Trends in the automation of service provisioning

The elements of automated provisioning are identified as: computerized operations systems; real-time interfaces among systems; consistency among various databases; remotely controllable network elements; and maximum availability of in-place connections. The past, present, and future of the provisioning process are described. The main thrusts of increasing automation and expanding it to a wider scope of services include streamlined interfaces to the customer, capitalizing on network advances, and an integrated flow-through architecture. A key feature of the architecture is the controller function, which directs the automatic processing of a customer's service request.< >