CN100401703C - A broadband network system - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention discloses a broadband network system, which includes user end equipment for running network application programs; central office equipment for connecting users to the Internet; user premise equipment for connecting the user end equipment and the central office equipment; the The central office equipment includes information collection equipment, including upper-level information collection equipment and lower-level information collection equipment; information analysis equipment, including upper-level information analysis equipment and lower-level information analysis equipment; the lower-level information collection equipment and upper-level information collection equipment are used to collect The network information of the network devices in their respective jurisdictions is submitted to the lower-level information analysis device and the upper-level analysis device for analysis, and converted into corresponding network indicators according to predetermined rules. Due to the hierarchical collection and analysis of the network equipment information, the original network information is converted into network indicators that can reflect the network operation status. When a network failure occurs, the troubleshooting time can be shortened and the difficulty of fault location can be reduced.

Description

A broadband network system

technical field

The invention relates to the field of broadband networks, in particular to a system for connecting broadband network users to the Internet.

Background technique

The demand for information in modern society is increasing, and the Internet is becoming more and more important to the information society. Video, audio communication, animation, advertisement and other entertainment services have greatly increased the amount of data on the Internet, so broadband network systems that can meet the needs of voice, image and other large-scale information transmission have emerged as the times require.

FIG. 1 is a structural block diagram of a broadband network system in the prior art. As shown in the figure, the current broadband network system includes: customer terminal equipment 1, customer premises equipment 0 and central office equipment 2; the central office equipment 2 includes DSLAM3 (Digital Subscriber Line Access Multiplexer, digital subscriber line access multiplexer ), BAS4 (Broadband Access Server, Broadband Access Server) and router/layer 3 switch 5. After the customer premises equipment 1 passes through the customer premises equipment 0 and the DSLAM3, it is connected to the BAS4, and the BAS4 connects the user to the Internet through the router/layer 3 switch 5.

With the increase in the number of broadband access users, the difficulties in the operation and maintenance of the broadband network system have gradually emerged: in the current broadband network system, when a fault occurs, the user usually needs to notify the operator of the fault, and it is often a long time for the network to fail. It takes a period of time for the operator to know, which leads to a decrease in user satisfaction; in addition, when the current broadband network system fails, the method of troubleshooting is for the maintenance personnel to obtain the original data of the network equipment by checking the network equipment of the faulty user, and after After the analysis, the possible cause of the failure is eliminated. Obviously, the current practice, on the one hand, is highly dependent on the experience of the maintenance personnel. The difficulty of maintenance increases, which in turn increases the operator's expenditure cost.

Contents of the invention

The technical problem to be solved by the present invention is to provide a broadband network system, which can shorten the troubleshooting time and reduce the difficulty of fault location when the network fails, thereby reducing the maintenance cost of the network operator.

In order to solve the above technical problems, the present invention provides a broadband network system, including:

Client devices for running web applications;

Central office equipment, used to connect users to the Internet;

Customer premises equipment connecting the customer end equipment and the central office equipment;

The central office equipment includes:

An information collection device, configured to collect network information of network devices, the information collection device includes an upper-level information collection device and a lower-level information collection device;

An information analysis device, configured to receive network information from an information collection device, and convert it into corresponding network indicators according to predetermined rules, and the information analysis device includes an upper-level information analysis device and a lower-level information analysis device;

The lower-level information collection device is used to collect network information of network devices within the jurisdiction and submit it to the lower-level information analysis device;

The lower-level information analysis device is used to analyze the network information submitted by the lower-level information collection device, convert it into corresponding network indicators according to predetermined rules, and send the network indicators to the upper-level information collection device;

The upper-level information collection device is used to collect network information of network devices within the jurisdiction and network indicators sent by the lower-level information analysis device, and submit them to the upper-level information analysis device;

The upper-level information analysis device is configured to analyze the network information submitted by the upper-level information collection device, convert it into corresponding network indicators according to predetermined rules, and combine the network indicators obtained by the analysis of the upper-level information analysis device with the upper-level information collection The network indicators submitted by the device and analyzed by the lower-level analysis device are summarized.

Wherein, the information analysis device includes a device resource management plane calculation unit for converting the network information into corresponding network device resource indicators; and/or a network management plane for converting network information into corresponding protocol layer indicators An indicator calculation unit; and/or a service plane indicator calculation unit for converting network information into corresponding service indicators.

Wherein the lower-level information analysis device further includes a hierarchical synchronization unit, configured to synchronously transmit the network indicators of the lower-level information analysis device to the upper-level information collection device;

The upper-level information collection device also includes an interface unit, configured to receive network indicators from the lower-level information analysis device;

The upper-level information analysis device further includes a summarizing unit for summarizing the network indicators from the lower-level information analysis device and the network indicators analyzed by the upper-level information analysis device according to predetermined rules.

Wherein, the central office equipment specifically includes:

A digital subscriber line access multiplexer connected to the customer premises equipment, used to connect users to broadband access servers;

A broadband access server connected to the digital subscriber line access multiplexer by broadband, used for user access authentication;

The router/layer 3 switch is used to connect the broadband access server to the Internet.

Further, the central office device may further include: a server group connected to the broadband access server or router/layer 3 switch; the server group includes an authentication server and/or a portal server and/or a Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol server.

Wherein, the information collection device is logically interoperable with the user end device, and the network information is the quality information of the user's access to the Internet.

Wherein, the information collection device communicates logically with the digital subscriber line access multiplexer, and the network information is the connection information of the user.

Wherein, the information collection device communicates logically with the broadband access server, and the network information is user access information.

Wherein, the information collection device communicates logically with the router/layer 3 switch, and the network information includes performance information and routing information of the router/layer 3 switch.

Wherein, the information collection device and the server group communicate logically, and the network information is information exchanged between the server group and the broadband access server.

Wherein, the information collection device further includes an information format conversion unit for converting the network information into a format; the information analysis device further includes an information format conversion unit for converting the information from the information collection device into a format transform.

Compared with the prior art, the beneficial effects of the present invention are: the present invention adds information collection equipment and information analysis equipment to the existing broadband network system, and the information collection equipment extracts the network information in each layer of equipment in the broadband network system hierarchically After the information is classified, abstracted and summarized by the information analysis equipment, various broadband network indicators are obtained. Since the network indicators convert the original network information into network indicators that can reflect the network operation, the user's network indicators displayed The data can evaluate the quality of the broadband network, and can further carry out daily network maintenance on the broadband network system. When the index data is found to be abnormal, the fault location can be performed directly according to the network index, instead of collecting raw data from each network device. This reduces troubleshooting time.

An advantage of the present invention is: the collection of information in the information collection device of the present invention can come from any one or more layers in the client equipment layer, DSLAM layer, BAS layer, router/three-layer switch layer and server layer, each Different layers collect different information, and reflect the user's online process from the indicators of each layer, making the network indicators more reliable.

In addition, another advantage of the present invention is that the manifestations of network indicators are classified according to application types, and are divided into status indicators, range indicators and information indicators. Users can clearly learn the current network operation status according to different types of network indicators, and Can predict certain network failures.

In addition, the information collection device and the information analysis device of the present invention also include an information format conversion unit, which can convert the network information into a unified format to facilitate information processing.

Further, the present invention can be applied to hierarchically managed networks, so it is more in line with the current development trend of broadband networks.

Description of drawings

Fig. 1 is a block diagram of a broadband network system in the prior art;

Fig. 2 is a block diagram of the broadband network system in the first embodiment;

Fig. 3 is a block diagram of the hierarchically managed broadband network system in the second embodiment.

Detailed ways

The present invention adds information collection equipment and information analysis equipment to the current broadband network, so that the broadband network system can learn the operation status of the network through the network operation index, thereby providing a basis for the operator's department performance and process operation assessment, market and management departments. Information support and network maintenance provide a reference. The core of the present invention is that the information collection equipment extracts the network information in each layer of equipment in the broadband network system. After the information is abstracted and summarized by the information analysis equipment, various broadband network indicators are obtained, and these indicators are used to determine the quality of the broadband network. The evaluation can further carry out daily network maintenance on the broadband network system, provide basis for network planning, and provide information support for market expansion, business innovation and management decision-making.

The broadband network system of the present invention comprises the following parts:

Client device: the client's Internet access device, used to run the network application program, in the present invention, several terminal devices are used to place at the operator's place to simulate the user's online behavior;

Customer Premises Equipment (CPE, Customer Premises Equipment): Customer Premises Equipment refers to the communication equipment on the user side, including private branch exchanges (PBX, Private Branch Exchange), multiplexers (multiplexers), modems (modems), codecs (codecs) ), phone calls, etc. Used to connect customer premises equipment to digital subscriber line access multiplexers.

Central office equipment: used to connect users to the Internet. Central office equipment can be increased or decreased according to business and user needs, and can include the following equipment:

Digital Subscriber Line Access Multiplexer (DSLAM, Digital Subscriber Line AccessMultiplexer): used to connect client equipment and broadband access servers, usually xDSL/LAN/HFC (xDSL/LAN/optical fiber/coaxial hybrid network ) and other access methods;

Broadband Access Server (BAS, Broadband Access Server): mainly completes user access;

Router/Layer 3 switch (L3, Layer 3Switch): used to connect the broadband access server to the Internet;

Information collection equipment: Information collection equipment is a logical network element, which can be shared with other servers or network equipment physically, and can be realized by one or a group of software, or installed on other servers, to complete the acquisition of users from the above network equipment Internet access information, and submit this information to the information analysis equipment for further processing;

Information analysis equipment: Information analysis equipment is a logical network element, which can be shared with other servers or network equipment physically, and can be one or a group. It obtains the original user online information from the information collection equipment, and after induction, analysis, and synthesis , get the indicators of the broadband network, use these indicators to evaluate the quality of the broadband network, guide network maintenance, network planning and information support.

With the increase of broadband network services, the number of network devices realizing different functions is also increasing. For example, the broadband network system may also include a server group, which is connected with a broadband access server or router in the broadband network system. / Layer 3 switch connection, the server group may include one or more of the following servers:

Authentication server: AAA is the abbreviation of Authentication, Authorization and Accounting (Authentication, Authorization and Accounting), which provides a consistent framework for configuring the three security functions of authentication, authorization and accounting. And AAA usually uses Remote Authentication Dial-In User Service Protocol (Radius, Remote Authentication Dial-In User Service) to complete. The authentication server is a PC or network device that implements the Radius protocol, and cooperates with the broadband access server to complete user authentication, authorization and billing;

Portal server: Portal service is a new type of service provided by ISP (Internet Service Provider, Internet Service Provider) to users, so that users can flexibly choose their own business by accessing the portal server, or provide related network services. Resources (such as HTTP connections, FTP downloads, etc.);

Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol server (DHCP: Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol): The DHCP server can automatically assign IP addresses, subnet masks, default gateways, DNS servers, and WINS servers to clients in the network. It enables network administrators to remotely configure TCP/IP parameters on each computer, and all settings can be modified directly on the server.

An advantage of the present invention is: the collection of information is divided into several levels, is respectively client equipment layer, DSLAM layer, BAS layer, router/three-layer switch layer and server layer, and each layer collects different information, from each layer index Reflect the user's online process. Information collection equipment and information analysis equipment only need to be able to logically communicate with network equipment that needs to collect information. When the present invention is actually applied, one or more network equipment layers that need to collect information can be selected according to the needs of the user.

The information analysis device converts various network information obtained from the information collection device into network indicators according to a certain calculation method. Another advantage of the present invention is that the manifestations of network indicators are classified according to application types. Can clearly know the current network operation, and can predict some network failures. The types of indicators described include:

1. Status indicators

For some indicators (for example: physical layer link state), it should be kept in a certain state when the network is normal, and if the state changes, it indicates that the network is abnormal. This type of indicator is referred to herein as a status indicator. For example: the current physical layer status of Fast Ethernet 3/0/0 on the BAS is used as a status indicator: the status of the physical layer status should remain unchanged under normal circumstances, if the physical layer status indicator changes in a certain period of time (for example: physical If the status of the layer changes from UP to DOWN), it indicates that there may be an abnormality in the network, for example: the peer device is faulty and so on.

2. Range indicators

For some indicators, they should be within a certain range when the network is normal. If the indicators exceed this range, it often indicates that the network is abnormal. This type of indicator is referred to herein as a range indicator. For example: define the average CPU usage rate on the BAS for 5 minutes as a range indicator: average CPU usage rate, under normal circumstances the average CPU usage rate should be less than 20%, if the average CPU usage rate for a certain period of time is 90%, it indicates Anomalies may occur on the network, for example, a certain link is connected and disconnected from time to time, causing repeated calculations of the OSPF protocol, and so on.

3. Information indicators

For some indicators, they are mainly used to analyze users' network behaviors. Operators can use these indicators to analyze user behaviors and provide reference information for improving network quality. There is no scope issue with these metrics, for example: sites visited by users.

The information analysis equipment uses the following calculation units to calculate the network indicators of each equipment layer according to the network information collected from the network equipment. The method of converting network information into network indicators can be determined according to the daily network operation conditions, which will be explained below.

1. Device resource management plane computing unit

The device resource management plane computing unit mainly analyzes the indicators of network device resources. For example: convert relevant network information into CPU usage rate, memory usage rate, etc. The method for converting network information into corresponding network indicators may be implemented in the following manner:

Taking memory usage as an example, the process of defining a specific indicator is as follows:

Indicator name: memory usage rate, this indicator indicates the current value of the device memory usage rate at the specified statistical time, if the device is centralized forwarding, the memory usage rate of the system is analyzed here; if the device is distributed forwarding, the master control is analyzed here board and the memory usage of each interface board;

The calculation method can be according to the following formula:

Memory occupancy = memory occupancy collected on the device

Upper limit: average value of memory usage * 150%

Lower limit: average value of memory usage * 50%

Assessment object: the use of memory resources on the network device or the running status of the program. Then the user can predict possible faults based on the data displayed by the indicator and perform fault location. When the memory usage rate is too high, possible causes include: memory leaks in the system; increase in the number of routes; hackers or virus attacks on the network, which occupy memory resources, such as: more MAC entries, more ARP entries, Increased number of TCP connections to the device;

When the memory usage is too low, there may be a decrease in the number of routes.

2. Network management plane indicator calculation unit: The network management plane indicator calculation unit mainly analyzes the indicators of each layer according to the layered method, specifically including:

2.1 Physical layer indicators

For example: the interface status of the physical layer, the physical layer interface status indicator of Fast Ethernet 3/0/0 is "UP", so when the interface status of Fast Ethernet 3/0/0 changes to "DOWN", it means that at this time can malfunction;

2.2 Link layer indicators

For example: the port rate of the data link layer, the size of the ARP table, etc. For example: the rate index of the data link layer port of Fast Ethernet 3/0/0 is "100M full duplex", so when Fast Ethernet 3/0/0 When the port speed of the data link layer becomes "10M half-duplex", it means that a fault may occur at this time;

2.3 Network layer indicators

For example: routing table size, etc.;

2.4 Application layer indicators

For example: NAT table size, etc.;

3. Business plane indicator calculation unit

The service plane indicator calculation unit is mainly for statistics and analysis of key indicators of various telecommunication services. Different access methods have different key indicators. For example, PPPOE user network indicators include the number of online users, PPP dial-up success rate, etc.; Portal user network indicators include the number of online users, Portal success rate, etc.

Several specific examples of applying the present invention are listed below.

The first embodiment: FIG. 2 is a block diagram of the broadband network system in this embodiment. As shown in the figure, the broadband network system includes: customer terminal equipment 1, customer premises equipment 0, BAS3, DSLAM2 connecting customer terminal equipment 1 and BAS3, router/layer 3 switch 4, server group 5 and information collection equipment 6 and an information analysis device 7 . Client equipment 1 is connected to BAS3 through customer premises equipment 0 and DSLAM2, and BAS3 and server group 5 connect users to the Internet through router/layer 3 switch 4, and said server group includes authentication server 51, Portal server 52 and dynamic host The protocol server 53 is configured. The dotted line in the figure indicates that the information collection device 6 and the information analysis device 7 logically communicate with each layer of equipment in the broadband network system. In addition, in order to facilitate the processing of data collected from network devices at various layers, the information collection device 6 and the information analysis device 7 also include an information format conversion unit 61 and an information format conversion unit 74 .

When collecting network device information, the information collection device 6 transmits the network information collected from each network device to the information analysis device 7 after format conversion by the information format conversion unit 61, and the information analysis device 7 includes a device resource management plane computing unit 71. The network management plane indicator calculation unit 72 and the service plane indicator calculation unit 73, the calculation units respectively obtain corresponding network information from the network information, and then convert them into corresponding network indicators, and the types of the network indicators include status respectively Indicators, range indicators, and message indicators. When the information analysis equipment finds that the calculated indicators are not within the normal value range, it can be considered that the network is abnormal, and the network management personnel will perform corresponding processing according to the indicator data.

For a large-scale network system, there may be many network devices, and it is often necessary to manage the network hierarchically. If only one information collection device or information analysis device is used to evaluate all the devices, not only the performance is not easy to meet the requirements, but also the It is easy to manage, so the present invention also provides a method for hierarchically applying information collection equipment and information analysis equipment. In hierarchical network management, multiple information collection devices and multiple information analysis devices may be included, multiple information collection devices and one information analysis device may be included, or one information collection device and multiple information analysis devices may be included.

The following describes an application situation when there are multiple information collection devices and multiple information analysis devices:

Embodiment 2: In the hierarchical operating environment of network equipment, the present invention divides information collection equipment and information analysis equipment into layers, and divides them into upper-level information collection equipment, lower-level information collection equipment, upper-level information analysis equipment, and lower-level information analysis equipment.

Fig. 3 is a block diagram of the hierarchically managed broadband network system in this embodiment. As shown in the figure, the broadband network system includes: user end equipment 1, user premises equipment 0, BAS3, DSLAM2 connecting user end equipment 1 and BAS3, router/layer 3 switch 4, server group 5 and lower-level information collection equipment 6. Lower-level information analysis equipment 7, upper-level information collection equipment 8, and upper-level information analysis equipment 9. Client equipment 1 is connected to BAS3 through customer premises equipment 0 and DSLAM2, and BAS3 and server group 5 connect users to the Internet through router/layer 3 switch 4, and said server group includes authentication server 51, Portal server 52 and dynamic host The protocol server 53 is configured. The dotted line in the figure indicates that the information collection equipment and the information analysis equipment logically communicate with each layer of equipment in the broadband network system. The lower-level information analysis device 7 includes a device resource management plane calculation unit 71, a network management plane index calculation unit 72, and a service plane index calculation unit 73, and also includes a hierarchical synchronization unit 75; the upper-level information collection device 8 also includes an interface unit 81. The upper-level information analysis device further includes a summary unit 94 in addition to a device resource management plane calculation unit 91 , a network management plane index calculation unit 92 , and a service plane index calculation unit 93 .

Each lower-level information collection device 6 manages the devices in their respective jurisdictions, is responsible for collecting the network information of network devices in their respective jurisdictions, and then submits it to the information analysis devices 7 of each layer for analysis. At the same time, each information analysis device 7 will analyze the network information The information is the network index, which is synchronized to the interface unit 81 of the upper-level information collection device 8 through the hierarchical synchronization unit 75; Therefore, on the upper-level information collection device 8, the broadband statistical data of the entire network equipment is collected to form a network-wide management data center, and users can perform statistics and analysis on the data of the entire network. In addition, due to the difference in the format of the collected network information, in order to facilitate the processing of the information analysis equipment, the information collection equipment and the information analysis equipment also include information format conversion units respectively. In this embodiment, only the information format conversion unit The case of being placed in the lower-level information collection device and the lower-level information analysis device is described as an example, that is, the information format conversion unit 61 and the information format conversion unit 74 shown in the figure convert the collected network information into a unified internal format. The information analysis device 9 converts the original network information of the management area obtained from the upper-level information collection device 8 into various network indicators, and the network indicators of the lower-level equipment obtained from the interface unit 81 are directly transmitted to the summary unit 94, and the summary unit 94 Summarize the network indicators of the entire network, output the indicator information to the user, and the user performs network maintenance according to the displayed indicator information.

The above is only a preferred embodiment of the present invention, it should be pointed out that for those of ordinary skill in the art, without departing from the principle of the present invention, some improvements and modifications can also be made, and these improvements and modifications should also be It is regarded as the protection scope of the present invention.

Claims (11)

1. A broadband network system, comprising: Client devices for running web applications; Central office equipment, used to connect users to the Internet; Customer premises equipment connecting the customer end equipment and the central office equipment; It is characterized in that the central office equipment includes: Information collection equipment, used to collect network information of network equipment, said information collection equipment includes upper-level information collection equipment and lower-level information collection equipment; An information analysis device, configured to receive network information from an information collection device, and convert it into corresponding network indicators according to predetermined rules, and the information analysis device includes an upper-level information analysis device and a lower-level information analysis device; The lower-level information collection device is used to collect network information of network devices within the jurisdiction and submit it to the lower-level information analysis device; The lower-level information analysis device is used to analyze the network information submitted by the lower-level information collection device, convert it into corresponding network indicators according to predetermined rules, and send the network indicators to the upper-level information collection device; The upper-level information collection device is used to collect network information of network devices within the jurisdiction and network indicators sent by the lower-level information analysis device, and submit them to the upper-level information analysis device; The upper-level information analysis device is configured to analyze the network information submitted by the upper-level information collection device, convert it into corresponding network indicators according to predetermined rules, and combine the network indicators obtained by the analysis of the upper-level information analysis device with the upper-level information collection The network indicators submitted by the device and analyzed by the lower-level analysis device are summarized. 2. The broadband network system according to claim 1, wherein the information analysis device includes a device resource management plane computing unit for converting the network information into a corresponding network device resource index; and/or using A network management plane indicator calculation unit for converting network information into corresponding protocol layer indicators; and/or a service plane indicator calculation unit for converting network information into corresponding service indicators. 3. The broadband network system according to claim 2, characterized in that: the lower-level information analysis equipment further includes a hierarchical synchronization unit for synchronously transmitting the network indicators of the lower-level information analysis equipment to the upper-level information collection equipment ; The upper-level information collection device also includes an interface unit for receiving network indicators from the lower-level information analysis device; the upper-level information analysis device also includes a summary unit for receiving the network indicators from the lower-level information analysis device The network indicators analyzed with the upper-level information analysis equipment are summarized according to predetermined rules. 4. The broadband network system according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein the central office equipment specifically includes: A digital subscriber line access multiplexer connected to the customer premises equipment, used to connect users to broadband access servers; A broadband access server connected to the broadband access multiplexer of the digital subscriber line, used for user access authentication; The router/layer 3 switch is used to connect the broadband access server to the Internet. 5. The broadband network system according to claim 4, wherein the central office equipment also includes: a server group connected to the broadband access server or router/layer 3 switch; the server group includes an authentication server and/or Portal Server and/or Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol Server. 6 . The broadband network system according to claim 5 , wherein the information collection device is logically interoperable with the client device, and the network information is the quality information of the user's access to the Internet. 7 . 7. The broadband network system according to claim 5, characterized in that: the information collection device is logically interoperable with the digital subscriber line access multiplexer, and the network information is user connection information. 8 . The broadband network system according to claim 5 , wherein the information collection device communicates logically with the broadband access server, and the network information is user access information. 9 . The broadband network system according to claim 5 , wherein the information collection device communicates logically with the router/layer 3 switch, and the network information includes performance information and routing information of the router/layer 3 switch. 10. The broadband network system according to claim 5, characterized in that: the information collection device and the server group are logically interoperable, and the network information is exchanged between the server group and the broadband access server information. 11. The broadband network system according to any one of claims 1 to 3, characterized in that: the information collection device also includes an information format conversion unit for converting the network information into formats; the information analysis device An information format conversion unit is also included, configured to convert the format of the information from the information collection device.

Images