4, where the CDR creation
is a stand-alone function distributed throughout the network.
This allows operators to scale the production of CDRs according to actual volume,
and it presents a more efficient method for the management of charging records.
Today??™s model relies on all CDR generation to be resident within each switching element.
Should the switching elements become congested, the production of CDRs is
secondary to completing a call.
Figure 7.4 Implementation of CDF and CGF
CDF/
CGF
CDF/
CGF
CDF/
CGF
CDF
CDF
CDF
CDF
CGF
CGF
Billing
domain
NE
NE
NE
NE
NE
NE
NE
NE
1
2
3
4
Online and Offline Charging in the IMS 171
Forwarding the charging event data with DIAMETER to the CGF allows operators
more control over their billing data and provides new auditing points that can be
monitored for billing verification and auditing. This is explained in more detail toward
the end of this chapter.
Option 1 in the figure illustrates the model that exists today, where CDR generation
is integrated within the network element itself. This presents a number of issues that
we know of today, congestion being one of those problems. When adding other functions
in addition to billing (such as various OSS/BSS functions), the use of probes is required
to collect the CDRs from the interface to the billing domain. This has already proven
extremely expensive in today??™s legacy networks.
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