1.0.0 Introduction
Reliance Infocomm is implementing countrywide telecom network providing wireless and wireline services to customers. Telecom GIS is being implemented as part of this project for serving the business needs of the enterprise. This paper discusses experience gained in implementation of a telecom GIS fully integrated with the Operations Support System (OSS) / Business Support System (BSS) for countrywide network of Reliance Infocom.
2.0.0 Business Requirement Assessment
At the outset of the vast telecomm infrastructure project, Reliance management recognised the importance of providing high quality of uninterrupted service to the customers. Continuously evolving technology and tremendous competition has necessitated maximisation of utilization of telecom inventory and tight inventory controls.
GIS platform with a dedicated telecommunication application is the optimum solution since it can store the network inventory in a geographical manner. Interfacing with network, O & M and customer facing systems enables to meet the business requirements successfully. Some of the main requirements expected to be met by the GIS / Telecom application are:
- Plan, design and engineer Network and expansion
- Modeling of (OutSide Plant) OSP and (InSide Plant) ISP items up to port level
- Placement of Trenches, Cables, Structures and facilities in the OSP
- Facility layouts, equipment placement and port-to-port connectivity
- Inventory management including equipment assignment
- Repository of As Built and survey data
- Provide network data to OSS / BSS systems
- Answer service activation / provisioning queries
- Cable fault localisation
- Several Sales, Marketing and Service fulfillment related functions
3.0.0 Selection of GIS Platform & Telecom Application
Technical evaluation of all existing out-of-box packages was done with one week hands-on experience wherein ease of learning and operation, efficiency of CAD functionalities etc. were tested by operators.
Detailed technical discussions involving client functional capabilities, RDBMS, version management of the GIS platform were carried out.
Ease of data conversion, telecom feature modeling and other functions were evaluated. Efforts in customisation, after sales support etc. were also considered.
Detailed analysis of productivity expected work volume, licensing cost was made and optimum solution arrived at.
4.0.0 Data Creation
4.1.1 It was necessary to create the high-resolution data of cities and inter-city roads for typical telecom operations since it is not readily available in the country. This data is categorised into (a) City (b) Survey (c) Roads. Detailed specifications were drawn for each dataset based on the business requirements.
4.1.2 City data was digitised in AutoCAD Map from 1 or 6 meter resolution satellite imagery. The work involved 500,000 man-hours and was outsourced from 8 vendors. Survey data in AutoCAD format was collected by field construction team using over 30 survey contractors. Road data was procured in coverage form. Over 30,000 kM DGPS survey in navigational mode and fixed points was done to geo-reference the entire dataset. Migration of data to GIS platform is done using FME software.
4.1.3 The planning of sequence of activities allowed us to carry out the mammoth task of data creation in parallel with other project activities without affecting the overall project schedule. This strategy also allows us to load large amounts of map and inventory data throughout the lifetime of the telecom operations.
4.1.4 However, this method imposes major constraints on the continuous availability of the multi-versioned GIS database. Although actual system time for data migration is less than a day, all preparatory work and attendant actions result in a down time of up to 4-5 days for uploading such bulk data. We are studying various options to reduce this downtime.