Blending telephony and IPTV: Building the TV-link service package using the Alcatel-Lucent Service BrokerTM

This paper discusses the design and implementation of blended services-composite services whose base component services interact within a common control structure. The paper focuses on blended services that combine aspects of Internet Protocol television (IPTV) and IP Multimedia Subsystem-(IMS)-based telephony services and, in particular, focuses on a service that blends TV viewing and telephone call-handling functions. If a subscriber to this service receives a telephone call while watching TV, the caller ID is displayed on the subscriber's TV screen and the subscriber can signal call control instructions using the set-top box remote control. In this service blend, functions from each base service are coordinated with actions in the other The mechanism allowing this service is an information channel that allows status and control information to move between the subscriber's set-top box and the IMS system. The services described in this paper are built upon a software foundation called the Alcatel-Lucent Service Broker (TM) platform, a platform that has unique capabilities to support such an information channel and to serve as the gateway between IMS and digital TV This foundation offers service developers a set of important functions for the creation of blended services. Specifically, the Alcatel-Lucent Service Broker offers a means of controlling the invocation of base services, a means of communicating through different protocols, and support for large-scale deployment and for service customization. (c) 2007 Alcatel-Lucent.