1.

Network planning and design is an iterative process, encompassing topological design, network-synthesis, and network-realization, and is aimed at ensuring that a new network or service meets the needs of the subscriber and operator. The process can be tailored according to each new network or service This is an extremely important process which must be performed before the establishment of a new telecommunications network or service. The network planning process begins with the acquisition of external information. This includes:

forecasts of how the new network/service will operate; the economic information concerning costs factors, revenue and ROI The technical details of the networks capabilities.

<ANSWER TO Q1 IN IMPORTANT QUESTIONS> Capacity Planning In information technology, capacity planning is the science and art of estimating the space, hardware, software and connection infrastructure resources that will be needed over some future period of time. A typical capacity concern of many enterprises is whether resources will be in place to handle an increasing number of requests as the number of users or interactions increase. The aim of the capacity planner is to plan so well that new capacity is added just in time to meet the anticipated need but not so early that resources go unused for a long period. The successful capacity planner is one that makes the trade-offs between the present and the future that overall prove to be the most cost-efficient. The capacity planner, using business plans and forecasts, tries to imagine what the future needs will be. Analytical modeling tools can help the planner get answers to "What if" scenarios so that a range of possibilities can be explored. The capacity planner is especially receptive to products that are seen to be scalable and also stable and predictable in terms of support and upgrades over the life of the product. As new technologies emerge and business strategies and forecasts change, capacity planners must revisit their plans. Three Steps for Capacity Planning
1. Determine Service Level Requirements The first step in the capacity planning process is to categorize the work done by systems and to quantify users expectations for how that work gets done. 2. Analyze Current Capacity Next, the current capacity of the system must be analyzed to determine how it is meeting the needs of the users. 3. Planning for the future Finally, using forecasts of future business activity, future system requirements are determined. Implementing the required changes in system configuration will ensure that sufficient capacity will be available to maintain service levels, even as circumstances

change in the future.

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2. Creating a Profit-Driven Network

Today's network operators need to focus on real profit targets based on realistic revenue opportunities and sound cost management. However, a network operator in a dynamic market-place, has difficulty in defining the metrics by which the network is measured and then identifying the sources of revenue within the network and the areas where money is being unwisely spent. The desire to maximise the revenue potential of the network while minimising expenditure leads to conflicts and compromises particularly with respect to expansion or upgrade plans for the network. In order to maintain the correct balance between these conflicting requirements and to create and maintain a profit-driven network an operator must ensure that the four main points below are achieved.

Minimise operational, systems and support expenditure: o align goals and objectives across teams; o provide a common information platform; o ensure all processes are co-ordinated and streamlined and have the appropriate support systems. Maximise network revenue potential: o understand the network topology; o track component inventory and location; o understand the connectivity relationships of network elements; o define and frequently monitor network utilisation; o optimise network element usage based on customer traffic demands. Minimise network operational and capital expenditure: o calculate where and when new equipment will be necessary; o optimise the architecture and network design to provide services to the largest number of customers at minimum cost; o understand the advantages/disadvantages of new network architectures and methodologies. Grow revenue from new services: o optimise network architectures to minimise delay and maximise reliability; o pursue new technologies that enable new and improved services.

Minimise Operational, Systems and Support Expenditure

Large networks generally need large, well co-ordinated teams in order to monitor and manipulate all the various and interrelated aspects of the network. It is sometimes too

easy to lose track of developments, overlook important information or have multiple teams duplicating work effort. Utilisator can be used as a common software application that can keep teams informed of network status thus allowing them to remain focused on their individual objectives. For example, a network may be supported by an array of teams such as sales and marketing, operations, low-level design and high-level strategic planning. Utilisator can be used as the common application that interconnects these teams together by incorporating it into the processes that these teams use to interact with each other. In such an environment Utilisator helps to minimise operational, systems and support expenditure.

Maximise Network Revenue Potential

In order to maximise the revenue potential of a network it is necessary to be able to monitor and track capacity take-up regularly and accurately. This will ensure that the network always has enough resources to support new traffic demands and will highlight any re-engineering that the network may require. To successfully achieve this, Utilisator accurately models the current network capacity fill and can output network statistics in an intuitive and user-friendly environment.

Minimise Network Operational and Capital Expenditure

In order for an operator to minimise its network's operational and capital expenditure it must minimise its field engineer base and ensure that the slimmest network design, using the most appropriate technology, is deployed in the most appropriate places. This is an extremely complex problem that has many subtle interactions and co-dependencies. If these issues could be understood and incorporated into a planning tool, it could greatly de-mystify the planning process, increase confidence in the network designs produced, and allow the work to be carried out by less specialised individuals. In order for BT to get the most out of such a planning tool, it was very important that it should accurately reflect and model its network; it has to do more than just act as an inventory system:

it has to understand the physical layout of individual NEs as well as their respective functionality; it has to understand the network architecture and technology in which the NEs are operating; it has to know how customer traffic would route across the network; it must be able to understand the impact of new or forecast traffic on network design, interaction and efficiency.

<ANSWER TO Q2 IN IMP QUESTIONS> a) Short-Term Planning

For short-term forecasting the following process is adopted. Within a few minutes a good representation of the capacity constraints and abilities can be ascertained:

download live network data from NMS; add additional in progress/short-term equipment build if desired this could be any new hardware additions that will be installed in the network during the length of the forecast routing period; route customer circuits in order-book/short-term forecasts this can be achieved in two ways: o the first facility is designed to quickly route a handful of circuits only, with the user identifying the end-points of a forecasted circuit and the tool selecting the best route between them (this route can be overridden manually by the user if desired); o if there are a large number of circuits forecast, the user can use the second option which is to create a traffic matrix (in a simple text file) specifying various circuit details that can be routed in bulk across the network; highlight any additional card build to satisfy short-term forecast, as in many cases the forecast traffic would exceed the capabilities of the current network, hence necessitating new network build Utilisator can be instructed to either add the new equipment required to support the demand or simply note that a particular demand cannot be routed.

At the end of this process, the planning team is able to decide on the most cost-efficient network build programme based on its experience of forecast demands and from priorities and objectives. It will be able to report to the investment/financial departments either the cost associated with meeting expected demands or the potential revenue lost should such investment not be forthcoming.

b) Medium-Term Planning
Short-term planning addresses the immediate and pressing customer orders and highlights areas where new cards would be required in existing network elements. For medium-term planning, the same initial process is followed, but the focus centres on whether there is cause to build new equipment capabilities at sites (for example new ADMs or interconnection points) as such activity takes longer to plan and deploy. The process for medium-term planning is as follows:

route mid-term forecasts/multiple traffic distributions; automatically add additional build to meet requirements, e.g. tributary cards; at major build points, interrupt routing process to add appropriate network infrastructure (e.g. ADMs and ring interconnections);

save various strategies as separate network models this is so that different scenarios can be examined at a later date to determine the best manner to service the expected medium-term demands.

At this stage the planning team should be able to identify where and when the existing network infrastructure could be nearing exhaustion. Network build programmes could then be initiated.

c) Long-Term Planning
Long-term planning involves taking both known and potential traffic forecasts and combining them with longer-term trends and internal strategies to indicate how the overall network could develop, expand and evolve over a period of 9-12 months. Such planning is important as significant network build, such as fibre deployments (link augmentations) or the installing of new sites, can take many months to realise. The process for long-term planning, again, follows similar steps as previously:

at major build points, interrupt routing process to add appropriate network infrastructure, e.g. new rings, stacked rings, spurs, meshes; simulate new products on manufacturer's road map to assess impact on network: o replacing current equipment; o redesigning current network; o enhanced stack design based on actual traffic analysis and/or improved equipment functionality; o Network expansion.

The long-term plans would feed into network strategy teams in order to provide a coherent deployment plan and to facilitate appropriate business case approval. -x-x-x- Answer ends here x-x-x<ANSWER TO Q3 & Q4 IN IMP QUESTIONS> Q. What is ROI (Return on Investment)? For a given use of money invested in an enterprise, the ROI (return on investment) is how much profit or cost saving is realized. An ROI calculation is sometimes used along with other approaches to develop a business case for a given proposal. The overall ROI for an enterprise is sometimes used as a way to grade how well a company is managed. Sources of revenue to deliver ROI Subscriber revenue

Voice & Data revenue directly from subscribers Data bits (charges to user based on bits of downloads)

Services (charges to user for data services SMS, remote data storage/sync/backup, etc) Apps purchases (charges to user for mobile app purchases) Products purchases (charges to user for product purchases, such as ring tones, songs, etc.) Non-subscriber revenue

Revenue share for third party services Revenue share from mobile apps purchases Revenue share from product purchases Revenue from advertising to subscribers by third parties -x-x-x- Answer ends here x-x-xDesign Methodology A bottom-up approach is the piecing together of systems to give rise to grander systems, thus making the original systems sub-systems of the emergent system. A top-down approach (is also known as step-wise design) is essentially the breaking down of a system to gain insight into its compositional sub-systems.

3. Network Model The essential inputs to the design process are: customer traffic requirements; sites for nodes; equipment (link and node) costs; available duct network; Reliability requirements. Design Types Mesh Network. Shared restoration mesh networks minimise the link cost by achieving direct routings for working paths and the highest possible degree of sharing for protection paths. This effect is most significant when links are long (because the savings are proportionately greater), and when the connectivity of the network nodes is high (because a greater degree of sharing of restoration capacity is possible). The traffic pattern is particularly important for ring networks where it is advantageous to be able to fill rings evenly

Rings Network Rings are the most common architecture found in metropolitan areas and span a large distances. The fiber ring might contain as few as four wavelength channels, and typically fewer nodes than channels. Bit rate is in the range of 622 Mbps to 10 Gbps per channel. Ring configurations can be deployed with one or more DWDM systems, supporting any-to-any traffic, or they can have a hub station and one or more OADM nodes, or satellites

Design Review of network design model Design review is a tool that can be used to help companies improve the quality of the services, reduce the time to market for a service and reduce the development and scrap/rework costs of the project. It is a general activity that can be applied readily to any industry, and can be used to improve the quality of services as well as products. <ANSWER TO Q5 IN IMP QUESTIONS> Quality of Service Quality of Service (QoS) is the collective measure of the level of service to a subscriber Quality of service is the ability to provide different priority to different applications, users, or data flows, or to guarantee a certain level of performance to a data flow. For example, a required bit rate, delay, jitter, packet dropping probability and/or bit error rate may be guaranteed. Quality of service guarantees are important if the network capacity is insufficient, especially for real-time streaming multimedia applications such as voice over IP, online games and IP-TV, since these often require fixed bit rate and are delay sensitive, and in networks where the capacity is a limited resource, for example in cellular data communication. A network or protocol that supports QoS may agree on a traffic contract with the application software and reserve capacity in the network nodes. A best-effort network or service does not support quality of service. Performance criteria for QoS Latency/Packet delay (or delay in general) It might take a long time for each packet to reach its destination, because it gets held up in long queues, or takes a less direct route to avoid congestion. This is different from

throughput, as the delay can build up over time, even if the throughput is almost normal. In some cases, excessive latency can render an application such as VoIP or online gaming unusable. Jitter (delay variations) Packets from the source will reach the destination with different delays. A packet's delay varies with its position in the queues of the routers along the path between source and destination and this position can vary unpredictably. This variation in delay is known as jitter and can seriously affect the quality of streaming audio and/or video. Packet loss The routers might fail to deliver (drop) some packets if their data is corrupted or they arrive when their buffers are already full. The receiving application may ask for this information to be retransmitted, possibly causing severe delays in the overall transmission. Bandwidth or throughput Due to varying load from other users sharing the same network resources, the bit-rate (the maximum throughput) that can be provided to a certain data stream may be too low for realtime multimedia services if all data streams get the same scheduling priority. Errors or bit error rate Sometimes packets are corrupted due to bit errors caused by noise and interference, especially in wireless communications and long copper wires. The receiver has to detect this and, just as if the packet was dropped, may ask for this information to be retransmitted -x-x-x- Answer ends here x-x-x<ANSWER TO Q6 IN IMP QUESTIONS> Documenting Your Network Design In engineering, technical documentation refers to any type of documentation that describes handling, functionality and architecture of a technical product or a product under development or use. Technical documentation aims at providing enough information for a user to understand inner and outer dependencies of the product at hand. Contents of a Network Design Document Executive summary Project goal Project scope Design requirements Current state of the network New logical and physical design Results of network design testing

 AND

Implementation plan Project budget Detailed topology maps Device configurations Addressing and naming details Network design testing results Contact information Pricing and payment options More information about the company that is presenting the design Annual reports, product catalogs, press releases Legal contractual terms and conditions -x-x-x- Answer ends here x-x-x<ANSWER TO Q7 & Q8 IN IMP QUESTIONS>

Planning and Design of GSM/CDMA Networks A good geographical coverage is the basis for providing network services. Careful network planning is thus a primary aspect of implementing GSM/CDMA networks Network planning is an ongoing process requiring inputs from lot competence areas, such as transmission, access systems, data communications, mobile switching, intelligent network, site acquisition, etc.

GSM network architecture elements Mobile station (MS) Base-station subsystem (BSS) Network and Switching Subsystem (NSS) Operation and Support Subsystem (OSS)

Radio Frequency Spectrum Planning (For Q7) The general process for RF Spectrum assignment follows the steps listed below. 1. Preparation of an ordered list of stations to be assigned; 2. Assign first frequency to first station using database lookup and analytical techniques to resolve interference problems; 3. Select next station to be assigned using selection procedures. These include assignment grids, sub-allocation plans etc.; 4. Apply frequency-selection method including database look up ; 5. Repeat until all frequencies are assigned. Site Engineering Collecting information regarding rules and regulations

Key information concerning , demography, income level, penetration forecast, geographical extension forecast, services to be supported, market segmentation, etc Availability of leased lines, microwave freq availability, required connections with other systems, etc Numbering, addressing and routing principles. Topographical maps. In urban areas cells are usually smaller than in the countryside. The maximum theoretical distance from a BTS to the edge of the cell is 35 KM.

Cellular transmission network planning Cellular transmission network refers to the usage of microwave links in the GSM network, for instance between the BTS and the BSC. Usually the main alternative is to use leased lines i.e. to utilize the already existing fixed infrastructure. A network layout diagram and a management network diagram must be drawn to identify how the network is to be implemented A cell is the basic construction block of a GSM network. One cell is the geographical area covered by one BTS Erlangs is the measuring unit of network traffic. One Erlang equals the continuous use of a mobile device for one hour.

Formula Erlangs =

(Calls per hour) * (avg. Conv. Time) 3600 Seconds

Congestion Handling The more traffic on available resources, the more chance that there will be congestion. Network planners should carefully analyze the traffic volume on the installed traffic channel capacity

QoS Quality of service experienced by the subscribers has to be high. Therefore it is important to reduce the number of dropped calls and the degree of interference in the air interference-in a cost efficient way.

Network Optimization The increase in the number of subscriber requires network expansion at the right times and places.

Therefore excess network capacity should be avoided At the same time it is necessary to offer sufficient grade of service to the subscribers Present and future demand for basic and supplementary services must be satisfied. Hence the network should be large enough (sufficient coverage and quality) and small enough (cost efficient) at the same time -x-x-x- Answer ends here x-x-x-

Planning and Design of Optical Fiber Based SDH / DWDM Networks <ANSWER TO Q9 IN IMP QUESTIONS> Types of Optical Fiber 1. Single mode fiber 1. Multimode fiber a) Step index fibers b) Graded index fibers Single-mode Fiber Advantages: Minimum dispersion: all rays take same path, same time to travel down the cable. A pulse can be reproduced at the receiver very accurately. Less attenuation, can run over longer distance without repeaters. Larger bandwidth and higher information rate Disadvantages: Difficult to couple light in and out of the tiny core Highly directive light source (laser) is required. Interfacing modules are more expensive Multi Mode Multimode step-index Fibers: inexpensive; easy to couple light into Fiber result in higher signal distortion; lower TX rate Multimode graded-index Fiber: intermediate between the other two types of Fibers -x-x-x- Answer ends here x-x-xWDM Basics WDM Wavelength Division Multiplexing.

The ability to use different wavelengths in a single fiber, to split and to combine them. Multiplexing multiple wavelengths over a single fiber Two Major Types CWDM Coarse Wave Length Division Multiplexing Channel Spacing 20 nanometers DWDM Dense Wave Length Division Multiplexing Channel Spacing 8 nanometers

<ANSWER TO Q10 IN IMP QUESTIONS> Business Benefits of DWDM Extends life of existing fiber runs Service providers can lease wavelengths Standard Transaction Language 1 [ TL-1] Interfaces for network management Multiple protocols or formats possible on each wavelength

Components Used in DWDM 1. Optical Add/drop Multiplexer Optical Mux/Demuxes are passive and reciprocal (bi-directional) devices also called filters It can be made with the help of Prism Optical gratings Integrated optical circuits Multiplexing & de-multiplexing the optical signal in DWDM systems Equalize gain and filtering noise in amplifiers 2. Optical Cross Connect(OCX) An optical cross connect is an element used for making interconnection between different channels either temporarily or permanently It contains a Space-Switch which allows any wavelength on any input fiber to be routed to any wavelength on any output fiber, given that wavelength is free to be used It contains mux/demux and/or switching arrangement -x-x-x- Answer ends here x-x-x

<ANSWER TO Q11 IN IMP QUESTIONS> SDH Rates STM Level STM-1 STM-4 STM-16 STM-64 SDH Network Topologies Point-to-Point Network Line Rate (Mbps) 155.52 622.08 2488.32/2.5 Gbps 9953.28/10 Gbps

Linear ADM Network

Ring Network

-x-x-x- Answer ends here x-x-x<ANSWER TO Q12 IN IMP QUESTIONS> Protection Switch Architecture 1) Path protection switch (PPS) / Line protection switch (LPS) Path protection is providing protection to a particular tributary (Eg. E1, 8mb, STM1 etc) while line protection is protecting the particular Lambda(single wavelength). 2) 1+1 protection switch /

1:1 Protection Switch

1:N (1:1) protection switch

3) Stand-by Line Access (SLA)

4) Unidirectional switch / Bidirectional switch 5) Unidirectional ring / Bidirectional ring 6) Revertive switch / Non-revertive switch

8) Manual switch operation This switch is operated manually -x-x-x- Answer ends here x-x-x-