Design of a message interworking function for converged IP messaging in Next Generation Networks

The Internet and the Internet protocol (IP) have influenced the way of communication in the contemporary society. At the same time, the fixed-mobile convergence leads to next generation networks (NGNs) where messaging is looked upon as one of the killer services. Unfortunately, most of the messaging systems are not interoperable and operate in isolation, so users might typically not be able to communicate among different systems. In this paper, we present the architecture of a NGN-based converged messaging enabler to allow transparent and seamless interworking between legacy messaging services as short messaging service (SMS), multimedia messaging service (MMS) and IP-based messaging as XMPP (extensible messaging and presence protocol) and E-Mail. The system provides a generic approach of message interworking that allows easy and straightforward integration of heterogeneous messaging services. A prototype is developed to demonstrate a complex scenario including messaging convergence and the interaction with other telecommunications enablers. We also anticipate the feasibility of the implementation to support multi-media communication.