User guide

SOAP Implementation Overview (Apache Axis)
AlliedView NMS Administration Guide (Northbound Interface)
12-2
12.2 SOAP Implementation
12.2.1 Overview (Apache Axis)
Apache Axis is able to provide web services, and as a successor of SOAP, it has the simplicity for hiding all XML details from
the users implementing the service or clients. Administrators can find detailed information on Axis/SOAP at www.apache.org.
Note: Apache Axis is described here because the AlliedView NMS server implementation is based on Apache
Axis for SOAP communication. Other web service tools besides Axis could be used.
Note: Axis 1 (1.4) does not support callback operations and is considered slower compared to other technologies
such as CORBA because it uses HTTP as the protocol and text (XML) data. Axis 2 (currently in beta
version) is expected to be an improvement of its predecessor.
Autonomous events configuration for
clients
allow clients to receive network events from the NMS immediately without
the need for the client to poll the NMS every time. The client will configure
the NMS with the information required (including criteria if only specific
events are needed) and the NMS will forward all events that match the crite-
ria
Retrieve device information from the
device through the NMS
All other operations in this release operate on the NMS with the results avail-
able in the NMS server. This operation will use the NMS to retrieve the data
from the device. Device data is retrieved using CLI or SNMP. The main pur-
pose for this is to evaluate how other device operations can be supported
Users accessing northbound interface
must be authenticated and denied
access if not authorized.
Operations done through the northbound interface will have access to the
NMS database and devices, therefore access should be restricted using the
users in NMS security database
Retrieve stored customer information
from device
Once the configuration is complete the northbound interface is expected to
have an API to retrieve the configured information from the device. This can
be used to allow clients to validate parameters or display subscribed services.
Provision a triple play customer. Allows northbound interface clients to provision triple play services for a
customer using iMAP device and RG or iMG device.
Provision a customer port on device Allows northbound interface clients to provision a customer port on iMAP
device without provisioning the RG or iMG device.
Provision a customer RG or iMG
device
Allows northbound interface clients to provision services on the RG for a
customer when the port where the RG is connected was provisioned sepa-
rately.
De-provision a triple play customer. Allows northbound interface clients to de-provision triple play services for a
customer on iMAP device and RG or iMG device through the API. The
iMAP port and RG can also be de-provisioned separately.
Modify Customer provision informa-
tion.
Allows northbound interface clients to modify selected provision informa-
tion for the customer. Configuration information that can be modified is sim-
ilar to what was used in provisioning.
Perform a bulk provision task (provi-
sion many customers from saved data)
Allows provision, de-provision or modify configuration of many customers
by loading the information from a file. The client in NMS that has limited
bulk provision operations is currently using RMI and is updated to use north-
bound operations.
TABLE 12-1 Northbound Interface APIs for Release 10.0
Capability Detail