Open APIs

Hi

Our Customers submit a Service Order for a CFS that they will use during a service time window in the future (could be months after order) - i.e. not immediately as a consequence of a Service Order. Operator interaction is needed to manage the allocation of resources so orders are initially put onto a queue until an operator is available - could be days for low priority customers/services. Customers can also submit a Reservation Order to (temporarily) reserve the sub-service and resources needed for a CFS they may need, followed by a Service Order referencing the reserved CFS to contract its use (and activation)

As part of the order processing we are not clear as to what value the Service Order (Item) state should be set to indicate the different steps in the order processing - e.g. most importantly, when the requested Order has been contractually accepted (but the Service is not yet active)

Similarly, it is not clear how the value of the Service state attribute is set relative to the processing of the corresponding Reservation or Service Order

1) Would we be correct in assuming the intended use of the Service Order state is as follows:

-> Acknowledged when Order has been received and checked for validity (Rejected otherwise)

-> Pending while the Order is waiting to be processed (e.g. on prioritised queue)

-> InProgress while the CFS is being design and the required sub-services are being allocated and resources reserved

-> Completed when the Service Order sub-services have been allocated and resources reserved. For a Service Order the Order the CFS will be activated at the requested time. For a Reservation Order, the CFS will not be activated unless a subsequent Service Order is received and accepted.

The definition of 'Completed' in TMF641 v4.1.0 states that "... the service is now active". However, for our use case, the service will not be activated until some time after the order processing has completed. Is it okay to interpret this as "... the service will be activated at the requested time" for a Service Order, or "... the sub-services and resources have been reserved" for a Reservation Order?

2) Similarly, for the Service state attribute, are we correct in assuming its value will be:

-> designed when the required services and/or resources have been identified

-> feasibilityChecked when the availability of the required services and/or resources has been verified

-> reserved when the required services and/or resources have been reserved (end point for Completion of a Reservation Order)

-> inactive when the Service Order has been accepted

-> active when the service is activated at the service start date (or re-activated within the service time window)

-> suspended when the service is still active, but doesn't meet the criteria agreed to (e.g. lower data rate)

-> inactive when the service is deactivated within the service time window (and could be re-activated)

-> terminated when the service is deactivated at the service time window end date

3) With regards the difference between a Reservation Order and a Service Order, how would TMF641 be used to differentiate between the two requested 'end points' of the service being ordered

For example, TMF641 v4.1.0 defines the Service Order state as:

"A service order item state type (ServiceOrderItemStateType). State of the order item: described in the state machine diagram. This is the requested state."

However, ServiceOrderItemStateType is the state of the Order, not the Service - so what would the Customer be requesting by setting this state?

And, is this attribute also used to feed back the current state of the order to the Customer

Whereas the ServiceRefOrValue state attribute is defined as:

"A service state type (ServiceStateType). The life cycle state of the service, such as designed, reserved, active, etc..."

And it is not clear if this is to be used as the requested end state of the order processing (e.g. 'reserve' for a Reservation Order or 'terminate' for a Service Order) or the current state of the service reflected back to the Customer as it progresses through its lifecycle during the Order processing and beyond

Thanks in advance for your guidance

Gary