The Open Broadband-CloudCO Application Software Development Kit (OB-CAS) project recently launched at the end of March 2024. The project will create a reference network management application ecosystem for the broadband industry. The project will develop an open platform software application environment to foster open innovation, leveraging existing standardized or open-source APIs. Access to a broader pool of expertise enables ISPs to select fit-for-purpose applications from a community of independent software vendors. This allows ideas to be developed faster and ensures faster time-to-market of new products or services. Software application providers will be able to integrate their cloud application running in a CloudCO environment more easily.
The OB-CAS team has agreed to develop the first Software Development Kit (SDK) deliverable and an associated sandbox to test applications. This includes an initial selection of APIs that enable an application to interface with an access domain controller, the usage of the OB-BAA core microservices, a PON network simulation for testing purposes, and the development of a sample application that can run in this sandbox environment, leveraging the APIs mentioned above.
The OB-CAS work group has agreed on an alarm correction application as the first sample application, which represents an important building block for root cause analysis automation. This application will detect if there is a common root cause when multiple alarms or event notifications are received by the network, with the logging of this information in an OpenSearch database.
The work group is aiming to demonstrate the alarm correlation application running in the OB-CAS sandbox environment at the Broadband Forum Innovation Demonstration at Network X in October 2024.
Management and data analysis software application providers are invited to join the project to help shape the API requirements and test and grow the SDK to see how their applications can operate in a CloudCO environment.
To learn more about the OB-CAS project’s ongoing work, please see: https://wiki.broadband-forum.org/display/OBCAS/OB-CAS+Home