Jim Rohn coined the term, "The Law of Diminishing Intent," to speak of the need to take action now rather than later, because if we wait for later it becomes likely that we won't do it at all. In the context of OSS, The Law of Diminishing Intent is indicative of the enthusiasm an organisation maintains through the implementation of an OSS. Excitement for an OSS…
Read More »Well, it's been a bit quiet here on PAOSS in the last week hasn't it? The new blogs each weekday have been absent. What's my excuse you're wondering. Paternity leave has gotten in the way of putting pen to website. That and the sleep deprivation that comes with a newborn. Despite this, I've still found myself thinking about OSS way too often. In particular, what the…
Read More »Redknee Wins Contract with a Tier 1 CSP in the Americas. Redknee Solutions announced that a leading Tier 1 communications service provider (CSP) in the Americas has signed an order of more than $8 million dollars to deploy the Redknee Unified solution to deliver its multi-brand growth strategy across multiple countries. Redknee’s converged monetization and subscriber management solution allows the CSP to leverage a virtualized and…
Read More »Verizon launches industry-leading large OpenStack NFV deployment. Verizon has completed the industry's largest known Network Function Virtualization OpenStack cloud deployment across five of its U.S. data centers. The NFV project, which began in 2015, created a production design based on a core and pod architecture that provides the hyperscale capabilities and flexibility necessary to meet the company's complex network requirements. Deployments are currently in progress in…
Read More »Consolidated Communications Simplifies Service Delivery with Enhanced OSS Capabilities from Netcracker. Netcracker Technology announced that Consolidated Communications, a leading business and broadband communications provider, went live with an upgraded Netcracker Service Order and Resource Management solution. The additional functionality includes an access service request integration module, which will help Consolidated Communications automate the assignment of tasks. Consolidated Communications, Inc. (CCI) is a leading business and broadband…
Read More »"Hands up if you have ever been bitten by an elephant? Now hands up if you have ever been bitten by a mosquito? See, it’s the little things in life that will get you" Joel Weldon paraphrased." Put another way, "the devil is in the details." This mindset has always perplexed me, particularly in the world of OSS. Attention to detail and being fastidious about the…
Read More »Redknee Renews Multi-Year Contract to Enhance the Competitive Positioning of TIM Brazil. Redknee Solutions announced that it has won a multi-year renewal of its software and services contract with TIM Brazil. Redknee will provide an end-to-end solution that includes new software capabilities, managed services, and support services that enable the company to secure its position as a leading mobile operator in Brazil. Redknee’s Cloud and Managed…
Read More »"A swipe file is a collection of tested and proven advertising and sales letters. Keeping a swipe file (templates) is a common practice used by advertising copywriters and creative directors as a ready reference of ideas for projects. Copywriters are not the only ones who can benefit from having a swipe file." Wikipedia. Do you keep swipe files as a ready reference of ideas for your…
Read More »Many operators have a dilemma on their hands. To find the lead indicators of network failures requires analysis of events leading up to the failure. But many operators are so snowed under that they are too busy rectifying the network to have time to analyse the causes. Not only that, but many actually rely on lag indicators (ie customer calls, which often don't get raised until…
Read More »"I have been harping on for years – many years – that the terms BSS and OSS are defunct and should be replaced with something far more generic like MMB: Money Making Bits. You may laugh, but BSS (business support systems) and OSS (operational support systems) are leftovers from a bygone era when communications service providers (known as PTTs or phone companies then) had to clearly…
Read More »Huawei Signs MOU under OSSii with NETSCOUT. Huawei announced that it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with NETSCOUT. The MOU allows NETSCOUT’s TrueCall® geoanalytics platform to access Huawei OSS interfaces under Operations Support Systems interoperability initiative (OSSii). Huawei has previously signed MOUs with several independent service vendors within OSS field. This MOU is based on principles specified by OSSii (Operations Support Systems interoperability initiative).…
Read More »"The knee-jerk reaction to open source is… well, it’s free. But it’s not that simple. Companies can craft strategic open source projects that complement and enhance and build momentum behind its own products. Huawei has been clear that this is part of its strategy." Scott Raynovich here on SDx Central. Scott's report goes on to highlight, "that the Chinese company is currently the largest contributor to…
Read More »Huawei's Heavy Investment in Five IoT Solutions. At the Huawei Global Analyst Summit (HAS) 2016, Huawei announced the Internet of Things (IoT) as one of its strategic priorities. Drawing on its long-term investment and expertise in ICT, Huawei has made impressive breakthroughs with its five IoT solutions. The company is also committed to building a robust IoT ecosystem and jointly driving industry innovation with its partners.…
Read More »Yesterday we discussed how all the abstraction and interpolation done in the layers of your OSS stack can allow many things to slip through the cracks. Dougie Stevenson suggested that this is one of the reasons why Engineers prefer to work from a command line. Evan Linwood suggested that we could apply the principle to the Enterprise network / application stack, "This thought process is relevant for…
Read More »SkyLine Membership Corporation Deploys Centina Systems for Fault, Performance and Network Management. Centina Systems announced that SkyLine Membership Corporation has deployed its NetOmnia™ suite of solutions for fault, performance and network management. Headquartered in West Jefferson, North Carolina, SkyLine Membership Corporation is a full-service provider of telecommunications and network services for business and residential customers. Today, SkyLine is the second-largest of eight telephone cooperatives in North…
Read More »Each subsequent step northbound in the conceptual diagram below does the same thing: It abstracts (vertical) - it only performs a sub-set of the lower layer's functionality It connects (horizontal) - it performs the task of connecting and managing a larger number of network elements than the lower layer So an OSS, will never (almost never?) replace the functionality of the NMS or EMS. But in return it should increase the…
Read More »"With everything going towards continuous delivery, ironic how you don’t see any unit test apparatus in the products. Even the new stuff. Asking for a Unit test harness is like asking for an Audi engine in a Chevy truck." Douglas Stevenson. Great call-out here from Dougie in a comment about why Network Engineers don't trust software. DevOps / continuous delivery is all about providing a constantly…
Read More »Vivo Accelerates Service Delivery Capabilities by Upgrading Netcracker Solution. Netcracker Technology announced that Vivo, the largest telecommunications service provider in Brazil, is upgrading Netcracker’s Activation Manager solution to streamline the process of bringing innovative new services to market. The upgraded solution’s newer features will support Vivo’s long-term business growth strategies and reduce total cost of ownership. Vivo is the leading telecommunications service provider in Brazil, offering…
Read More »I was walking along a city street between meetings recently and overheard the tiniest snippet of a conversation between a couple walking in the opposite direction - "sometimes you just need a new teacher." What a great, random insight. One of the great things about being an OSS consultant and assisting many clients and their customers with their OSS is the ever-changing array of teachers to…
Read More »A very clever colleague of mine, Keith, recently stated, "The failing of network engineers is that they don't trust software (ie OSS, NMS, etc)." Do you agree with Keith? Do you feel that most network engineers prefer to work from the command line rather than the GUI? If so, why is that? Lack of confidence in tools based on past failures or functionality gaps? Speed /…
Read More »In yesterday's post we discussed how Virtual Reality (VR) can be utilised in OSS. Today we look at how OSS and Augmented Reality (AR) to be further augmented with decision support systems to help OSS operators. As a starting point for this exercise, we have to think about what OSS situations have a spatial reality so it seems logical to start at genba, the real place.…
Read More »