE XL PCI Family (Microsoft Corporation) sdver output (Unicenter Software delivery version) Unicenter Software Delivery 4.0 SP1 I2 ENU [2901] Copyright 2004 Computer Associates International, Incorporated ms sql 2000 version and odbc driver version MS SQL 2000 Server Standard Edition Product Version: 8.00.760 (SP3) ODBC Driver: SQL Server - Version 2000.86.3959.00 complete Unicenter Software delivery service log file TRIGGER[1] 27/05 10:38:28,366 SD Trigger Agent has started NATF[1] 27/05 10:38:28,928 Initiation phase finished IM[1] 27/05 10:38:31,272 Installation Manager in init phase IM[1] 27/05 10:38:31,694 Process IM(L) - [004152] failed to open database SDDATA. dbopen() call failed. IM[1] 27/05 10:38:31,694 sqls error details: IM[1] 27/05 10:38:31,694 (null) IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,069 ##EXCEPTION## TableError T@:PS_SQLS\isam_db.cxx:744. IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,069 ##EXCEPTION## TableError C@:TaskmgrL\ASMTML.CXX:596. IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,069 ##EXCEPTION## ErrorCode: 4711 in SDDATA:Isam::Isam. Process IM(L) - [004152] failed to open database SDDATA. dbopen() call failed. IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,069 sqls error details: IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,069 (null) IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,069 returned 0. IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,084 Persistent Storage could not be opened. Error cause is found in the ASM Event Log. Restart Task Manager. IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,084 Failed to open database. IM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,084 Installation Manager ends TM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,116 Task Manager in init phase TM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,334 Process TM(L) - [006132] failed to open database SDDATA. dbopen() call failed. TM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,334 sqls error details: TM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,334 (null) TM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,381 ##EXCEPTION## TableError T@:PS_SQLS\isam_db.cxx:744. TM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,381 ##EXCEPTION## TableError C@:TaskmgrL\ASMTML.CXX:596. TM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,381 ##EXCEPTION## ErrorCode: 4711 in SDDATA:Isam::Isam. Process TM(L) - [006132] failed to open database SDDATA. dbopen() call failed. TM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,381 sqls error details: TM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,381 (null) TM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,381 returned 0. TM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,381 Persistent Storage could not be opened. Error cause is found in the ASM Event Log. Restart Task Manager. TM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,381 Failed to open database. TM[1] 27/05 10:38:32,381 Task Manager ends DM[1] 27/05 10:38:33,272 Dialogue Manager is now active API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,397 API Server Process in init phase API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,397 API - SDNLS_Init API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,397 API - connectEM API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,412 API - apiServ.init DM[1] 27/05 10:38:34,678 **AND** 1 Agents triggered API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,709 Process API(L) - [005680] failed to open database SDDATA. dbopen() call failed. API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,709 sqls error details: API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,709 (null) API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,756 ##EXCEPTION## TableError T@:PS_SQLS\isam_db.cxx:744. API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,756 ##EXCEPTION## TableError C@:MainAPIL\APISERVL.CXX:246. API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,756 ##EXCEPTION## ErrorCode: 4711 in SDDATA:Isam::Isam. Process API(L) - [005680] failed to open database SDDATA. dbopen() call failed. API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,756 sqls error details: API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,756 (null) API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,756 returned 0. API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,756 Open of the database failed. API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,756 API - apiServ.init complete API[1] 27/05 10:38:34,756 API - start_APIServer DM[1] 27/05 10:38:34,803 CZZAAR1037 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:35,772 DPU in init phase DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,100 >> GetManagerData DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,287 >> SetCompInfo DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,334 >> GetContainerList DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,350 getJobState 3 from 5b6ad DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,350 getJobState 3 from 5b6ad DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,350 getJobState 3 from 5b6b7 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,350 getJobState 3 from 5b6b7 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,350 getJobState 3 from 5b6c1 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,350 getJobState 3 from 5b6c1 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,366 getJobState 3 from 5b6cb DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,366 getJobState 3 from 5b6cb DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,366 getJobState 3 from 5b6f9 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,366 getJobState 3 from 5b6f9 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,366 getJobState 3 from 5b71a DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,366 getJobState 3 from 5b71a DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,366 getJobState 3 from 5b724 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,381 getJobState 3 from 5b724 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,397 getJobState 3 from 5b72e DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,397 getJobState 3 from 5b72e DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,397 getJobState 3 from 5b738 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,397 getJobState 3 from 5b738 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,397 getJobState 3 from 5b742 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,397 getJobState 3 from 5b742 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,397 getJobState 3 from 5b74c DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,397 getJobState 3 from 5b74c DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,397 getJobState 3 from 5b756 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,397 getJobState 3 from 5b756 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,397 getJobState 3 from 5b78a DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,397 getJobState 3 from 5b78a DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,397 getJobState 3 from 5b7af DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,397 getJobState 3 from 5b7af DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,522 >> SetCompAttr DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,569 >> SetDetected DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 disconnect DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 getJobState 3 from 5b6ad DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 getJobState 3 from 5b6b7 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 getJobState 3 from 5b6c1 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 getJobState 3 from 5b6cb DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 getJobState 3 from 5b6f9 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 getJobState 3 from 5b71a DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 getJobState 3 from 5b724 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 getJobState 3 from 5b72e DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 getJobState 3 from 5b738 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 getJobState 3 from 5b742 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 getJobState 3 from 5b74c DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 getJobState 3 from 5b756 DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 getJobState 3 from 5b78a DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 getJobState 3 from 5b7af DPU[1:CZZAAR1037] 27/05 10:38:36,584 DPU ends DM[1] 27/05 10:38:38,006 **AND** 0 Agents triggered JCE[1] 27/05 10:38:38,053 JCE starts DM[1] 27/05 10:38:38,287 CZZAAS1003 DPU[2:CZZAAS1003] 27/05 10:38:38,412 DPU in init phase DPU[2:CZZAAS1003] 27/05 10:38:38,647 >> GetManagerData DPU[2:CZZAAS1003] 27/05 10:38:38,756 >> SetCompInfo DPU[2:CZZAAS1003] 27/05 10:38:38,787 >> GetContainerList DM[1] 27/05 10:38:38,850 **AND** 1 Agents triggered DM[1] 27/05 10:38:38,928 CZZAAR1124 DPU[3:CZZAAR1124] 27/05 10:38:39,053 DPU in init phase DPU[3:CZZAAR1124] 27/05 10:38:39,272 >> GetManagerData DM[1] 27/05 10:38:39,334 **AND** 1 Agents triggered DPU[3:CZZAAR1124] 27/05 10:38:39,381 >> SetCompInfo DPU[3:CZZAAR1124] 27/05 10:38:39,412 >> GetContainerList DM[1] 27/05 10:38:39,412 CZZAAR1125 DPU[3:CZZAAR1124] 27/05 10:38:39,428 getJobState 3 from 5b88e DPU[3:CZZAAR1124] 27/05 10:38:39,428 getJobState 3 from 5b88e DPU[2:CZZAAS1003] 27/05 10:38:39,491 >> SetCompAttr DPU[3:CZZAAR1124] 27/05 10:38:39,522 >> SetCompAttr DPU[4:CZZAAR1125] 27/05 10:38:39,522 DPU in init phase DPU[3:CZZAAR1124] 27/05 10:38:39,584 >> SetDetected DPU[2:CZZAAS1003] 27/05 10:38:39,584 >> SetDetected DPU[3:CZZAAR1124] 27/05 10:38:39,584 disconnect DPU[3:CZZAAR1124] 27/05 10:38:39,600 getJobState 3 from 5b88e DPU[3:CZZAAR1124] 27/05 10:38:39,600 DPU ends DPU[2:CZZAAS1003] 27/05 10:38:39,631 disconnect DPU[2:CZZAAS1003] 27/05 10:38:39,631 DPU ends DPU[4:CZZAAR1125] 27/05 10:38:39,756 >> GetManagerData DPU[4:CZZAAR1125] 27/05 10:38:39,850 >> SetCompInfo DPU[4:CZZAAR1125] 27/05 10:38:39,881 >> GetContainerList DPU[4:CZZAAR1125] 27/05 10:38:39,897 getJobState 3 from 5b8a9 DPU[4:CZZAAR1125] 27/05 10:38:39,897 getJobState 3 from 5b8a9 DPU[4:CZZAAR1125] 27/05 10:38:39,991 >> SetCompAttr DPU[4:CZZAAR1125] 27/05 10:38:40,100 >> SetDetected DPU[4:CZZAAR1125] 27/05 10:38:40,116 disconnect DPU[4:CZZAAR1125] 27/05 10:38:40,116 getJobState 3 from 5b8a9 DPU[4:CZZAAR1125] 27/05 10:38:40,116 DPU ends DM[1] 27/05 10:38:40,741 **AND** 0 Agents triggered JCE[1] 27/05 10:38:42,756 JCE ends DM[1] 27/05 10:38:47,475 **AND** 0 Agents triggered DM[1] 27/05 10:38:54,241 **AND** 0 Agents triggered

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  • I need scanning software to use with my scanner.

    - by D Connors
    So, I got this (HP F4280) printer/scanner about a year ago, and I'm really happy with it. The only thing is that I never really liked the HP scanning software that came with it. A few months ago I reformatted and reinstalled windows 7. Then, once I plugged in the printer, I noticed that windows recognized it automatically, and offered to install all the drivers by itself. So instead of manually installing the driver that came in the CD, I simply let windows automatically install it from its servers, and so far it's great. Instead of HP's scanning software (that really wasn't pleasing me), I got a very simplified interface that is more than enough for my ocasional scanning habits. Until today. Today I had to scan a bunch of old pictures for my father. And that simple interface felt like it was lacking quite a few features to make this repetitive task a little easier. And that's why I'm now looking for a good software to use for scanning. By "good" I mean anything well thought out, and specially anything that will make my life easier when repetitive-scanning. It doesn't need to have professional tweaking options, but having them is not a problem either. You guys got anything?

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  • Is there a Telecommunications Reference Architecture?

    - by raul.goycoolea
    @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Abstract   Reference architecture provides needed architectural information that can be provided in advance to an enterprise to enable consistent architectural best practices. Enterprise Reference Architecture helps business owners to actualize their strategies, vision, objectives, and principles. It evaluates the IT systems, based on Reference Architecture goals, principles, and standards. It helps to reduce IT costs by increasing functionality, availability, scalability, etc. Telecom Reference Architecture provides customers with the flexibility to view bundled service bills online with the provision of multiple services. It provides real-time, flexible billing and charging systems, to handle complex promotions, discounts, and settlements with multiple parties. This paper attempts to describe the Reference Architecture for the Telecom Enterprises. It lays the foundation for a Telecom Reference Architecture by articulating the requirements, drivers, and pitfalls for telecom service providers. It describes generic reference architecture for telecom enterprises and moves on to explain how to achieve Enterprise Reference Architecture by using SOA.   Introduction   A Reference Architecture provides a methodology, set of practices, template, and standards based on a set of successful solutions implemented earlier. These solutions have been generalized and structured for the depiction of both a logical and a physical architecture, based on the harvesting of a set of patterns that describe observations in a number of successful implementations. It helps as a reference for the various architectures that an enterprise can implement to solve various problems. It can be used as the starting point or the point of comparisons for various departments/business entities of a company, or for the various companies for an enterprise. It provides multiple views for multiple stakeholders.   Major artifacts of the Enterprise Reference Architecture are methodologies, standards, metadata, documents, design patterns, etc.   Purpose of Reference Architecture   In most cases, architects spend a lot of time researching, investigating, defining, and re-arguing architectural decisions. It is like reinventing the wheel as their peers in other organizations or even the same organization have already spent a lot of time and effort defining their own architectural practices. This prevents an organization from learning from its own experiences and applying that knowledge for increased effectiveness.   Reference architecture provides missing architectural information that can be provided in advance to project team members to enable consistent architectural best practices.   Enterprise Reference Architecture helps an enterprise to achieve the following at the abstract level:   ·       Reference architecture is more of a communication channel to an enterprise ·       Helps the business owners to accommodate to their strategies, vision, objectives, and principles. ·       Evaluates the IT systems based on Reference Architecture Principles ·       Reduces IT spending through increasing functionality, availability, scalability, etc ·       A Real-time Integration Model helps to reduce the latency of the data updates Is used to define a single source of Information ·       Provides a clear view on how to manage information and security ·       Defines the policy around the data ownership, product boundaries, etc. ·       Helps with cost optimization across project and solution portfolios by eliminating unused or duplicate investments and assets ·       Has a shorter implementation time and cost   Once the reference architecture is in place, the set of architectural principles, standards, reference models, and best practices ensure that the aligned investments have the greatest possible likelihood of success in both the near term and the long term (TCO).     Common pitfalls for Telecom Service Providers   Telecom Reference Architecture serves as the first step towards maturity for a telecom service provider. During the course of our assignments/experiences with telecom players, we have come across the following observations – Some of these indicate a lack of maturity of the telecom service provider:   ·       In markets that are growing and not so mature, it has been observed that telcos have a significant amount of in-house or home-grown applications. In some of these markets, the growth has been so rapid that IT has been unable to cope with business demands. Telcos have shown a tendency to come up with workarounds in their IT applications so as to meet business needs. ·       Even for core functions like provisioning or mediation, some telcos have tried to manage with home-grown applications. ·       Most of the applications do not have the required scalability or maintainability to sustain growth in volumes or functionality. ·       Applications face interoperability issues with other applications in the operator's landscape. Integrating a new application or network element requires considerable effort on the part of the other applications. ·       Application boundaries are not clear, and functionality that is not in the initial scope of that application gets pushed onto it. This results in the development of the multiple, small applications without proper boundaries. ·       Usage of Legacy OSS/BSS systems, poor Integration across Multiple COTS Products and Internal Systems. Most of the Integrations are developed on ad-hoc basis and Point-to-Point Integration. ·       Redundancy of the business functions in different applications • Fragmented data across the different applications and no integrated view of the strategic data • Lot of performance Issues due to the usage of the complex integration across OSS and BSS systems   However, this is where the maturity of the telecom industry as a whole can be of help. The collaborative efforts of telcos to overcome some of these problems have resulted in bodies like the TM Forum. They have come up with frameworks for business processes, data, applications, and technology for telecom service providers. These could be a good starting point for telcos to clean up their enterprise landscape.   Industry Trends in Telecom Reference Architecture   Telecom reference architectures are evolving rapidly because telcos are facing business and IT challenges.   “The reality is that there probably is no killer application, no silver bullet that the telcos can latch onto to carry them into a 21st Century.... Instead, there are probably hundreds – perhaps thousands – of niche applications.... And the only way to find which of these works for you is to try out lots of them, ramp up the ones that work, and discontinue the ones that fail.” – Martin Creaner President & CTO TM Forum.   The following trends have been observed in telecom reference architecture:   ·       Transformation of business structures to align with customer requirements ·       Adoption of more Internet-like technical architectures. The Web 2.0 concept is increasingly being used. ·       Virtualization of the traditional operations support system (OSS) ·       Adoption of SOA to support development of IP-based services ·       Adoption of frameworks like Service Delivery Platforms (SDPs) and IP Multimedia Subsystem ·       (IMS) to enable seamless deployment of various services over fixed and mobile networks ·       Replacement of in-house, customized, and stove-piped OSS/BSS with standards-based COTS products ·       Compliance with industry standards and frameworks like eTOM, SID, and TAM to enable seamless integration with other standards-based products   Drivers of Reference Architecture   The drivers of the Reference Architecture are Reference Architecture Goals, Principles, and Enterprise Vision and Telecom Transformation. The details are depicted below diagram. @font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoCaption, li.MsoCaption, div.MsoCaption { margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt; font-size: 9pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: rgb(79, 129, 189); font-weight: bold; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; } Figure 1. Drivers for Reference Architecture @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Today’s telecom reference architectures should seamlessly integrate traditional legacy-based applications and transition to next-generation network technologies (e.g., IP multimedia subsystems). This has resulted in new requirements for flexible, real-time billing and OSS/BSS systems and implications on the service provider’s organizational requirements and structure.   Telecom reference architectures are today expected to:   ·       Integrate voice, messaging, email and other VAS over fixed and mobile networks, back end systems ·       Be able to provision multiple services and service bundles • Deliver converged voice, video and data services ·       Leverage the existing Network Infrastructure ·       Provide real-time, flexible billing and charging systems to handle complex promotions, discounts, and settlements with multiple parties. ·       Support charging of advanced data services such as VoIP, On-Demand, Services (e.g.  Video), IMS/SIP Services, Mobile Money, Content Services and IPTV. ·       Help in faster deployment of new services • Serve as an effective platform for collaboration between network IT and business organizations ·       Harness the potential of converging technology, networks, devices and content to develop multimedia services and solutions of ever-increasing sophistication on a single Internet Protocol (IP) ·       Ensure better service delivery and zero revenue leakage through real-time balance and credit management ·       Lower operating costs to drive profitability   Enterprise Reference Architecture   The Enterprise Reference Architecture (RA) fills the gap between the concepts and vocabulary defined by the reference model and the implementation. Reference architecture provides detailed architectural information in a common format such that solutions can be repeatedly designed and deployed in a consistent, high-quality, supportable fashion. This paper attempts to describe the Reference Architecture for the Telecom Application Usage and how to achieve the Enterprise Level Reference Architecture using SOA.   • Telecom Reference Architecture • Enterprise SOA based Reference Architecture   Telecom Reference Architecture   Tele Management Forum’s New Generation Operations Systems and Software (NGOSS) is an architectural framework for organizing, integrating, and implementing telecom systems. NGOSS is a component-based framework consisting of the following elements:   ·       The enhanced Telecom Operations Map (eTOM) is a business process framework. ·       The Shared Information Data (SID) model provides a comprehensive information framework that may be specialized for the needs of a particular organization. ·       The Telecom Application Map (TAM) is an application framework to depict the functional footprint of applications, relative to the horizontal processes within eTOM. ·       The Technology Neutral Architecture (TNA) is an integrated framework. TNA is an architecture that is sustainable through technology changes.   NGOSS Architecture Standards are:   ·       Centralized data ·       Loosely coupled distributed systems ·       Application components/re-use  ·       A technology-neutral system framework with technology specific implementations ·       Interoperability to service provider data/processes ·       Allows more re-use of business components across multiple business scenarios ·       Workflow automation   The traditional operator systems architecture consists of four layers,   ·       Business Support System (BSS) layer, with focus toward customers and business partners. Manages order, subscriber, pricing, rating, and billing information. ·       Operations Support System (OSS) layer, built around product, service, and resource inventories. ·       Networks layer – consists of Network elements and 3rd Party Systems. ·       Integration Layer – to maximize application communication and overall solution flexibility.   Reference architecture for telecom enterprises is depicted below. @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoCaption, li.MsoCaption, div.MsoCaption { margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt; font-size: 9pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: rgb(79, 129, 189); font-weight: bold; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Figure 2. Telecom Reference Architecture   The major building blocks of any Telecom Service Provider architecture are as follows:   1. Customer Relationship Management   CRM encompasses the end-to-end lifecycle of the customer: customer initiation/acquisition, sales, ordering, and service activation, customer care and support, proactive campaigns, cross sell/up sell, and retention/loyalty.   CRM also includes the collection of customer information and its application to personalize, customize, and integrate delivery of service to a customer, as well as to identify opportunities for increasing the value of the customer to the enterprise.   The key functionalities related to Customer Relationship Management are   ·       Manage the end-to-end lifecycle of a customer request for products. ·       Create and manage customer profiles. ·       Manage all interactions with customers – inquiries, requests, and responses. ·       Provide updates to Billing and other south bound systems on customer/account related updates such as customer/ account creation, deletion, modification, request bills, final bill, duplicate bills, credit limits through Middleware. ·       Work with Order Management System, Product, and Service Management components within CRM. ·       Manage customer preferences – Involve all the touch points and channels to the customer, including contact center, retail stores, dealers, self service, and field service, as well as via any media (phone, face to face, web, mobile device, chat, email, SMS, mail, the customer's bill, etc.). ·       Support single interface for customer contact details, preferences, account details, offers, customer premise equipment, bill details, bill cycle details, and customer interactions.   CRM applications interact with customers through customer touch points like portals, point-of-sale terminals, interactive voice response systems, etc. The requests by customers are sent via fulfillment/provisioning to billing system for ordering processing.   2. Billing and Revenue Management   Billing and Revenue Management handles the collection of appropriate usage records and production of timely and accurate bills – for providing pre-bill usage information and billing to customers; for processing their payments; and for performing payment collections. In addition, it handles customer inquiries about bills, provides billing inquiry status, and is responsible for resolving billing problems to the customer's satisfaction in a timely manner. This process grouping also supports prepayment for services.   The key functionalities provided by these applications are   ·       To ensure that enterprise revenue is billed and invoices delivered appropriately to customers. ·       To manage customers’ billing accounts, process their payments, perform payment collections, and monitor the status of the account balance. ·       To ensure the timely and effective fulfillment of all customer bill inquiries and complaints. ·       Collect the usage records from mediation and ensure appropriate rating and discounting of all usage and pricing. ·       Support revenue sharing; split charging where usage is guided to an account different from the service consumer. ·       Support prepaid and post-paid rating. ·       Send notification on approach / exceeding the usage thresholds as enforced by the subscribed offer, and / or as setup by the customer. ·       Support prepaid, post paid, and hybrid (where some services are prepaid and the rest of the services post paid) customers and conversion from post paid to prepaid, and vice versa. ·       Support different billing function requirements like charge prorating, promotion, discount, adjustment, waiver, write-off, account receivable, GL Interface, late payment fee, credit control, dunning, account or service suspension, re-activation, expiry, termination, contract violation penalty, etc. ·       Initiate direct debit to collect payment against an invoice outstanding. ·       Send notification to Middleware on different events; for example, payment receipt, pre-suspension, threshold exceed, etc.   Billing systems typically get usage data from mediation systems for rating and billing. They get provisioning requests from order management systems and inquiries from CRM systems. Convergent and real-time billing systems can directly get usage details from network elements.   3. Mediation   Mediation systems transform/translate the Raw or Native Usage Data Records into a general format that is acceptable to billing for their rating purposes.   The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Mediation system in the end-to-end solution.   ·       Collect Usage Data Records from different data sources – like network elements, routers, servers – via different protocol and interfaces. ·       Process Usage Data Records – Mediation will process Usage Data Records as per the source format. ·       Validate Usage Data Records from each source. ·       Segregates Usage Data Records coming from each source to multiple, based on the segregation requirement of end Application. ·       Aggregates Usage Data Records based on the aggregation rule if any from different sources. ·       Consolidates multiple Usage Data Records from each source. ·       Delivers formatted Usage Data Records to different end application like Billing, Interconnect, Fraud Management, etc. ·       Generates audit trail for incoming Usage Data Records and keeps track of all the Usage Data Records at various stages of mediation process. ·       Checks duplicate Usage Data Records across files for a given time window.   4. Fulfillment   This area is responsible for providing customers with their requested products in a timely and correct manner. It translates the customer's business or personal need into a solution that can be delivered using the specific products in the enterprise's portfolio. This process informs the customers of the status of their purchase order, and ensures completion on time, as well as ensuring a delighted customer. These processes are responsible for accepting and issuing orders. They deal with pre-order feasibility determination, credit authorization, order issuance, order status and tracking, customer update on customer order activities, and customer notification on order completion. Order management and provisioning applications fall into this category.   The key functionalities provided by these applications are   ·       Issuing new customer orders, modifying open customer orders, or canceling open customer orders; ·       Verifying whether specific non-standard offerings sought by customers are feasible and supportable; ·       Checking the credit worthiness of customers as part of the customer order process; ·       Testing the completed offering to ensure it is working correctly; ·       Updating of the Customer Inventory Database to reflect that the specific product offering has been allocated, modified, or cancelled; ·       Assigning and tracking customer provisioning activities; ·       Managing customer provisioning jeopardy conditions; and ·       Reporting progress on customer orders and other processes to customer.   These applications typically get orders from CRM systems. They interact with network elements and billing systems for fulfillment of orders.   5. Enterprise Management   This process area includes those processes that manage enterprise-wide activities and needs, or have application within the enterprise as a whole. They encompass all business management processes that   ·       Are necessary to support the whole of the enterprise, including processes for financial management, legal management, regulatory management, process, cost, and quality management, etc.;   ·       Are responsible for setting corporate policies, strategies, and directions, and for providing guidelines and targets for the whole of the business, including strategy development and planning for areas, such as Enterprise Architecture, that are integral to the direction and development of the business;   ·       Occur throughout the enterprise, including processes for project management, performance assessments, cost assessments, etc.     (i) Enterprise Risk Management:   Enterprise Risk Management focuses on assuring that risks and threats to the enterprise value and/or reputation are identified, and appropriate controls are in place to minimize or eliminate the identified risks. The identified risks may be physical or logical/virtual. Successful risk management ensures that the enterprise can support its mission critical operations, processes, applications, and communications in the face of serious incidents such as security threats/violations and fraud attempts. Two key areas covered in Risk Management by telecom operators are:   ·       Revenue Assurance: Revenue assurance system will be responsible for identifying revenue loss scenarios across components/systems, and will help in rectifying the problems. The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Revenue Assurance system in the end-to-end solution. o   Identify all usage information dropped when networks are being upgraded. o   Interconnect bill verification. o   Identify where services are routinely provisioned but never billed. o   Identify poor sales policies that are intensifying collections problems. o   Find leakage where usage is sent to error bucket and never billed for. o   Find leakage where field service, CRM, and network build-out are not optimized.   ·       Fraud Management: Involves collecting data from different systems to identify abnormalities in traffic patterns, usage patterns, and subscription patterns to report suspicious activity that might suggest fraudulent usage of resources, resulting in revenue losses to the operator.   The key roles and responsibilities of the system component are as follows:   o   Fraud management system will capture and monitor high usage (over a certain threshold) in terms of duration, value, and number of calls for each subscriber. The threshold for each subscriber is decided by the system and fixed automatically. o   Fraud management will be able to detect the unauthorized access to services for certain subscribers. These subscribers may have been provided unauthorized services by employees. The component will raise the alert to the operator the very first time of such illegal calls or calls which are not billed. o   The solution will be to have an alarm management system that will deliver alarms to the operator/provider whenever it detects a fraud, thus minimizing fraud by catching it the first time it occurs. o   The Fraud Management system will be capable of interfacing with switches, mediation systems, and billing systems   (ii) Knowledge Management   This process focuses on knowledge management, technology research within the enterprise, and the evaluation of potential technology acquisitions.   Key responsibilities of knowledge base management are to   ·       Maintain knowledge base – Creation and updating of knowledge base on ongoing basis. ·       Search knowledge base – Search of knowledge base on keywords or category browse ·       Maintain metadata – Management of metadata on knowledge base to ensure effective management and search. ·       Run report generator. ·       Provide content – Add content to the knowledge base, e.g., user guides, operational manual, etc.   (iii) Document Management   It focuses on maintaining a repository of all electronic documents or images of paper documents relevant to the enterprise using a system.   (iv) Data Management   It manages data as a valuable resource for any enterprise. For telecom enterprises, the typical areas covered are Master Data Management, Data Warehousing, and Business Intelligence. It is also responsible for data governance, security, quality, and database management.   Key responsibilities of Data Management are   ·       Using ETL, extract the data from CRM, Billing, web content, ERP, campaign management, financial, network operations, asset management info, customer contact data, customer measures, benchmarks, process data, e.g., process inputs, outputs, and measures, into Enterprise Data Warehouse. ·       Management of data traceability with source, data related business rules/decisions, data quality, data cleansing data reconciliation, competitors data – storage for all the enterprise data (customer profiles, products, offers, revenues, etc.) ·       Get online update through night time replication or physical backup process at regular frequency. ·       Provide the data access to business intelligence and other systems for their analysis, report generation, and use.   (v) Business Intelligence   It uses the Enterprise Data to provide the various analysis and reports that contain prospects and analytics for customer retention, acquisition of new customers due to the offers, and SLAs. It will generate right and optimized plans – bolt-ons for the customers.   The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Business Intelligence system at the Enterprise Level:   ·       It will do Pattern analysis and reports problem. ·       It will do Data Analysis – Statistical analysis, data profiling, affinity analysis of data, customer segment wise usage patterns on offers, products, service and revenue generation against services and customer segments. ·       It will do Performance (business, system, and forecast) analysis, churn propensity, response time, and SLAs analysis. ·       It will support for online and offline analysis, and report drill down capability. ·       It will collect, store, and report various SLA data. ·       It will provide the necessary intelligence for marketing and working on campaigns, etc., with cost benefit analysis and predictions.   It will advise on customer promotions with additional services based on loyalty and credit history of customer   ·       It will Interface with Enterprise Data Management system for data to run reports and analysis tasks. It will interface with the campaign schedules, based on historical success evidence.   (vi) Stakeholder and External Relations Management   It manages the enterprise's relationship with stakeholders and outside entities. Stakeholders include shareholders, employee organizations, etc. Outside entities include regulators, local community, and unions. Some of the processes within this grouping are Shareholder Relations, External Affairs, Labor Relations, and Public Relations.   (vii) Enterprise Resource Planning   It is used to manage internal and external resources, including tangible assets, financial resources, materials, and human resources. Its purpose is to facilitate the flow of information between all business functions inside the boundaries of the enterprise and manage the connections to outside stakeholders. ERP systems consolidate all business operations into a uniform and enterprise wide system environment.   The key roles and responsibilities for Enterprise System are given below:   ·        It will handle responsibilities such as core accounting, financial, and management reporting. ·       It will interface with CRM for capturing customer account and details. ·       It will interface with billing to capture the billing revenue and other financial data. ·       It will be responsible for executing the dunning process. Billing will send the required feed to ERP for execution of dunning. ·       It will interface with the CRM and Billing through batch interfaces. Enterprise management systems are like horizontals in the enterprise and typically interact with all major telecom systems. E.g., an ERP system interacts with CRM, Fulfillment, and Billing systems for different kinds of data exchanges.   6. External Interfaces/Touch Points   The typical external parties are customers, suppliers/partners, employees, shareholders, and other stakeholders. External interactions from/to a Service Provider to other parties can be achieved by a variety of mechanisms, including:   ·       Exchange of emails or faxes ·       Call Centers ·       Web Portals ·       Business-to-Business (B2B) automated transactions   These applications provide an Internet technology driven interface to external parties to undertake a variety of business functions directly for themselves. These can provide fully or partially automated service to external parties through various touch points.   Typical characteristics of these touch points are   ·       Pre-integrated self-service system, including stand-alone web framework or integration front end with a portal engine ·       Self services layer exposing atomic web services/APIs for reuse by multiple systems across the architectural environment ·       Portlets driven connectivity exposing data and services interoperability through a portal engine or web application   These touch points mostly interact with the CRM systems for requests, inquiries, and responses.   7. Middleware   The component will be primarily responsible for integrating the different systems components under a common platform. It should provide a Standards-Based Platform for building Service Oriented Architecture and Composite Applications. The following lists the high-level roles and responsibilities executed by the Middleware component in the end-to-end solution.   ·       As an integration framework, covering to and fro interfaces ·       Provide a web service framework with service registry. ·       Support SOA framework with SOA service registry. ·       Each of the interfaces from / to Middleware to other components would handle data transformation, translation, and mapping of data points. ·       Receive data from the caller / activate and/or forward the data to the recipient system in XML format. ·       Use standard XML for data exchange. ·       Provide the response back to the service/call initiator. ·       Provide a tracking until the response completion. ·       Keep a store transitional data against each call/transaction. ·       Interface through Middleware to get any information that is possible and allowed from the existing systems to enterprise systems; e.g., customer profile and customer history, etc. ·       Provide the data in a common unified format to the SOA calls across systems, and follow the Enterprise Architecture directive. ·       Provide an audit trail for all transactions being handled by the component.   8. Network Elements   The term Network Element means a facility or equipment used in the provision of a telecommunications service. Such terms also includes features, functions, and capabilities that are provided by means of such facility or equipment, including subscriber numbers, databases, signaling systems, and information sufficient for billing and collection or used in the transmission, routing, or other provision of a telecommunications service.   Typical network elements in a GSM network are Home Location Register (HLR), Intelligent Network (IN), Mobile Switching Center (MSC), SMS Center (SMSC), and network elements for other value added services like Push-to-talk (PTT), Ring Back Tone (RBT), etc.   Network elements are invoked when subscribers use their telecom devices for any kind of usage. These elements generate usage data and pass it on to downstream systems like mediation and billing system for rating and billing. They also integrate with provisioning systems for order/service fulfillment.   9. 3rd Party Applications   3rd Party systems are applications like content providers, payment gateways, point of sale terminals, and databases/applications maintained by the Government.   Depending on applicability and the type of functionality provided by 3rd party applications, the integration with different telecom systems like CRM, provisioning, and billing will be done.   10. Service Delivery Platform   A service delivery platform (SDP) provides the architecture for the rapid deployment, provisioning, execution, management, and billing of value added telecom services. SDPs are based on the concept of SOA and layered architecture. They support the delivery of voice, data services, and content in network and device-independent fashion. They allow application developers to aggregate network capabilities, services, and sources of content. SDPs typically contain layers for web services exposure, service application development, and network abstraction.   SOA Reference Architecture   SOA concept is based on the principle of developing reusable business service and building applications by composing those services, instead of building monolithic applications in silos. It’s about bridging the gap between business and IT through a set of business-aligned IT services, using a set of design principles, patterns, and techniques.   In an SOA, resources are made available to participants in a value net, enterprise, line of business (typically spanning multiple applications within an enterprise or across multiple enterprises). It consists of a set of business-aligned IT services that collectively fulfill an organization’s business processes and goals. We can choreograph these services into composite applications and invoke them through standard protocols. SOA, apart from agility and reusability, enables:   ·       The business to specify processes as orchestrations of reusable services ·       Technology agnostic business design, with technology hidden behind service interface ·       A contractual-like interaction between business and IT, based on service SLAs ·       Accountability and governance, better aligned to business services ·       Applications interconnections untangling by allowing access only through service interfaces, reducing the daunting side effects of change ·       Reduced pressure to replace legacy and extended lifetime for legacy applications, through encapsulation in services   ·       A Cloud Computing paradigm, using web services technologies, that makes possible service outsourcing on an on-demand, utility-like, pay-per-usage basis   The following section represents the Reference Architecture of logical view for the Telecom Solution. The new custom built application needs to align with this logical architecture in the long run to achieve EA benefits.   Packaged implementation applications, such as ERP billing applications, need to expose their functions as service providers (as other applications consume) and interact with other applications as service consumers.   COT applications need to expose services through wrappers such as adapters to utilize existing resources and at the same time achieve Enterprise Architecture goal and objectives.   The following are the various layers for Enterprise level deployment of SOA. This diagram captures the abstract view of Enterprise SOA layers and important components of each layer. Layered architecture means decomposition of services such that most interactions occur between adjacent layers. However, there is no strict rule that top layers should not directly communicate with bottom layers.   The diagram below represents the important logical pieces that would result from overall SOA transformation. @font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoCaption, li.MsoCaption, div.MsoCaption { margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt; font-size: 9pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; color: rgb(79, 129, 189); font-weight: bold; }p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast { margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0cm; }ul { margin-bottom: 0cm; } Figure 3. Enterprise SOA Reference Architecture 1.          Operational System Layer: This layer consists of all packaged applications like CRM, ERP, custom built applications, COTS based applications like Billing, Revenue Management, Fulfilment, and the Enterprise databases that are essential and contribute directly or indirectly to the Enterprise OSS/BSS Transformation.   ERP holds the data of Asset Lifecycle Management, Supply Chain, and Advanced Procurement and Human Capital Management, etc.   CRM holds the data related to Order, Sales, and Marketing, Customer Care, Partner Relationship Management, Loyalty, etc.   Content Management handles Enterprise Search and Query. Billing application consists of the following components:   ·       Collections Management, Customer Billing Management, Invoices, Real-Time Rating, Discounting, and Applying of Charges ·       Enterprise databases will hold both the application and service data, whether structured or unstructured.   MDM - Master data majorly consists of Customer, Order, Product, and Service Data.     2.          Enterprise Component Layer:   This layer consists of the Application Services and Common Services that are responsible for realizing the functionality and maintaining the QoS of the exposed services. This layer uses container-based technologies such as application servers to implement the components, workload management, high availability, and load balancing.   Application Services: This Service Layer enables application, technology, and database abstraction so that the complex accessing logic is hidden from the other service layers. This is a basic service layer, which exposes application functionalities and data as reusable services. The three types of the Application access services are:   ·       Application Access Service: This Service Layer exposes application level functionalities as a reusable service between BSS to BSS and BSS to OSS integration. This layer is enabled using disparate technology such as Web Service, Integration Servers, and Adaptors, etc.   ·       Data Access Service: This Service Layer exposes application data services as a reusable reference data service. This is done via direct interaction with application data. and provides the federated query.   ·       Network Access Service: This Service Layer exposes provisioning layer as a reusable service from OSS to OSS integration. This integration service emphasizes the need for high performance, stateless process flows, and distributed design.   Common Services encompasses management of structured, semi-structured, and unstructured data such as information services, portal services, interaction services, infrastructure services, and security services, etc.   3.          Integration Layer:   This consists of service infrastructure components like service bus, service gateway for partner integration, service registry, service repository, and BPEL processor. Service bus will carry the service invocation payloads/messages between consumers and providers. The other important functions expected from it are itinerary based routing, distributed caching of routing information, transformations, and all qualities of service for messaging-like reliability, scalability, and availability, etc. Service registry will hold all contracts (wsdl) of services, and it helps developers to locate or discover service during design time or runtime.   • BPEL processor would be useful in orchestrating the services to compose a complex business scenario or process. • Workflow and business rules management are also required to support manual triggering of certain activities within business process. based on the rules setup and also the state machine information. Application, data, and service mediation layer typically forms the overall composite application development framework or SOA Framework.   4.          Business Process Layer: These are typically the intermediate services layer and represent Shared Business Process Services. At Enterprise Level, these services are from Customer Management, Order Management, Billing, Finance, and Asset Management application domains.   5.          Access Layer: This layer consists of portals for Enterprise and provides a single view of Enterprise information management and dashboard services.   6.          Channel Layer: This consists of various devices; applications that form part of extended enterprise; browsers through which users access the applications.   7.          Client Layer: This designates the different types of users accessing the enterprise applications. The type of user typically would be an important factor in determining the level of access to applications.   8.          Vertical pieces like management, monitoring, security, and development cut across all horizontal layers Management and monitoring involves all aspects of SOA-like services, SLAs, and other QoS lifecycle processes for both applications and services surrounding SOA governance.     9.          EA Governance, Reference Architecture, Roadmap, Principles, and Best Practices:   EA Governance is important in terms of providing the overall direction to SOA implementation within the enterprise. This involves board-level involvement, in addition to business and IT executives. At a high level, this involves managing the SOA projects implementation, managing SOA infrastructure, and controlling the entire effort through all fine-tuned IT processes in accordance with COBIT (Control Objectives for Information Technology).   Devising tools and techniques to promote reuse culture, and the SOA way of doing things needs competency centers to be established in addition to training the workforce to take up new roles that are suited to SOA journey.   Conclusions   Reference Architectures can serve as the basis for disparate architecture efforts throughout the organization, even if they use different tools and technologies. Reference architectures provide best practices and approaches in the independent way a vendor deals with technology and standards. Reference Architectures model the abstract architectural elements for an enterprise independent of the technologies, protocols, and products that are used to implement an SOA. Telecom enterprises today are facing significant business and technology challenges due to growing competition, a multitude of services, and convergence. Adopting architectural best practices could go a long way in meeting these challenges. The use of SOA-based architecture for communication to each of the external systems like Billing, CRM, etc., in OSS/BSS system has made the architecture very loosely coupled, with greater flexibility. Any change in the external systems would be absorbed at the Integration Layer without affecting the rest of the ecosystem. The use of a Business Process Management (BPM) tool makes the management and maintenance of the business processes easy, with better performance in terms of lead time, quality, and cost. Since the Architecture is based on standards, it will lower the cost of deploying and managing OSS/BSS applications over their lifecycles.

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  • Required Skill Sets Of A Software Architect

    The question has been asked as to what is the required skill sets of a software architect. The answer to this is that it truly depends. When I state that it depend, it depends on the organization, industry, and skill sets available on the open market and internally within a company. With open ended skill sets even Napoleon Dynamite could be an architect. Napoleon Dynamite’s Skills Pedro: Have you asked anybody yet? Napoleon Dynamite: No, but who would? I don't even have any good skills. Pedro: What do you mean? Napoleon Dynamite: You know, like nunchuck skills, bow hunting skills, computer hacking skills... Girls only want boyfriends who have great skills. Pedro: Aren't you pretty good at drawing, like animals and warriors and stuff? This example might be a little off base but it does illustrate a point. What are the real required skills of a software architect? In my opinion, an architect needs to demonstrate the knowledge of the following three main skill set categories so that they are successful. General Skill Sets of an Architect Basic Engineering Skills Organizational  Skills Interpersonal Skills Basic Engineering Skills are a very large part of what a software architect deal with on a daily bases when designing or updating systems. Think about it, how good would a lead mechanic be if they did not know how to fix or repair cars? They would not be, and that is my point that architects need to have at least some basic skills regarding engineering. The skills listed below are generic in nature because they change from job to job, so in this discussion I am trying to focus more on generalities so that anyone can apply this information to their individual situation. Common Basic Engineering Skills Data Modeling Code Creation Configuration Testing Deployment/Publishing System and Environment Knowledge Organizational Skills If an Architect works for or with an origination then they will need strong organization skills to survive. An architect is no use to a project if the project is missed managed. Additionally, budgets and timelines can really affect a company and their products when established deadlines are repeated not meet. By not meeting these timelines a company is forced to cancel the project and waste all the money and time spent or spend more money until it is completed, if it is ever completed. Common Organizational Skills Project Management Estimation (Cost and Time) Creation and Maintenance of Accepted Standards Interpersonal Skills For me personally Interpersonal skill ranks above the other types of skill sets because an architect can quickly pick up the other two skill sets by communicating with other team/project members so that they are quickly up to speed on a project. Additionally, in order for an architect to manage a project or even derive rough estimates they will more than likely have to consult with others actually working on the code (Programmers/Software Engineers) to get there estimates since they will be the ones actually working on the changes to be implemented. Common Interpersonal Skills Good Communicator Focus on projects success over personal Honors roles within a team Reference: Taylor, R. N., Medvidovic, N., & Dashofy, E. M. (2009). Software architecture: Foundations, theory, and practice Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons

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  • Discoverer 11g 11.1.1.2 Certified with EBS 12 on Five New Platforms

    - by Steven Chan
    Oracle Fusion Middleware 11g Release 1 includes Oracle Discoverer.  Discoverer is an ad-hoc query, reporting, analysis, and Web-publishing tool that allows end-users to work directly with Oracle E-Business Suite OLTP data.We certified Discoverer 11gR1 11.1.1.2 with the E-Business Suite Release 11i and 12 on Linux earlier this year.  Our Applications Platforms Group has just released five additional platform certifications for Discoverer 11.1.1.2 for Oracle E-Business Suite Release 12 (12.0.x and 12.1.x).Certified EBS 12 PlatformsLinux x86-64 (Oracle Enterprise Linux 4, 5) Linux x86-64 (RHEL 4, 5) Linux x86-64 (SLES 10) Oracle Solaris on SPARC (64-bit) (Solaris 9, 10) HP-UX Itanium (11.23, 11.31) HP-UX PA-RISC (64-bit) (11.23, 11.31) IBM AIX on Power Systems (64-bit) (5.3, 6.1) Microsoft Windows Server (32-bit) (2003, 2008)

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  • Creating Google+ profile has changed a Google Apps for Business email name

    - by inbanco
    We use Google Apps for business for email, docs etc. For one account [email protected] I setup a Google+ profile but didn't realise it would change the name of the email account Was: From email name: "Sydney Branch" Email address: [email protected] Now: From email name: "John Smith" Email address: [email protected] I'd like to change it back. The name hasn't changed though in the Google Apps domain management email section though, so i don't know what's going on and don't want to lose that email address/account through suspension. I couldn't care less about losing Google+, i'm happy to remove that profile, but would it revert the name?

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  • Introducing Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 - Business Intelligence Samples

    - by smisner
    On April 14, 2010, Microsoft Press (blog | twitter) released my latest book, co-authored with Ross Mistry (twitter), as a free ebook download - Introducing Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2. As the title implies, this ebook is an introduction to the latest SQL Server release. Although you'll find a comprehensive review of the product's features in this book, you will not find the step-by-step details that are typical in my other books. For those readers who are interested in a more interactive learning experience, I have created two samples file for download: IntroSQLServer2008R2Samples project Sales Analysis workbook Here's a recap of the business intelligence chapters and the samples I used to generate the screen shots by chapter: Chapter 6: Scalable Data Warehousing covers a new edition of SQL Server, Parallel Data Warehouse. Understandably, Microsoft did not ship me the software and hardware to set up my own Parallel Data Warehouse environment for testing purposes and consequently you won't see any screenshots in this chapter. I received a lot of information and a lot of help from the product team during the development of this chapter to ensure its technical accuracy. Chapter 7: Master Data Services is a new component in SQL Server. After you install Master Data Services (MDS), which is a separate installation from SQL Server although it's found on the same media, you can install sample models to explore (which is what I did to create screenshots for the book). To do this, you deploying packages found at \Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\Master Data Services\Samples\Packages. You will first need to use the Configuration Manager (in the Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2\Master Data Services program group) to create a database and a Web application for MDS. Then when you launch the application, you'll see a Getting Started page which has a Deploy Sample Data link that you can use to deploy any of the sample packages. Chapter 8: Complex Event Processing is an introduction to another new component, StreamInsight. This topic was way too large to cover in-depth in a single chapter, so I focused on information such as architecture, development models, and an overview of the key sections of code you'll need to develop for your own applications. StreamInsight is an engine that operates on data in-flight and as such has no user interface that I could include in the book as screenshots. The November CTP version of SQL Server 2008 R2 included code samples as part of the installation, but these are not the official samples that will eventually be available in Codeplex. At the time of this writing, the samples are not yet published. Chapter 9: Reporting Services Enhancements provides an overview of all the changes to Reporting Services in SQL Server 2008 R2, and there are many! In previous posts, I shared more details than you'll find in the book about new functions (Lookup, MultiLookup, and LookupSet), properties for page numbering, and the new global variable RenderFormat. I will confess that I didn't use actual data in the book for my discussion on the Lookup functions, but I did create real reports for the blog posts and will upload those separately. For the other screenshots and examples in the book, I have created the IntroSQLServer2008R2Samples project for you to download. To preview these reports in Business Intelligence Development Studio, you must have the AdventureWorksDW2008R2 database installed, and you must download and install SQL Server 2008 R2. For the map report, you must execute the PopulationData.sql script that I included in the samples file to add a table to the AdventureWorksDW2008R2 database. The IntroSQLServer2008R2Samples project includes the following files: 01_AggregateOfAggregates.rdl to illustrate the use of embedded aggregate functions 02_RenderFormatAndPaging.rdl to illustrate the use of page break properties (Disabled, ResetPageNumber), the PageName property, and the RenderFormat global variable 03_DataSynchronization.rdl to illustrate the use of the DomainScope property 04_TextboxOrientation.rdl to illustrate the use of the WritingMode property 05_DataBar.rdl 06_Sparklines.rdl 07_Indicators.rdl 08_Map.rdl to illustrate a simple analytical map that uses color to show population counts by state PopulationData.sql to provide the data necessary for the map report Chapter 10: Self-Service Analysis with PowerPivot introduces two new components to the Microsoft BI stack, PowerPivot for Excel and PowerPivot for SharePoint, which you can learn more about at the PowerPivot site. To produce the screenshots for this chapter, I created the Sales Analysis workbook which you can download (although you must have Excel 2010 and the PowerPivot for Excel add-in installed to explore it fully). It's a rather simple workbook because space in the book did not permit a complete exploration of all the wonderful things you can do with PowerPivot. I used a tutorial that was available with the CTP version as a basis for the report so it might look familiar if you've already started learning about PowerPivot. In future posts, I'll continue exploring the new features in greater detail. If there's any special requests, please let me know! Share this post: email it! | bookmark it! | digg it! | reddit! | kick it! | live it!

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  • Configure EnableTransaction and IsolationLevel property in Business Rules for Dynamic Send Port

    - by Vishal
    Why do you want to add these properties to the BRE..??                 There is a lot of performance issue when using WCF adapters with Dynamic Send Port. Please check the below link for more info.   http://blogs.msdn.com/mdoctor/archive/2009/12/18/performance-tip-when-using-wcf-custom-with-dynamic-send-ports-and-custom-bindings-on-biztalk-server-2009.aspx?CommentPosted=true#commentmessage     So if you are using ESB Toolkit 2.0 in your solution and you do not want to move towards static adapte then you can add the below line in your SetEndpointConfig value for BRE.                 BindingType=xyzAdapterBinding&EnableTransaction=true&IsolationLevel=ReadCommited&BindingConfiguration=<bindingname=”xyzAdapterBinding" />   The IsolationLevel values can be: Serializable RepeatableRead ReadCommited ReadUncommited Snapshot Chaos   Below are few Business Rules Composer Screenshots.

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  • ArvinMeritor Sees Business Improvement: Uses Oracle Demand Management, Supply Chain Planning and Tra

    - by [email protected]
    As manufacturers begin repositioning for the economic recovery, they are reevaluating their supply chain networks, extending lean into their supply chains and making logistics visibility a priority. ArvinMeritor leveraged Oracle's Demantra, ASCP and Transportation Management applications to: Optimize operations execution by building consensus-driven demand, sales and operations plans Slash transportation costs by rationalizing shippers, optimizing routes and improving delivery performance Demantra for demand management, forecasting, sales and operations planning and global trade management Advanced Supply Chain Planning for material and capacity planning across global distribution and manufacturing facilities based on consensus forecasts, sales orders, production status, purchase orders, and inventory policy recommendations Transportation Management for transportation planning, execution, freight payment, and business process automation on a single application across all modes of transportation, from full truckload to complex multileg air, ocean, and rail shipments Oracle hosted an 'open-house/showcase" on March 30th, 2010 atArvinMeritor Global Headquarters 2135 West Maple RoadTroy, MI 48084 

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  • Exposing business logic as WCF service

    - by Oren Schwartz
    I'm working on a middle-tier project which encapsulates the business logic (uses a DAL layer, and serves a web application server [ASP.net]) of a product deployed in a LAN. The BL serves as a bunch of services and data objects that are invoked upon user action. At present times, the DAL acts as a separate application whereas the BL uses it, but is consumed by the web application as a DLL. Both the DAL and the web application are deployed on different servers inside organization, and since the BL DLL is consumed by the web application, it resides in the same server. The worst thing about exposing the BL as a DLL is that we lost track with what we expose. Deployment is not such a big issue since mostly, product versions are deployed together. Would you recommend migrating from DLL to WCF service? If so, why? Do you know anyone who had a similar experience?

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  • Guidance on building an au pair-to-family networking site.

    - by Philip Kidd
    I'm building a website for an au pair agency business that will connect au pairs to families around Europe. I know nothing about website building, HTML etc. so I'm using a wysiwyg editer (weebly). How I would like the site to function: Families upload their information into profiles Au pairs do the same families can view a limited part of an au pairs' profile until they pay a deposit After deposit is payed, all au pairs' profile information becomes open to families Families can order au pairs and confirm their order with another payment payment must be made before 'order' is confirmed By 'order' I mean full communications become open between the family and the au pair they have 'ordered' as well as travel information being sent to another agency the site needs to be linked with a bank account (e.g paypal) and another agency, who will look after the flight bookings etc. A website already exists for this business however it just contains information on the business and application forms - if the site becomes fully automated it will relieve a lot of strain on administration in the office (dealing with applications, travel information etc.)

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  • What Should You Look for In a CRM Demo?

    - by charles.knapp
    I have helped firms evaluate software demos and delivered demos in diverse industries such as manufacturing, healthcare, life sciences, and travel (to name just a few). Here are a few suggestions. First, which vendor has the best fit for your industry? Make sure that the vendor demo staff tell you clearly throughout the demo (not just in a passing comment), what portion of each business process and screen is standard, what has been configured, what has been custom coded, and what has been provided by a partner. If you don't keep asking, what you buy may be less useful than what you saw. This will lead to added (and unbudgeted) costs and time. Second, what are the roles of the primary users? What are their top-most needs, such as exception-oriented dashboards or rapid data entry? Can you get a demo for each key role, showing how the software fits a typical workday? Have the vendor repeatedly tell you what is standard, configured, custom coded, or provided by a partner. Third, how well does the demo balance ease of use with completeness of business processes? One common approach is to hide needed fields or steps that are of low visual value. Another approach is to focus heavily on a visually appealing capability, while downplaying the fit with your key business processes. Result: despite their business acumen, demo attendees may not focus adequately on gaps in business fit So, look for complete disclosure and complete CRM. To arrange a demo from Oracle, please visit http://www.oracle.com/crm.

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