Interactive conflict resolution for personalized policy-based services

Illllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll

US007548967B2

(12) United States Patent

Amyot et al.

(io) Patent No.: (45) Date of Patent:

US 7,548,967 B2 Jun. 16, 2009

(54) INTERACTIVE CONFLICT RESOLUTION FOR PERSONALIZED POLICY-BASED SERVICES

(75) Inventors: Daniel Amyot, Hull (CA); Kathy

Baker, Ottawa (CA); Thomas Gray,
Carp (CA); Ramiro Liscano, Ottawa
(CA); Jean-Marc Seguin, Stittsville
(CA); Jacques Sincennes, Gatineau
(CA)

(73) Assignee: Mitel Networks Corporation, Ottawa, Ontario (CA)

( * ) Notice: Subject to any disclaimer, the term of this patent is extended or adjusted under 35 U.S.C. 154(b) by 495 days.

(21) Appl.No.: 10/680,345

(22) Filed: Oct. 8, 2003

(65) Prior Publication Data

US 2004/0153875 Al Aug. 5, 2004

(30) Foreign Application Priority Data

Oct. 17, 2002 (GB) 0224187.5

A method and apparatus for defining and validating feature policies in an execution system, such as a communication system. The method includes entering user policies described in a straightforward manner (e.g. using a Web browser and user-understandable language) in such a way that they can be translated into a formal executable language. The user policies are then (translated into an executable feature language such as the IETE's CPL. The user is then either compelled or provided with an option to validate the overall feature set before the overall feature is uploaded to the execution system. If validation is selected, the features are translated from CPL into another format, such as FIAT, from which it is possible to detect common feature specification errors. That FIAT detected errors are then analyzed in a manner that is aware of the expectations and common errors of native users, and interpreted to determine possible errors as errors that are common to naive users.

13 Claims, 6 Drawing Sheets

U.S. PATENT DOCUMENTS

7,133,511 B2* 11/2006 Buntinetal 379/189

2001/0007106 Al 7/2001 Slaikeu

2002/0103895 Al * 8/2002 Chiang 709/224

2002/0184535 Al * 12/2002 Moaven et al 713/202

2002/0198892 Al * 12/2002 Rychel et al 707/102

2003/0065942 Al * 4/2003 Lineman et al 713/201

2003/0169859 Al * 9/2003 Strathmeyer et al 379/88.17

2004/0161086 Al * 8/2004 Buntinetal 379/189

FOREIGN PATENT DOCUMENTS

GB 2 363 284 12/2001

WO 02/091756 11/2002

OTHER PUBLICATIONS

T.F. Bowen, et al.; The Feature Interaction Problem in Telecommunications Systems ; Jul. 3, 1989 ; pp. 59-62.

V.K. McConnell, et al.; Feature Interaction Analysis in the Advanced Intelligent Network : A Telephone Company Perspective; May 23, 1993; pp. 1548-1552.

S. Tsang, et al.; The Feature Interaction Problem in Networked Multimedia Services—Present and Future; Jan. 1997; pp. 235-246. A. Sefidcon, et al.; FID: Feature Interaction Detection Tool; Oct. 15, 2000; pp. 283-289.

European Search Report; EP 03 25 6555; completed Dec. 19, 2003. J. Lennox, et al.; CPL: A Language for User Control of Internet Telephony Services; Jan. 15, 2002; IETF Internet Draft.

Z. Fu, et al.: IPSec/VPN Security Policy: Correctness, Conflict Detection and Resolution; Jan. 2001; IEEE Policy 2001 Workshop. M. Amer, et al.; Feature Interaction Resolution Using Fuzzy Policies; May 2000; Proceedings of the 6th Feature Interaction in Telecommunications and Software Systems, pp. 94-112. T. Bray, et al.; Extensible markup language (XML) 1.0 (second edition); Oct. 2000; W3C Recommendation REC-xml-20001006. F. Dawson, et al.; Internet calendaring and scheduling core object specification (iCalendar); Nov. 1998; IETF, Request for Comments 2445.

N. Gorse; The Feature Interaction Problem: Automatic Filtering of

Incoherences & Generation of Validation Test Suites at the Design

Stage; Sep. 2000; M.Sc. thesis, SITE, University of Ottawa.

J. D. Moffett, et al.; Policy Conflict Analysis in Distrubuted System

Management; 1994; Journal of Organization Computing, 4(1), pp.

1-22.

A. Sefidcon, F. Khendek: FID: feature interaction detection tool; 2000; Microprocessors and Microsystems 24 (2000) 283-289. S. Tang, E.H. Magill andB. Kelly: The feature interaction problem in networked multimedia services—present and future; 1997, BT Technol J. vol. 15 No. 1 Jan. 1997, pp. 235-246. Von K. McConnell, Margaret E. Nilson, and Elenita E. Silverstein: Feature Interaction Analysis in the Advanced Intelligent Network: A Telephone Company Perspective, 1993, 0-7803-0950-2/1993, IEEE, pp. 1548-1552.

T.F. Bowen, F.S. Dworack, C.H. Chow, N. Grifffeth, G.E. Herman, Y-J Lin: The Feature Interaction Problem In Telecommunications Systems, Bellcore, USA.

* cited by examiner