I want to discuss today one of the issues we had elaborated on in the Diameter technical group (http://www.linkedin.com/groups?mostPopular=&gid=1787697 )
This is the trend towards Diameter SCTP
We see more and more Diameter running over SCTP in some major operators, really everywhere – APAC, EU and US.
This is still a very small percentage of Diameter (which in itself is still in early adoption days) but this is certainly a trend.
This creates some new issues:
- Vendors support for SCTP is limited – so connectivity problem is an issues
- Connectivity between Diameter SCTP/Diameter TCP requires mediation (Diameter SCTP to Diameter TCP gateways)
- Testing is problematic – many in between entites (routers/switches/load balancer…) have problems with SCTP and it takes time to understand this is not a problem related directly to your product, so you only test your product you test all the transport layer in between (something that works with no problem with TCP)
- Need for through testing – the product beaves completely different with none TCP layer 3 stack
I really don’t know what the future hold, will Diameter over SCTP trend increase and it will become the common path ?
I personally don’t think so, there were many initiative to improve TCP over the years (e.g WTCP) and although they had great advantages over TCP they never won, so I’m afraid SCTP will follow the same route. But still there is Diameter over SCTP trend on the rise. Well we’ll need to wait and see.
8/4/10
6/18/10
Improving Diameter protocol
This time I want to discuss one of the problems we see with Diameter and introduce a work being done to overcome this problem.
Capabilities exchange is one of the fundamental and most important mechanisms in Diameter, it is taking place in the beginning of each session, and allows peers to define the basic parameters/capabilities for the session (version number, supported Diameter apps, security mechanisms, etc…)
But what if the capabilities on one of the sides change during the session ? what if the sessions are being kept open for long time
and in this time an upgrade or configuration change in one of the clients/servers involved takes place ?
The way Capabilities exchange is defined in RFC 3588 is that it can take place only in the inception of a session, so if there is a change
during the session it means we need to tear down all the existing sessions involved and restarted in order for the updated capabilities to be taken into account – not very efficient you’ll agree.
But worry no more, the cure is on the way, a new IETF Diameter draft is here to help - The Diameter Capabilities Update Application.
A work led by Glen Zorn, whom is one of the driving forces behind Diameter since his Cisco days.
This work defines a new Diameter application intended to allow the dynamic update of a subset of Diameter peer capabilities over an
existing connection.
Because the new proposed Capabilities Update application operates over an existing transport connection, modifications of certain capabilities is prohibited.
There are a lot of heated discussions going on in the Diameter swamp around this new work – some security issues have being raised, but I think those will be handled also.
This is a blessed and important work (I can see all of you with Gx interface related work scars nodding your heads) and let’s hope we will have this draft approved soon.
I personally believe with service providers complaining on the amount of signaling in Diameter and the delays involved in some of sessions set up times – this new work is very important and sheds bright healthy light into one of the dark corners of the Diameter 3588 RFC.
Capabilities exchange is one of the fundamental and most important mechanisms in Diameter, it is taking place in the beginning of each session, and allows peers to define the basic parameters/capabilities for the session (version number, supported Diameter apps, security mechanisms, etc…)
But what if the capabilities on one of the sides change during the session ? what if the sessions are being kept open for long time
and in this time an upgrade or configuration change in one of the clients/servers involved takes place ?
The way Capabilities exchange is defined in RFC 3588 is that it can take place only in the inception of a session, so if there is a change
during the session it means we need to tear down all the existing sessions involved and restarted in order for the updated capabilities to be taken into account – not very efficient you’ll agree.
But worry no more, the cure is on the way, a new IETF Diameter draft is here to help - The Diameter Capabilities Update Application.
A work led by Glen Zorn, whom is one of the driving forces behind Diameter since his Cisco days.
This work defines a new Diameter application intended to allow the dynamic update of a subset of Diameter peer capabilities over an
existing connection.
Because the new proposed Capabilities Update application operates over an existing transport connection, modifications of certain capabilities is prohibited.
There are a lot of heated discussions going on in the Diameter swamp around this new work – some security issues have being raised, but I think those will be handled also.
This is a blessed and important work (I can see all of you with Gx interface related work scars nodding your heads) and let’s hope we will have this draft approved soon.
I personally believe with service providers complaining on the amount of signaling in Diameter and the delays involved in some of sessions set up times – this new work is very important and sheds bright healthy light into one of the dark corners of the Diameter 3588 RFC.
5/20/10
RFC 3588 vs 3588bis, what will the market adopt
RFC 3588, the Diameter base protocol RFC was officially introduced in 2003 by the IETF.
Over the last couple of years there was a lot of work done to introduce a new Diameter base, this was led by people like Glen Zorn and Victor Fajardo, was named RFC 3588bis.
RFC 3588bis is set to replace the original RFC 3588 with fixes to some of the Diameter base issues, mainly in the areas of session, security (TLS) and some improvements and clean up (IPSec..)
I have a few concerns how It will affect the adoption of Diameter, which is today mainly in the telecom field (and not the Internet)
There are a few questions that come to mind (and my own personal bet)
- Will the market move to RFC 3588 bis? (yes, the big question is in what rate)
- Will it create interoperability issues ? (yes of course)
- Will it create confusion ? (you bet)
- Will it help to establish Diameter position as the AAA/Control protocol of the next decade ? (maybe)
- Is it needed ? (I prefer not to answer this one )
One thing for sure it’s going to be interesting in the Diameter scene, with continuing adoption, growing amount of Diameter signaling, Diameter spreading out of the mobile core to the wireline, booming amount of Diameter interfaces, LTE (which should be renamed to Diameter TE due to the amount of Diameter signaling there) and of course new Diameter base.
Over the last couple of years there was a lot of work done to introduce a new Diameter base, this was led by people like Glen Zorn and Victor Fajardo, was named RFC 3588bis.
RFC 3588bis is set to replace the original RFC 3588 with fixes to some of the Diameter base issues, mainly in the areas of session, security (TLS) and some improvements and clean up (IPSec..)
I have a few concerns how It will affect the adoption of Diameter, which is today mainly in the telecom field (and not the Internet)
There are a few questions that come to mind (and my own personal bet)
- Will the market move to RFC 3588 bis? (yes, the big question is in what rate)
- Will it create interoperability issues ? (yes of course)
- Will it create confusion ? (you bet)
- Will it help to establish Diameter position as the AAA/Control protocol of the next decade ? (maybe)
- Is it needed ? (I prefer not to answer this one )
One thing for sure it’s going to be interesting in the Diameter scene, with continuing adoption, growing amount of Diameter signaling, Diameter spreading out of the mobile core to the wireline, booming amount of Diameter interfaces, LTE (which should be renamed to Diameter TE due to the amount of Diameter signaling there) and of course new Diameter base.
4/6/10
Diameter Routing Agent – some open questions
I want to share with you, some thoughts from discussion I recently had about DRA.
Diameter Routing Agent (DRA) was defined in 3GPP Release 8 and onwards to manage PCRF interaction in LTE networks.
PCRF’s are becoming more advanced, with more and more Diameter interfaces, more and more traffic – and pretty soon you need someone to manage this Diameter signaling Spaghetti – this is where DRA comes into the picture – putting some order and management.
We come across some first implementations of DRA’s (and yes we in Traffix have one also, and it’s fully 3GPP Kosher) in the market this days.
Some questions that come to mind from some first glimpse in DRA implementations:
DRA – Standalone / or part of the PCRF
We see both scenarios in the market, some of the DRA’s out there are part of the PCRF, maybe it’s because they were rolled out by the PCRF vendors, I personally believe there is a huge advantage for a standalone installation, separate from the PCRF.
DRA – Diameter Proxy agent / Redirect agent
DRA was defined to act as both Proxy or Redirect agent, there was a big argument if both functionalities are needed, and eventually it was decided not to decide.
I personally think giving the DRA the flexibility to act as both Proxy or Redirect is great, and makes sure that networks could be tuned and set with much less limitations.
DRA - Interconnectivity
Policy in 3GPP is all about freedom – either in roaming scenarios or in interconnectivity between different technologies.
However with DRA being supported only by 3GPP for mobile networks, how will it integrate to the RACS in the TISPAN wireline networks for example ? will it affect fixed mobile convergence scenarios ?
Diameter Routing Agent is still new functionality, both in the specifications and much more in the market, with first glimpses mainly in LTE labs and with half backed products that only resemble DRA from a far.
I personally believe DRA will become a central component in LTE and future telecom networks, getting more and more responsibility and functionality, but this days are still far and many standardization open issues need to be closed before that.
Diameter Routing Agent (DRA) was defined in 3GPP Release 8 and onwards to manage PCRF interaction in LTE networks.
PCRF’s are becoming more advanced, with more and more Diameter interfaces, more and more traffic – and pretty soon you need someone to manage this Diameter signaling Spaghetti – this is where DRA comes into the picture – putting some order and management.
We come across some first implementations of DRA’s (and yes we in Traffix have one also, and it’s fully 3GPP Kosher) in the market this days.
Some questions that come to mind from some first glimpse in DRA implementations:
DRA – Standalone / or part of the PCRF
We see both scenarios in the market, some of the DRA’s out there are part of the PCRF, maybe it’s because they were rolled out by the PCRF vendors, I personally believe there is a huge advantage for a standalone installation, separate from the PCRF.
DRA – Diameter Proxy agent / Redirect agent
DRA was defined to act as both Proxy or Redirect agent, there was a big argument if both functionalities are needed, and eventually it was decided not to decide.
I personally think giving the DRA the flexibility to act as both Proxy or Redirect is great, and makes sure that networks could be tuned and set with much less limitations.
DRA - Interconnectivity
Policy in 3GPP is all about freedom – either in roaming scenarios or in interconnectivity between different technologies.
However with DRA being supported only by 3GPP for mobile networks, how will it integrate to the RACS in the TISPAN wireline networks for example ? will it affect fixed mobile convergence scenarios ?
Diameter Routing Agent is still new functionality, both in the specifications and much more in the market, with first glimpses mainly in LTE labs and with half backed products that only resemble DRA from a far.
I personally believe DRA will become a central component in LTE and future telecom networks, getting more and more responsibility and functionality, but this days are still far and many standardization open issues need to be closed before that.
2/25/10
Telecom Analytics - the advantages of Diameter
Service Providers today are looking for new ways to increase revenues. One of the main paths towards achieving this goal is the use of analytics for targeted customer approach and for personalized, tuned, advanced and combined service offering. The above require real-time analysis of subscriber behavior and other information known to the service provider. This information should be analyzed per subscriber or a group of subscribers and used in order to tune customer service offering and user experience.
This information is available and encapsulated inside Diameter, some of the advantage of using Diameter compared to traditional Data path methods are:
Granularity of information – the information that flows in the control plane contains the most valuable and strategic information in the network – the location of the subscribers, their buddies (IM friends) list, their phone number, the kind of technology they use to connect to the network, their charging scheme, their IP Address, services they are using, etc.
Most of this information is not available in the in the service and the data domain.
Smaller amount of traffic – extracting information from the signaling flows can be done efficiently with software based solutions using off the shelf servers and is much more cost effective – the amount of traffic is typically 1/1,000 of the data path traffic.
Synchronization and correlation – the signaling flows in the control plane enable synchronization between different transactions and extraction of information according to pre-configured definitions. For example: extraction of all information related to a specific subscriber, a specific services, a group of users or even a specific location.
Pre-defined routes - extracting information from the data domain is not simple.
For example: messages might go through one route, and come back via another, this is the nature of IP environments, and thus a large scale implementation covering all possible routes is required. Furthermore, the amount of data that should be processed for the large amount of available applications and proprietary protocols is enormous. In the signaling domain on the other hand, traffic is controlled, interactions and routing is fixed, the implementation effort is therefore several scales smaller and the correlation of information is easier.
Information that can be extracted from Diameter:
• Accounting-Record-Type
• WLAN-Information // used in WLAN access//
• Unit-Cost
• Traffic-Data-Volumes
• Time-Usage
• Tariff-Information
• Supplementary-Service // info on additional supported services //
• Charging-Rule-Base-Name
• QoS-Information
• Rating-Group
• Time-First-Usage
• Time-Last-Usage
• Time-Usage
• 3GPP-User-Location-Info
• SDP-Media-Name //file name //
• SDP-Media-Description // type, size,format …////
• Authorized-QoS
• SDP-Type
• 3GPP-Charging-Id
• 3GPP-PDP-Type
• PDP-Address
• QoS-Information
• GGSN-Address
• 3GPP-IMSI-MCC-MNC // Mobile Network Identifer //
• 3GPP-Charging-Characteristics
• Traffic-Data-Volumes
• User-Equipment-Info // terminal related information – vendor, model….//
• Terminal-Information
• Number-Of-Participants //for multi participent services //
• Participants-Involved //for multi participent services //
• Participant-Group //for multi participent services //
• LCS-Client-ID //Location info//
• Location-Type
• Location-Estimate
• Positioning-Data
• Calling-Party-Address //the call participents info//
• Called-Party-Address //the call participents info//
• Low-Balance-Indication
• Remaining-Balance
• MSISDN
• Service-Indication
• Service-area-ID
• Global-Cell-ID
• Location-area-ID
• Bearer-Identifier
• Guaranteed-Bitrate-DL //QoS//
• Guaranteed-Bitrate-UL //QoS//
• QoS-Information
• RAT-Type AVP // Radio Access WLAN (0) UTRAN (1000) /GERAN (1001)/GAN (1002)/ HSPA(1003) ..//
• Termination-Cause
• User-Name
Summary
The signaling transactions through the control plane in telecom networks are the perfect enabler for network intelligence, analysis and user behavior monitoring. In Internet based networks over the top services model is the only model, the signaling is minimal and differentiation hardly exists. The common (and maybe best) way to extract user-related information is extracting it from the data path using DPI like products. The telecom market, however, offers a much richer and granular source of information which is encapsulated in the signaling path.
Using the signaling as the main source for network intelligence offers several advantages:
o Signaling is easier to collect - smaller in size, routes are predictable
o Signaling is much richer in information compared to the data path
o Signaling could be correlated easily
o In converged networks and roaming scenarios signaling is the only source of intelligence
o Cost efficient – no need for large scale deployment of expensive super processors, signaling domain – 1/1,000 of the usual amount of traffic, in predictable routes.
This information is available and encapsulated inside Diameter, some of the advantage of using Diameter compared to traditional Data path methods are:
Granularity of information – the information that flows in the control plane contains the most valuable and strategic information in the network – the location of the subscribers, their buddies (IM friends) list, their phone number, the kind of technology they use to connect to the network, their charging scheme, their IP Address, services they are using, etc.
Most of this information is not available in the in the service and the data domain.
Smaller amount of traffic – extracting information from the signaling flows can be done efficiently with software based solutions using off the shelf servers and is much more cost effective – the amount of traffic is typically 1/1,000 of the data path traffic.
Synchronization and correlation – the signaling flows in the control plane enable synchronization between different transactions and extraction of information according to pre-configured definitions. For example: extraction of all information related to a specific subscriber, a specific services, a group of users or even a specific location.
Pre-defined routes - extracting information from the data domain is not simple.
For example: messages might go through one route, and come back via another, this is the nature of IP environments, and thus a large scale implementation covering all possible routes is required. Furthermore, the amount of data that should be processed for the large amount of available applications and proprietary protocols is enormous. In the signaling domain on the other hand, traffic is controlled, interactions and routing is fixed, the implementation effort is therefore several scales smaller and the correlation of information is easier.
Information that can be extracted from Diameter:
• Accounting-Record-Type
• WLAN-Information // used in WLAN access//
• Unit-Cost
• Traffic-Data-Volumes
• Time-Usage
• Tariff-Information
• Supplementary-Service // info on additional supported services //
• Charging-Rule-Base-Name
• QoS-Information
• Rating-Group
• Time-First-Usage
• Time-Last-Usage
• Time-Usage
• 3GPP-User-Location-Info
• SDP-Media-Name //file name //
• SDP-Media-Description // type, size,format …////
• Authorized-QoS
• SDP-Type
• 3GPP-Charging-Id
• 3GPP-PDP-Type
• PDP-Address
• QoS-Information
• GGSN-Address
• 3GPP-IMSI-MCC-MNC // Mobile Network Identifer //
• 3GPP-Charging-Characteristics
• Traffic-Data-Volumes
• User-Equipment-Info // terminal related information – vendor, model….//
• Terminal-Information
• Number-Of-Participants //for multi participent services //
• Participants-Involved //for multi participent services //
• Participant-Group //for multi participent services //
• LCS-Client-ID //Location info//
• Location-Type
• Location-Estimate
• Positioning-Data
• Calling-Party-Address //the call participents info//
• Called-Party-Address //the call participents info//
• Low-Balance-Indication
• Remaining-Balance
• MSISDN
• Service-Indication
• Service-area-ID
• Global-Cell-ID
• Location-area-ID
• Bearer-Identifier
• Guaranteed-Bitrate-DL //QoS//
• Guaranteed-Bitrate-UL //QoS//
• QoS-Information
• RAT-Type AVP // Radio Access WLAN (0) UTRAN (1000) /GERAN (1001)/GAN (1002)/ HSPA(1003) ..//
• Termination-Cause
• User-Name
Summary
The signaling transactions through the control plane in telecom networks are the perfect enabler for network intelligence, analysis and user behavior monitoring. In Internet based networks over the top services model is the only model, the signaling is minimal and differentiation hardly exists. The common (and maybe best) way to extract user-related information is extracting it from the data path using DPI like products. The telecom market, however, offers a much richer and granular source of information which is encapsulated in the signaling path.
Using the signaling as the main source for network intelligence offers several advantages:
o Signaling is easier to collect - smaller in size, routes are predictable
o Signaling is much richer in information compared to the data path
o Signaling could be correlated easily
o In converged networks and roaming scenarios signaling is the only source of intelligence
o Cost efficient – no need for large scale deployment of expensive super processors, signaling domain – 1/1,000 of the usual amount of traffic, in predictable routes.
1/22/10
Diameter on going work
Diameter is rapidly gaining momentum, breaking the mobile network implementations boundaries.
But still Diameter is young and misses some important capabilities and applications needed in order to “fulfill its destiny” and become the signaling protocol for telecommunications – taking full responsibility over control, policy, QoS and AAA and replacing over a dozen legacy protocols that are used today in both wireless and wireline networks and of course the Internet (don’t forget the IETF is the main sponsor of Diameter)
I wanted to share with you some of the important work that is being done by the good people at IETF DIME to add those missing capabilities.
Here are some examples of work that is being standardized:
draft-ietf-dime-diameter-base-protocol-mib
Defines the Management Information Base (MIB) module needed to manage an implementation of the Diameter protocol.
draft-ietf-dime-local-keytran
Some AAA applications require the transport of cryptographic keying material; this work specifies a set of AVP’s providing native Diameter support of cryptographic key delivery.
draft-ietf-dime-nat-control
The Diameter NAT Control Application allows external devices to configure and manage a Large Scale NAT (LSN) device - expanding the existing Diameter-based AAA and policy control capabilities with a NAT control component
draft-ietf-dime-capablities-update
The Capabilities Update application is intended to allow the dynamic update of Diameter peer capabilities while the peer-to-peer connection is in the open state.
draft-ietf-dime-ikev2-psk-diameter
Specifies the interaction between the Access Gateway and Diameter server for the IKEv2 based on pre-shared secrets.
draft-ietf-dime-extended-naptr
Describes an extended format for the NAPTR service fields used in dynamic Diameter agent discovery.
draft-ietf-dime-realm-based-redirect
RFC 3588 allows a Diameter redirect agent to specify one or more individual hosts to which a Diameter message may be redirected. However, in some circumstances an operator may wish to redirect messages to an alternate domain without specifying individual hosts. This work defines an application by which this can be achieved.
draft-wu-dime-pmip6-lr
Support for Proxy Mobile IPv6 Mobile Access Gateway (MAG) and Local Mobility Anchor (LMA) routing.
draft-ietf-dime-qos-attributes
Defines a number of Diameter AVP’s for traffic classification with actions for filtering and Quality of Service (QoS) treatment.
draft-ietf-dime-diameter-cc-appl-mib
Defines the Management Information Base (MIB) module needed to manage an implementation of the Diameter Credit Control application.
But still Diameter is young and misses some important capabilities and applications needed in order to “fulfill its destiny” and become the signaling protocol for telecommunications – taking full responsibility over control, policy, QoS and AAA and replacing over a dozen legacy protocols that are used today in both wireless and wireline networks and of course the Internet (don’t forget the IETF is the main sponsor of Diameter)
I wanted to share with you some of the important work that is being done by the good people at IETF DIME to add those missing capabilities.
Here are some examples of work that is being standardized:
draft-ietf-dime-diameter-base-protocol-mib
Defines the Management Information Base (MIB) module needed to manage an implementation of the Diameter protocol.
draft-ietf-dime-local-keytran
Some AAA applications require the transport of cryptographic keying material; this work specifies a set of AVP’s providing native Diameter support of cryptographic key delivery.
draft-ietf-dime-nat-control
The Diameter NAT Control Application allows external devices to configure and manage a Large Scale NAT (LSN) device - expanding the existing Diameter-based AAA and policy control capabilities with a NAT control component
draft-ietf-dime-capablities-update
The Capabilities Update application is intended to allow the dynamic update of Diameter peer capabilities while the peer-to-peer connection is in the open state.
draft-ietf-dime-ikev2-psk-diameter
Specifies the interaction between the Access Gateway and Diameter server for the IKEv2 based on pre-shared secrets.
draft-ietf-dime-extended-naptr
Describes an extended format for the NAPTR service fields used in dynamic Diameter agent discovery.
draft-ietf-dime-realm-based-redirect
RFC 3588 allows a Diameter redirect agent to specify one or more individual hosts to which a Diameter message may be redirected. However, in some circumstances an operator may wish to redirect messages to an alternate domain without specifying individual hosts. This work defines an application by which this can be achieved.
draft-wu-dime-pmip6-lr
Support for Proxy Mobile IPv6 Mobile Access Gateway (MAG) and Local Mobility Anchor (LMA) routing.
draft-ietf-dime-qos-attributes
Defines a number of Diameter AVP’s for traffic classification with actions for filtering and Quality of Service (QoS) treatment.
draft-ietf-dime-diameter-cc-appl-mib
Defines the Management Information Base (MIB) module needed to manage an implementation of the Diameter Credit Control application.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
