A few weeks ago, when my wife and I celebrated our 30th wedding anniversary, she bought me one of those (very) expensive, high-end watches. But even though my wife has excellent taste, and did indeed choose a beautiful timepiece, I’ve got to admit that I’m very far from being a watch fanatic. To be honest, I haven’t worn a watch on my wrist for over 10 years. Why would I need to? If I want to know the time, all I need to do is have a quick peek at my mobile phone. Even better, I can also see the date, my emails and my WhatsApp messages — and I can even get an up-to-date weather forecast for anywhere in the world. It’s all there. So much information available at a single glance.
What if there was something similar in the telecommunications industry that could make managing networks almost as simple as having a quick look at a single pane of glass? After all, VoIP management landscapes generally comprise three main layers of management tools that you need to learn and keep up with.
Let’s have a look at each of these layers.
In the top layer, sitting above everything, are the service providers’ network management systems (NMS). Typically vendor-agnostic, these applications provide a picture of the aggregated status of the entire service provider network. The service provider NMS aggregates the multi-vendor EMS indications into a central view and gives general network level insight.
The second layer consists of multi-vendor VoIP management solutions. These applications monitor the voice quality of all the elements in the network and provide a root cause analysis based on the voice and data layers combined.
The third layer is made up of vendor-specific management tools and expert systems that cover device and element management, service monitoring, analytics, security and advanced centralized VoIP routing.
For monitoring the devices’ status, an element management system (EMS) is going to be your application of choice. When you need to perform a root cause analysis on a VoIP issue, another application will be required. The same goes for analytics — you’ll need a third application for that. It’s a bit like having to walk around all day with three different watches on your wrist — one to tell you the time, one to tell you the date and one to tell you what day it is.
And talking of time, it’s clear that the time has come for a network management solution that gathers all these disparate parts together under one roof. A full lifecycle management suite for VoIP deployments that provides monitoring, management and operation of all the products in the network — all in a single pane of glass.
AudioCodes’ One Voice Operations Center (OVOC) is that solution. OVOC shows all the devices associated with a specific user and the user service experience in a single window, without having to jump from application to application. From this one solution, you can do everything that previously demanded several different applications, including:
- New device detection and configuration
- Accurate inventory population
- Automation and mass operation support
- A central, correlated alarm dashboard
- Group-based configuration and update management
- Change documentation and device configuration backup and restore.
And if all that wasn’t enough, you also get service alarms, trends and statistical analysis, reporting, user experience monitoring, root cause analysis and issue correction. OVOC brings it all together in a single pane of glass, exactly the way a smartphone does.
Although I don’t really like the watch my wife bought me, I feel compelled to wear it. I genuinely want to remain alive to be able to celebrate my 31st wedding anniversary. However, now and again something strange happens. Sometimes, when my wife and I are winding down with a glass of wine and a movie in the evening, my watch will suddenly pick up a reflection from the television screen. Instinctively, I tap on it as I would my phone to see if I’ve got any messages. Old habits always die hard, don’t they? With a quizzical look on her face, my wife asks me if all is OK with the watch and reminds me that it has a lifetime warranty.
Our application note, The OVOC Journey from Detection to Correction, explains in detail how OVOC seamlessly fuses VoIP network device management and quality of experience monitoring into a single, intuitive web-based application.
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