A novel software approach for service brokering in advanced service architectures

Service brokering considerably enhances advanced service architectures, such as IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS), since the myriad applications potentially involved in a call or other session are located in the application layer and are separate and large grained. Through effective service brokering-that is, the effective blending and coordinating of services-interaction problems can be controlled and new composite services offering an enriched end-user experience can be provided. How can an effective service brokering capability be realized in a product when it must address needs not yet known? This question instigated the novel software approach (covered by filed Lucent patents) used in the Lucent Service Broker (TM) product. Adapting techniques used in Web servers and Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) servlet engines, but bringing to the design the special needs for service interaction and blending along with attendant needs for scalability and performance, the Lucent Service Broker was designed as a software engine with a powerful but easy-to-use AN for customer programmability. This paper describes the software design of the Lucent Service Broker, particularly focusing on its novel aspects. 0 2006 Lucent Technologies Inc.