1.1 Introduction

1.2 AG 4000C Board Features

1.3 Software Components

1.3.1 Natural Access

1.3.2 NMS OAM

AG Board Plug-In

1.3.3 Configuration Files

1.3.4 Runtime Software

1.3.5 Trunk Control Programs (TCPs)

1.1 Introduction

The AG 4000C Installation and Developer's Manual provides information about:

• Configuring and installing an AG 4000C board

• Verifying that it has been installed correctly and is operating correctly

• Developing an application that uses this telephony board

This manual is targeted to developers of telephony and voice applications who are using the AG 4000C board with Natural Access. This manual defines telephony terms where applicable, but assumes that readers are familiar with telephony concepts, switching, and the C programming language.

1.2 AG 4000C Board Features

The AG 4000C board is part of the Alliance Generation family of telephony boards. It is available in configurations with two or four T1 or E1 trunks. 1600 to 4800 MIPS configuration are available for voice processing. A variety of applications are supported. These include 120 ports of IVR and fax or 60 ports of NMS Fusion.

Refer to the NMS web site (www.nmss.com) for a list of available AG 4000C board configurations, for a list of countries where NMS has obtained approval for the AG 4000C board, and for product updates.

An AG 4000C board contains the following main components:

• DSP resources
  Each board has 16 high-performance digital signal processors (DSPs) that provide resources for 120 ports of call processing and programmable voice processing. Each DSP supports one or more tasks. These tasks include voice recording and playback, DTMF detection and generation, and call progress analysis. Fax and NMS Fusion are supported on an AG 4000C board.
  The AG 4000C/3200 T and E boards are shipped with a daughterboard that has an additional 16 high-performance digital signal processors (DSPs).

• CompactPCI bus connectivity
  Each AG 4000C board is designed to reside in a single CompactPCI bus slot. Each board contains a 5 volt CompactPCI bus interface compliant with the CompactPCI Specification PICMG 2.0 R2.1. The CompactPCI interface is a 33 Mhz, 32-bit target device.

• Trunk connectivity
  Each board contains T1 or E1 network interfaces for digital trunk connectivity.

• H.110 bus connectivity
  The AG 4000C board provides full support of the H.110 bus specification. The H.110 bus allows boards to share data and signaling information with other boards on the H.110 bus. For example, you can connect two or more AG 4000C boards for applications that perform trunk-to-trunk switching. You can use H.110 compatible products from other manufacturers with the AG 4000C board.

• Telephony bus switching
  Switching for the AG 4000C board is implemented with the T8100A. The T8100A is a single chip that offers full support for the H.110 bus within the H.110 architecture providing access to all 4096 slots on the H.110 bus.
  On the AG 4000C board, switch connections are allowed for up to 128 full duplex connections between local devices and the H.110 bus. Non-blocking switch connections are allowed between local devices.
  Figure 1 shows where the main components are located on an AG 4000C board:
  
  
  Figure 1. AG 4000C Board Equipped With Front I/O

Figure 2 shows where the main components are located on an AG 4000C board that is equipped with rear I/O:

Figure 2. AG 4000C Board Equipped With Rear I/O

Figure 3 shows where the main components are located on a rear panel I/O transition board. A rear panel I/O transition board is used if you are installing an AG 4000C board that is designed for rear panel I/O.

Figure 3. Rear Panel I/O Transition Board

1.3 Software Components

AG 4000C boards require the following software components:

• The Natural Access development environment, which provides APIs for call control, system configuration, voice store and forward, and other functions.

• NMS OAM (Operations, Administration, and Maintenance) software, which performs operations on, administration of, and maintenance of telephony resources in a system. NMS OAM manages a database of configuration information for each telephony resource, including AG boards.

• Configuration files, which describe how each board is set up and initialized. These files are used to initialize the NMS OAM database for the boards.

• Runtime software, which controls the AG 4000C board.

• One or more trunk control programs (TCPs). These programs allow your application to communicate with the telephone network using the signaling schemes (protocols) used on the trunk.

Figure 4 shows how these software components relate to one another. Each component is described in detail in the following sections.

Figure 4. Software Components

1.3.1 Natural Access

Natural Access is a complete software development environment for voice applications. It provides a standard set of functions grouped into logical services. Each service has a standard programming interface. For more information about standard (base) and optional (domain) Natural Access services, refer to the Natural Access Developer's Reference Manual.

1.3.2 NMS OAM

NMS OAM is an extension to Natural Access which performs operations on, administration of, and maintenance of resources in a system. These resources include hardware components (including AG boards) and low-level board management software modules (such as the Hot Swap process).

Using NMS OAM, you can:

• Create, delete, and query the configuration of a component

• Start (boot), stop (shut down), and test a component

• Receive notifications from components

NMS OAM maintains a database containing records of configuration information for each component. This information consists of parameters and values. Refer to Figure 5.

Figure 5. NMS OAM Components

Each parameter and value is expressed as a keyword name/value pair (for example, AutoStart = NO). You can query the NMS OAM database for keyword values for any component. Keywords and values can be added, modified, or deleted.

To use NMS OAM or any related utility, ensure that the Natural Access Server (ctdaemon) is running. For more information about ctdaemon, refer to the Natural Access Developer's Reference Manual. For more information about NMS OAM and its utilities, refer to the NMS OAM System User's Manual.

AG Board Plug-In

NMS OAM uses the AG board plug-in software module to communicate with AG boards. The AG plug-in, agplugin.bpi, is included with the NMS OAM software. It is installed in the nms\bin directory by default (/opt/nms/lib under UNIX). The file must reside in this directory in order for NMS OAM to load it when it starts up.

1.3.3 Configuration Files

When you set up your system, you create a record in the NMS OAM database for each board that contains configuration information for the board. To do so, supply the information in the configuration file and run the oamsys utility. This utility creates the records and then directs the OAM service to start the boards, configured as specified.

Sample board keyword files are shipped with the software. Refer to Chapter 3 for more information about the system configuration files and oamsys.

1.3.4 Runtime Software

The runtime software consists of runfiles and DSP files. The runfile is the basic low-level software that an AG board requires to operate. DSP files enable the AG board's on-board digital signal processors to perform certain tasks, such as DTMF signaling, voice recording, and playback.

Several runfiles and DSP program files are installed with Natural Access. Specify the files to use for your configuration in the board keyword file. When NMS OAM boots a board, the runfiles and DSP program files are transferred from the host into on-board memory.

For more information about board keyword files, refer to Chapter 3 of this manual. For more information about the DSP files shipped with Natural Access, refer to the ADI Service Function Reference Manual.

1.3.5 Trunk Control Programs (TCPs)

AG 4000C boards are compatible with a variety of signaling schemes, called protocols. A Trunk Control Program (TCP) performs all of the signaling tasks to interface with the protocol used on a channel.

Several different protocol standards are used throughout the world. These standards differ considerably from country to country. For these reasons, different TCPs are supplied with Natural Access for various protocols and country-specific variations.

You can load more than one TCP at a time for applications that support multiple protocols simultaneously. TCPs are specified in the configuration file and are downloaded to the board by oamcfg. TCPs run on the board, relieving the host computer from the task of processing the protocol directly. For more information about TCPs, refer to the NMS CAS for Natural Call Control Developer's Manual.