The TeleManagement Forum recently announced its Compliance Certification Program, and announced that Tribold was the first company to have a product certified. The TM Forum says that the program “enables industry suppliers to test and certify their adherence to individual TM Forum frameworks and standards. Through a combination of prescribed self-testing and external verification, compliance is assessed on a graduated scale to show the level of adoption of the elements of each framework. Products which meet the rigorous standards set by the compliance tests are awarded the TM Forum Compliance Mark for each framework they successfully adopt.”
Now I understand why that’s a good thing for the TMF – revenue for the organization, more “oomph” behind their very good work on projects like MTOSI, OSS/J, their NGOSS framework, and the SID, just to name a few. These quasi-standards have been more successful (although not nearly as successful as they should be – but more on that in another BLOG later) than any other set of telecommunications industry-created standards I have seen in my 30 years in the industry. But what, exactly, will the certification mean for the buyers and users of the systems that will be conforming? Ensuring interoperability with other that meet the standard? Certainly not without rigorous testing and integration work - there’s no such thing as blind plug-and-play in interfaces as complex as they are. For the ISVs, another hurdle to get over, and another cost (and become the 21st Century equivalent of Telcordia’s old hated OSMINE program? Hmmm.).
Now I understand why that’s a good thing for the TMF – revenue for the organization, more “oomph” behind their very good work on projects like MTOSI, OSS/J, their NGOSS framework, and the SID, just to name a few. These quasi-standards have been more successful (although not nearly as successful as they should be – but more on that in another BLOG later) than any other set of telecommunications industry-created standards I have seen in my 30 years in the industry. But what, exactly, will the certification mean for the buyers and users of the systems that will be conforming? Ensuring interoperability with other that meet the standard? Certainly not without rigorous testing and integration work - there’s no such thing as blind plug-and-play in interfaces as complex as they are. For the ISVs, another hurdle to get over, and another cost (and become the 21st Century equivalent of Telcordia’s old hated OSMINE program? Hmmm.).
Let’s remember that the most successful standards have been set as de facto standards in the competitive marketplace, and then “standardized” later. And, somehow, the IETF doesn’t have a certification program and seems to be getting along just fine.
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