Download Network Management Integration Options

Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
Pronto OSS – Options for Network Management Integration
Various network management options are available in the Pronto OSS for integration into a
carrier’s existing management processes. These options are described in detail in this document
and they include:
- SNMP based management of the Pronto Hotspot Service Controller (PHC) and Pronto
Hotzone Service Gateway (PHG) networks. This includes SNMP proxys from the OSS,
SNMP MIBs on the PHC/PHG, using SNMP to manage other elements at the location, etc.
- XML-based APIs through Pronto’s Generic API module (GAPI). This allows for the service
provider to develop custom applications for various purposes. In this document an Alarm
Management and a Network Viewer application is described.
- Plug-ins and toolkits available from Pronto Networks for integration into an existing HP
Openview installation.
Pronto’s Hotspot Networking System is a solution suite for wireless network management that
handles billing, management and security. The Pronto OSS provides management solutions that
are scalable, innovative, and reduces a service provider’s operational and capital expenditures.
In addition, the Pronto OSS is designed to easily integrate into a service provider’s existing NMS
infrastructure.
This document is intended for network management and IT planners in a service provider’s
organization that are investigating integration options for merging new services and networks into
their existing operations processes.
This paper is based on R3.0 of the Pronto OSS.
1. Network Management features of the Pronto OSS
The Pronto OSS is a wireless access infrastructure solution that provides service control and
service management for broadband WLANs. It consists of two major components – the Pronto
Operations Support System (OSS) and an access network consisting of PHC and PHGs. The
Pronto OSS is the back-office operations support and billing systems software that provides
complete AAA, billing, credit card authorization, roaming bulk settlement and network monitoring
functionalities. PHCs and PHGs are customer site gateways to which Access Points (AP) are
connected. The OSS provides solutions for the management of wireless networks. These
solutions cater to various demanding practical scenarios.
A typical wireless network has a user station / laptop that would require Internet connectivity. A
WiFi access point (AP) provides wireless connectivity to the station. There can be many APs in a
given location connected to the router through a switch. The Gateway/ router basically provides
WAN connectivity. Typically, in a Pronto Managed Wireless Network (a Hotspot), the PHC is the
Gateway/ router. In case of small enterprise networks, PHC doubles up for an AP i.e. it will be
Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 1
Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
both an AP and a Gateway/ router. When there are many APs, the APs are connected to PHC
through a switch at a typical large public hotspot location like an airport or shopping mall, etc.
The Pronto Networks Hotspot OSS features powerful configuration, fault and performance
management capabilities that enable NOC personnel to configure and monitor the health of the
Hotspot controllers, and monitor pure access points attached to Hotspot Controllers on a real time
basis. Capabilities to create greeting pages and log files for Hotspot Controller initialization and
web service requests have been included. With these enhanced network management features,
Pronto can now improve hotspot operators’ service uptime and reduce operational costs.
The Pronto OSS Management Features
 Heartbeat - Every Hotspot Controller in the network sends heartbeats to the Hotspot OSS
Server. This information is used to monitor its health, status and user connections. Different
filters are provided to easily locate and provide quick relief measures in case of a controller
outage. Also, integrated into this module, is the ability to locate the controllers deployed in
different parts of the world and view their sessions. This heartbeat mechanism allows the
Pronto OSS to manage private networks that may reside behind firewall or Network Access
Translation routers, etc. The heartbeat mechanism thus provides visibility to networks that
heretofore would require configuration changes in the location devices, assignment of public
(or static) IP addresses, or would not be visible at the NOC. The Pronto OSS can now serve
as a proxy to external management systems.
The Pronto OSS provides such proxy
capabilities that include SNMP proxies, HPOV plug-ins, and other XML-based APIs.
 Alert Management – The OSS provides an enhanced ability to manage alerts and monitor the
health of the production network. All alerts arising out of the various subsystems are
centrally managed. Alerts can be filtered by type as well as severity level. Multiple alert
groups can be configured and rules can be defined in the system to manage and dispatch
alert messages received by the OSS.
 Pure Access Point Management and Monitoring - PHCs have the ability to monitor the access
points (APs) connected to their subtending Ethernet interfaces. The OSS additionally captures
the Mapped IP Address for these devices. The administrator can also enable or disable
monitoring for a given AP. In conjunction with the Alert Management system, email alerts can
be dispatched to recipient groups, when a dumb AP goes down or does not respond to
requests from the PHC.
 Remote Management (Dashboard) – The Pronto OSS “Controller Monitor” screen highlights
(color codes) when specific event traps or system exceptions are traced. A valuable feature
addition to the Network Management module is the Remote Web Console, whereby third
party access points and gateways can be remotely configured and managed. With this feature
the unknown dumb AP that is on a private network behind the PHC can be remotely
configured. Configuration information of access points like IP Address, MAC address and the
url of access point setup interface are stored and managed from the OSS repository. Rest of
Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 2
Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
the information pertaining to the access point configuration like SSID is obtained from the
access point’s repository itself.
A network operator wanting to set-up a new wireless network using Pronto’s OSS would have
various needs based on their existing infrastructure.
The Pronto OSS provides various
alternatives to address the needs of these network operators.
Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 3
Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
2. SNMP based management options
For a new wireless network operator, OSS provides wireless network management with SNMP
giving a feature rich NMS functionality through OSS.
In a Pronto OSS, Network management is fully based on the basic SNMP architecture and
functionality. The Client (NMS in Pronto OSS) ‘reads from’ and ‘writes’ selected information on a
Server (NE – Can be any SNMP enabled wireless device in the hotspot i.e. PHCs, APs etc).
Figure 1: OSS solution to Wireless network management
Pronto OSS supports simple SNMP communication primitives: three types of requests (GET,
GETNEXT, and SET) and one unsolicited information transmission (TRAP).
To get information
from any NE, Pronto OSS will send a ‘GetRequest’ or ‘GetNextRequest’ to the agent, and the
requested information or an error message will be sent back in a ‘Response’. If OSS wants to
change information on an agent, a ‘SetRequest’ will be sent with a corresponding response to
confirm or report an error. The unsolicited message is called a ‘trap’. This message is usually sent
by NE devices on start-up, on status change or in response to abnormal (error) conditions.
Advantages of using Pronto’s NMS in this mechanism are:
1. The network operator can buy APs from any manufacturer thus providing flexibility.
2. The network can scale easily without any onsite configuration requirements.
Let us consider a situation where the network operator realizes that the usage at a particular
hotspot is relatively high and wishes to expand geographically. All that the network operator
needs to do is to purchase new APs, plug them on to his network and inform the OSS about the
MAC addresses of the APs. The network operator does not require any trained technically qualified
people to execute this job. Moreover the operator can manage the network using Pronto’s OSS.
This OSS feature relieves the operator of deployment and scaling problems that are typically
bottlenecks experienced using many third party NMSs.
Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 4
Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
3. Using Pronto’s OSS, a user gets to manage NEs that belong to a private LAN
Let us consider a network operator who already owns a wired network that is being managed by a
third party NMS like HP Open View, and desires to expand to wireless networks using Pronto’s
OSS – see Figure 2.
Figure 2: Total OSS solution to Wired and new Wireless network management using any NMS
The requirements of such a network operators can be varied. Some of them are cited below:
 Ability to manage the new wireless network using a third party NMS that is already being
used to manage the existing wired network. To accommodate this requirement, OSS
provides a plug-in for HP OpenView (or any other NMS), which gives the network manager,
ability to monitor the NEs in the wireless network.
In the management environment, OSS captures the wireless network topology of the entire
network and exports the topology to the third party NMS, thus integrating the management
of wireless networks through third party NMS.
 A network operator can manage the new wireless network (NEs behind the PHC) through any
third party NMS. This feature enables the network operator to continue using his existing
NMS to manage the new Wireless Network, even though it may be part of a mixed
private/public network.
Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 5
Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
Figure 3: OSS as a SNMP proxy for NMS
To facilitate this feature, the Pronto OSS acts as a SNMP proxy agent as depicted in Figure 3.
Architecturally, it works as follows: A SNMP request for AP/ PHC is initiated by the third party
NMS and is proxied to OSS that runs the SNMP proxy agent. The proxy agent in turn
encapsulates the SNMP message in a SOAP-XML format and sends it to the PHC. The PHC
extracts the SNMP message encapsulated inside it. The SNMP request is then sent to the AP
behind the PHC. The same mechanism is followed for the SNMP Response from the AP to the
NMS in the reverse order.
Suppose a third party NMS wants to manage a NE behind a private LAN (i.e. behind the PHC)
without going though the proxy agent.
Figure 4: SNMP management using ALG aware PHC
This is possible only if the NE is directly reachable implying that the NE should have a public
static IP. But in typical WLAN scenarios, the NE belongs to a private LAN (i.e. behind a PHC) as
shown in Figure 4. To facilitate the management of NEs belonging to a private LAN, Pronto
Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 6
Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
provides a SNMP ALG (SNMP Application Level Gateway) feature in the PHC through which it is
possible to achieve Static NAT in the PHC. SNMP messages meant to/from the NE (in a private
LAN) now contains the IP of the NE. The IP address is replaced with an IP that makes sense to
the receiver, the replacement function being performed by the SNMP-ALG aware PHC.
In short, using Pronto OSS NMS, Network operator/ Manager experiences a flexible and feature
rich environment, like:
Use any third party AP
Scale the network on the fly
Remote SNMP management of NEs of a private LAN
Continue to use their existing NMS and yet monitor the new Wireless Network under various
requirements:
 Use their existing NMS to monitor the new Wireless Network using a proxy agent
 Use their existing NMS to monitor the new Wireless Network without a proxy agent




Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 7
Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
4. Monitoring Options using Pronto’s Generic Application Programming
Interface (GAPI)
Pronto OSS features an XML based API that allows for the development of custom applications for
various data access and alert related features. This section provides a description of a Network
Monitoring Application, developed and offered by Pronto Networks, that features complete
network monitoring of the PHC/PHG and all the APs connected at the location. As we illustrate,
this application includes an integrated AP monitoring function. Note that in the Pronto OSS
solution, the APs can be from various hardware manufacturers.
Architecture of the GAPI Application:
GAPI is a mechanism developed as a part of the Pronto OSS to deliver the critical customer
related information in any possible combination to any external application. GAPI is capable of
1. Recognizing an event.
2. Notify the external application of the event occurrence, and
3. Deliver information pertaining to this event to the external application.
GAPI is an easy to use mechanism that delivers the notifications of all event types to any external
application and then accepts a query for delivering any data pertaining to that event, subject to
security restrictions. GAPI is a Java/Perl servlet with support for SOAP/XML data. Figure 5 shows
the basic architecture of the GAPI application.
ENS
Figure 5 - GAPI Architecture
Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 8
Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
The GAPI Mechanism consists of an Event Notification Service and an Event Trigger.
Event Notification Service (ENS)
Event Notification Service (ENS) brokers' events between the Event Trigger and the Event
Receiver. The ENS maintains all information about which subscribers are interested in which
events, so that publishers and subscribers need not be aware of each other. Moreover, anyone
can publish or subscribe to events using the well-defined generic interface without having to
implement any major changes in the logic.
Event Trigger
This mechanism triggers or produces events and notifies the Event Receiver of the event
occurrence. In case it receives a query about this event for an external application from the Event
Receiver, it results in a canonical push of data from the GAPI Interface to the Event Receiver and
finally to the passive external application.
For additional details of the capabilities of the GAPI interface, please refer to additional
documentation and product information briefs available from Pronto Networks.
An Integrated Network Monitoring Application
This is an XML based API application designed for the purpose of monitoring a wireless Hotspot
Network. The application provides a customizable GUI based view of the network in the form of
various fields for various different parameters associated with the WISP and the network
elements to be monitored. Fig 6 shows the GUI based view of the application. The application
allows login access to the network personnel at the following levels for monitoring purposes:
1. NOC level
2. WISP level
3. Location level
Following are the key features of the Integrated Network Monitoring Application:
1. The application features the ability to monitor the PHCs and APs in a Pronto OSS. Status of
each PHC can be displayed using different color codes. For example, if the PHC status is
displayed as
a. Red – It indicates that PHC is down.
b. Green - It indicates that PHC is up.
c. Orange - It indicates that PHC is partially down, i.e. one or more of the APs
connected to the PHC may be down.
Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 9
Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
Figure 6: Integrated Network Monitoring Application – GUI view
2. The application allows the NOC personnel to monitor any specific network element by
performing a search for that particular network element. This search can be based on the
following parameters:
a. All Exact Words – This allows to search for any specific network element/specific
parameter associated with a specific network element by keying in the exact string,
as it needs to be searched.
b. All Any Word - This allows to search for any specific network element/specific
parameter associated with a specific network element by keying in the any of the
words in the exact string, as it needs to be searched.
c. Any particular field name – This would allow the network statistics to be displayed
according based on a particular field value. For example, network statistics can be
displayed based on a particular WISP ID, Location ID, or NAS ID etc.
3. Automatic updation of data: The application allows an automatic refresh of the data in
various fields displayed on specified configurable intervals.
4. Movable Windows: The GUI based view of the application is fully customizable. It allows
the various windows in the application view to be movable according to user’s choice. For
example, Figure 7 and 8 display 2 different views of the same monitoring data in the
application windows. The application also allows the ability to view specific details with the
ability to zoom in based on WISP, location, PHC status etc.
Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 10
Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
Figure 7: GUI View 1
Figure8: GUI View 2 after moving the windows from View 1
5. AP List, ACL, VLAN, L3 details if present: The application presents the status of various
connected Access points, which may be any third party APs. A list of any connected APs
can be viewed by clicking on the AP List tab. Similarly, the status of ACLs, VLANs or L3
features can be viewed by clicking on their respective tabs if there are any configured in
the network. Figure 9 displays a list of connected APs from different vendors.
Figure 9: AP List View
In Pronto’s existing deployments, the following WiFi access points, Wireless Mesh Routers, and
other Wireless elements have been used. In all these cases, these elements are connected the
LAN interface of the PHC or PHG at the location. This is not intended to be a comprehensive list,
just a current snapshot of Pronto’s deployments, and these APs are included in this Network
Monitoring Application presented in this section.
Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 11
Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
-
Netgear WG302, ME102, ME103
D-Link DWL-1000AP+, DWL-7200
Linksys WAP54G
Proxim AP-4000, AP-2000, AP-600, AP-700
3Com 7250 AP
Cisco Aironet 350
Cisco 1200
Cisco 1231
YDI – Ether-Ant Type III and AP Plus devices
Tropos – External 5110 and Internal 3110
Vivato – VA2200 AP/Bridge
Engenius – AP NL-3054CB3 Plus Deluxe, NL-2611 CB3+
Valuepoint SuperAP500 IA18
The Network Monitoring application provides an integrated view of the entire network,
abstracting the hardware specific configuration details from the NOC operator, reducing
operating expenditures.
Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 12
Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
5. HP Openview Plug-ins to integrate with existing HP Openview installations
In order to provide the facility of viewing the graphical representation of the wireless network
topology in any hotspot and various levels of hierarchy in it, Pronto’s OSS provides the ability of
its integration with any third party NMS. For example Pronto’s OSS supports the NMS Plug-in for
HP Openview NNM 6.x to monitor the Pronto Hotspot Controllers and the third party access points
behind it. The main objective of
this application is to display the entire logical topology of the OSS operation as a hierarchy, by
displaying the status of the Pronto Hotspot Controllers and the third party Access Points using the
OpenView color codes.
The NOC personnel, who are monitoring this network environment, can gather information on the
status of each node in the environment from this topological view. It is also alert to any changes
in the status of a node in the network such as a controller or access point failure. This helps the
NOC personnel to zoom in on the faulty device and perform diagnostic operations.
The NMS plug-in can also manage all SNMP supporting devices on the network. Hence, all
servers, switches and routers on the network that support SNMP and have IP reachability can now
be managed from the OSS.
The following are the feature highlights of the NMS Plug-in application:

One can now view Hotspot Controllers and Access Points and their hierarchy from the HP
OpenView GUI.

The status of the Hotspot Controller and the Access point is displayed in the HP OpenView
GUI using color codes.

The status of the Hotspot Controller and/or Access Points is propagated along the
hierarchy and displayed to the NOC personnel with a change in the color of the WISP,
Franchise, and Location symbols.

Parameters associated with the Hotspot Controller and Access Point can be viewed be right
clicking on any displayed symbol and choosing Object Properties.

Topologyies of any number of 'OSS' can thus be maintained in the HP OpenView Database.

NMS Plug-ins provides access to any OSS and the ability to update/view the topology on
return to a particular OSS.

It provides built-in user-authentication mechanism using windows registry.
It is designed for service providers requiring a geographical view of the complete wireless hotspot
network traversing the complete hierarchy enabling it to monitor the status of devices at each
level of the network.
Pronto offers this functionality through the NMS plug-in as mentioned above. Considering the
following as the network hierarchy, we present examples of region-wise views that can be created
for the network operator.
WISP LEVEL -> LOCATION LEVEL -> CITY LEVEL -> PHC LEVEL -> AP LEVEL
Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 13
Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
WISP Level View
This is a snapshot from the HP Openview installation that is now displaying a WISP level view of
the network. In a wireless Hotspot Network, this would represent a central NOC level view from
where the NOC personnel can monitor the status of the network at each city (region) level.
Different color codes would represent the status of network at City level. For example, if a
particular city’s symbol displays as red, it indicates that the particular city’s network has a fault in
some particular location of the city, which can be located by clicking on that particular city’s
symbol.
City Level & Location Level View
This snapshot from the HP Openview displays the City (region) and Location level views of the
network. In a wireless Hotspot Network, this would represent a city/location level view from
where the NOC personnel can monitor the status of the network at each location of the city where
the hotspots are installed. Different color codes would represent the status of network at location
Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 14
Pronto OSS – Network Management Integration Options
level. For example, if a particular location’s symbol displays as red, it indicates that the particular
location’s network has a fault in some particular PHC of that location, which can be located by
clicking on that particular location’s symbol.
PHC and AP Level View
This snapshot from the HP Openview displays the PHC level view of the network in the operator’s
wireless Hotspot Network, from where the NOC personnel can monitor the status of the network
at each PHC in that particular location. Different color codes would represent the status of
network at PHC level. For example, if a particular PHC’s symbol displays as red, it indicates that
either the particular PHC or one of the Access Points connected to that PHC is down which can be
located by clicking on that particular PHC’s symbol.
Pronto OSS R3.0
July 2005
Page 15