Process management and control software for distributed telecommunications switching systems

Process management and control software which enables transparent access to processes distributed among processing modules in switching systems is presented. The processes that constitute application software can communicate with processes in other modules without explicitly specifying where those modules are. Transparency is realized by unified interfaces to access processes and by a process control mechanism based on process name propagation. A prototype of the distributed operating system expected to be applied to NTT´s next-generation switching systems is described. This model unifies software for different system configurations and reduces the amount of reprogramming required by software reconfiguration. Some application examples are presented