Call Policy Markup Language (CPML) is an XML-based language to be used in the context of the Extensible Service Policy Architecture (ESP), under development by Digital Telecommunications, Inc. "ESP provides the bridge between the IP-based information community and the SS7-based PSTN, thus opening the PSTN to a wealth of new services driven by IP. Indeed, by combining IP/web-based technology like CPML, LDAP (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol), web search engines, JAVA, CORBA with traditional telecommunications technology such as SS7 and TCAP, one achieves a service network whereby web-based applications and customers can reach the information resource and customers of the PSTN and visa versa. DTI's ESP architecture is set-apart by its reliance upon a combination of search engine technology and new tools (based on XML) for storing knowledge along with data to distribute call policy (applications) to web pages. DTI's ESP architecture is set-apart by its reliance upon a combination of search engine technology and new tools (based on XML) for storing knowledge along with data to distribute call policy (applications) to web pages. It is an open architecture that relies on APIs to communicate with network elements such as switches and an open XML based language (Call Policy Markup Language) for service definition. ESP makes use of search engine technology in a real time mode. To describe this attribute, DTI has coined the term 'Dynamically Searchable Policy.' An ESP based network has the power to quickly locate among a loosely coupled body of data the correct web page for needed service logic and then to interpret that page into switch functions. Central to this ability is Call Policy Markup Language (CPML), which leverages Internet technologies to enable the execution of service logic in an interpretive manner rather than from compiled code."
"CPML stands for Call Policy Markup Language. It is an open language used to simply describe call processing. CPML is an extension of XML (Extensible Markup Language) that is a standards based, meta-language from which other languages are derived. CPML was developed by DTI to migrate the operations of the telecommunications network, including its features, functions, and enhanced services, out of the world of proprietary operating systems, structured databases, and complex programs or APIs. CPML opens the telecommunications network to basic IP tools that brings order to its complexity and empowers carriers, and ultimately customers, to control, customize, and extend the functionality and usefulness of the telecommunications network. Like its cousin HTML, CPML is used to create web pages. However, unlike HTML pages that are used to present visual content, CPML pages are designed to be used by a network switching element to present the appropriate service logic (switch action) for a particular customer, or group of customers."
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[January 28, 2000] "Divide and Conquer -- By Separating Processing From Switching, CPML Protocol Pushes Dual Platform Services." By Paul Korzeniowski. In tele.com Issue 502 (January 24, 2000). "Community Telephone Co. (Evansville, Ind.), a competitive local service provider, thinks differentiated services are the key to its future. The company is rolling out a service that will enable customers to log onto their own Web pages and tell the central office (CO) switch where to route their calls throughout the day. This complex service is being made possible by the company's switch vendor, DTI Networks Inc. (DTI, Boca Raton, Fla.), which has developed a protocol that will ease communications between packet- and circuit-switched networks. The protocol-Call Policy Markup Language (CPML), which DTI hopes to push as a standard-is offered on two products that the company plans to announce by the end of this month. . . The emerging specification augments rather than replaces other initiatives designed to link the circuit and packet worlds, such as IP Device Control (IPDC) and Media Gateway Control Protocol (MGCP). While the others focus on how the physical connections are made between IP and public switched telephone networks (PSTNs), CPML is more concerned with how the applications using these connections exchange data. CPML could be used in place of more generic languages such as C or C++ to build enhanced services applications. Basing its work on XML allowed DTI to provide a high-level, easy-to-use interface to CO switches, which have been closed, proprietary and complex."
[January 27, 2000] "DTI Offers Local Providers Voice and More." By Carol Wilson. In Inter@ctive Week [Online] (January 27, 2000). "A little-known maker of voice switching equipment has developed a new approach to providing enhanced voice features over Internet Protocol networks that could enable competitive carriers to reap voice service revenue more rapidly. DTI Networks today, Jan. 24, is announcing a Web-based environment for developing enhanced voice services that will be far more profitable for local service providers than basic voice. The company also is introducing what it refers to as Call Policy Markup Language, an eXtensible Markup Language (XML)-based approach to setting up, controlling and taking down voice calls. DTI's entry into the market for softswitches -- open server-based systems that support voice switching features -- could have a significant impact. That market has been dominated by big players such as Lucent Technologies and newcomers such as Sonus Networks, said Sanjay Mewada, program manager of telecommunications research and consulting at The Yankee Group. DTI's CSX 2100 voice server and Telecommunications Services Portal, on which the XML-based voice feature creation environment resides, will make designing enhanced voice features as easy as Web page creation."
[July 26, 1999] "DTI Announces Breakthrough Architecture For Voice Service Creation. Web-based Architecture Enables Carriers and Subscribers to Define and Customize Services in Real Time." - "Digital Telecommunications, Inc. (DTI), today announced the Extensible Service Policy (ESP) architecture, which utilizes Web technology to empower telecommunications carriers to deliver, for the first time, innovative real-time and dynamic voice services over current and next-generation networks. The ESP architecture enables carriers to quickly and easily offer new services, such as user-configurable call handling, that break through the boundaries and limitations of the current voice service architecture, while maintaining strict standards for security and privacy. Key to the ESP architecture is the application of Web technology to the tasks of defining, storing and modifying call policy information. Unlike traditional Voice over IP approaches, which focus on IP as a transmission medium, DTI's Voice Under IPTM technology brings both circuit- and packet- switched calls under the control of a powerful IP-based call management system. DTI's Call Policy Mark-up Language (CPML) creates a simplified, XML-based language, common to voice and data networks, so service providers, system integrators and subscribers can create and maintain services with the same ease that people publish and maintain Web pages. . . Through a combination of search engine technology and CPML for storing knowledge along with data to distribute call policy to Web pages, the ESP architecture reduces the time and complexity associated with building voice services. It is also an open architecture, which relies on APIs and standard protocols to communicate with network elements such as switches, and an open XML-based language (CPML) for service definition, enabling other Web-based data to be accessed and utilized. To harness the vast pool of Internet programmers to serve the voice market, DTI will publish style guides for CPML programming, identify and catalog XML resources that are useful in CPML development and offer tools to facilitate the development of CPML pages. These will be available to service providers, end users, systems integrators and developers who wish to build unique service features and offer them for sale. To make CPML features available in today's networks and in networks incorporating equipment of a variety of types, DTI will also provide Telecommunications Services Portal features to exercise voice switches and gateways using standard protocols such as SS7 and MGCP. Equipped with a Service Agent, these products can then interact with the Telecommunications Services Portal to receive feature signaling through their APIs, or through proprietary call control languages the vendors may have adopted." See also the white paper.
[August 24, 1999] "Web Languages Call Out to Closed Telco Switches." By Loring Wirbel. In Electronic Engineering Times [Online] Issue 1075 (August 23, 1999). "Derivatives of the Internet's Extensible Markup Language are taking center stage in the effort to force open the formerly closed world of circuit-based switches in the telephone company central office. The advent of tools that leverage Web scripting languages could presage what hardware designers hope will be the eventual demise of the complex and burdensome Signaling System 7 protocol. A handful of proposals, including the Call Policy Markup Language from telco switch maker Digital Telecommunications Inc. (Boca Raton), take a fresh approach to converged voice-and-data networks that could open a new market avenue for third-party software. They may also challenge the business model by which carriers and OEMs alike develop and deploy voice features on an increasingly Internet Protocol-based network. . . 'We want to make CPML simple enough to enable a third-party independent software market to develop,' Digital Telecommunications CEO Richard Graves said of the Call Policy Markup Language. 'But we expect carrier-developed applications will emerge much faster.' Chuck Harris, vice president of marketing at telco switch startup Tachion Networks Inc. said his company is a fan of CPML but that carriers will want to ensure that software developed by independent startups will not harm network stability. The tricky balance that Digital Telecom must strike is between using CPML to enhance the feature set of its own hardware and advocating its open nature to attract other hardware vendors to open scripting. Given the popularity of HTML and XML, Graves said, it's likely that the industry will favor an XML derivative, and his company is betting that CPML is furthest along in definition."
Extensible Service Policy Architecture: The Real Future of Telephony
[July 23, 1999] "DTI Harnesses XML for Telecom Applications." By Ted Smalley Bowen. In InfoWorld (July 22, 1999). "Digital Telecommunications Inc. (DTI) on Monday will roll out an Extensible Markup Language (XML)-based developer's kit that company officials claim will allow telecommunications companies to easily create and modify voice service applications, rather than having to rely on the relatively rigid and cumbersome programming tools provided by network infrastructure vendors. The software combines Web-based service logic and IP message distribution in such a way that the service logic is independent from the underlying message transmission, hardware, and signaling, according to Richard Graves, co-founder, CEO, and CTO of DTI. DTI's Extensible Service Policy (ESP) architecture is aimed at providers of voice and data services, networks system integrators, and subscribers, allowing them to create and modify services that run over existing the network infrastructure and so-called converged voice and data networks. DTI's ESP architecture employs the company's Call Policy Markup Language (CPML), an XML-based language for voice and data networks, through which developers can create and modify services in a similar fashion to generating Web pages, according to Graves. To foster the adoption of CPML, DTI plans to submit it as a proposed standard to the World Wide Web Consortium and other groups working on network software standards. The ESP Telecommunication Services Portal, comprising Service Agent and Service Portal functions, is now in beta testing and is slated for shipment in the fourth quarter."
Compare: "Call Processing Language (CPL)."
