Trunking alarm aggregation method and apparatus

摘要

In a telephony voice network having at least two connectable endpoint nodes with a trunk therebetween and a trunking alarm associated with each endpoint node, an alarm aggregation method is proposed. The method involves first detecting a trunking alarm associated with one of the endpoint nodes and second detecting a second trunking alarm associated with another of the endpoint nodes. The method aggregates the results of the first and second detecting to assist in determining a condition of the trunk between the two endpoint nodes. Such an out-of-service condition of the trunk may be signaled onto an outgoing T1/E1 connection coupled with the affected trunk. Preferably, plural connectable endpoint node pairs define plural ones of such trunks therebetween with each of the plural trunks having a trunking alarm associated with each endpoint node pair. In such a case, the first and second detecting and the first aggregating are performed for each of the plural trunks, and the method further involves second aggregating the plural results of the plural instances of the first aggregating. Invented alarm aggregation and conditioning apparatus preferably includes a trunk group including plural dedicated endpoint node pair connections, each endpoint node pair connection including a bi-directional alarm signaling mechanism, with the trunk group generating one or more alarms from each alarm signaling mechanism. The apparatus further includes an alarm aggregation mechanism coupled with the trunk group for aggregating one or more alarms generated by the trunk group into a trunk group alarm representing the condition of the trunk group.