Parlay X

Objective

• Define a set of powerful yet simple, highly abstracted, imaginative, building blocks of telecom capabilities that developers and the IT community can both quickly comprehend and use to generate new, innovative applications.
• Each building block will be abstracted from the set of telecom capabilities exposed by the Parlay APIs
• The capabilities offered by a building block may be homogeneous (e.g. call control only) or heterogeneous (e.g. mobility and presence)
• The interaction between the application and the building block (i.e. a Parlay X API) will be realized by a simple XML-based message exchange
• A building block will NOT be application-specific

The aim of this site is to bring together all parties (vendors, carriers, and users) interested in web services for Next Generation Networks (NGN).  A Parlay X Working Group has been created within the Parlay industry forum to collect requirements and plan the development of APIs.  A mailing list (parlay_xwg@mail.parlay.org) is active, please enlist at this page.

Other Abstraction Levels

• Protocol Based: IN, WIN, CAMEL, GSM, INAP, SIP, MEGACO,
• API Based: JAIN, Parlay, OSA, Proprietary APIs,
• Scripting Language Based: VXML, CPL, SCML

The following picture shows three of the above mentioned activities. It shows four layers, each characterized by the number of capabilities that is offered and the number of developers that can use them. Parlay X and Parlay Web Services are disjunct when compared with the former activities, they are further discussed within the respecitive working groups.

Useful Links

Some pointers to background information on NGN related initiatives on open APIs are provided here.

• Learn more about using WSDL to describe web services in the Parlay X Web Services White Paper.

You can also contact John-Luc Bakker (+1 973 829-5062) or Martin Yates (+44 1473 642026) working either for Telcordia Technologies or BTexact, for more information.

About Telcordia.  Telcordia has been a leader and active participant in the Next Generation Network (NGN) industry fora such as JAIN and Parlay defining open Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) for NGN softswitches and other NGN elements. For a summary of Telcordia activities in this area, see here.

About BTexact.  BTexact, headquartered at Adastral Park, is home to 3,500 of BT's top scientists, engineers and business people. We provide research, development and consulting services for BT - developing innovative technological ideas and solutions that translate into practical and marketable solutions for the business. Our mission is to bring competitive advantage to the new wave BT, seeking to meet its customers' changing needs and to provide them with easy and supportive access to the new information age.