This section describes the new features and functionality supported in the PowerMedia XMS Release 2.0.
For more information, see the documents listed in the Related Documentation section.
The key new features and functionality include:
The JSR 309 Connector is the Dialogic implementation of the JSR 309 version 1.0 final specification. This connector software runs on a Java EE (J2EE) application server and enables a multimedia application on the application server to control the PowerMedia XMS using an industry recommended Java API for media control.
Voice Extensible Markup Language (VoiceXML or VXML) for PowerMedia XMS is designed for creating audio dialogs that feature synthesized speech, digitized audio, speech recognition, DTMF key input, speech recording, telephony, and mixed initiative conversations. The current release of VXML in PowerMedia XMS does not support video.
Media Resource Control Protocol (MRCP), accessible only through VXML, is used by PowerMedia XMS as an industry standard interface to speech servers that enable Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) and Text-to-Speech (TTS). MRCP provides an easy way to build voice user interfaces, allowing grammar to be built for speech input and providing a way to easily translate text into voice prompts without reading and recording them.
Network Announcement (NETANN) is a protocol specified by RFC 4240 that specifies techniques used to provide basic network media services with SIP, such as announcements, basic conferences, and invoking dialogs using VXML. NETANN can be used to build announcement servers that can be directed to play media files or put callers into a basic conference by adding directives to the SIP URL used to contact PowerMedia XMS.
The RESTful Management API is an alternate way of configuring and performing system management tasks for PowerMedia XMS. The RESTful Management API is a remote API carried over HTTP transport that allows the option to incorporate configuration elements into the application or web interface in a more automated or distributed manner.
The RESTful Media API uses a Representational State Transfer (RESTful) web service. This web service is a software system designed to support call and media control over a network, using the HTTP protocol.
The RESTful Media API consists of a series of requests and responses built around the transfer of representations of "resources". These resources are accessed through Universal Resource Indicators (URIs).
Enhancements to the RESTful Media API include new methods and attributes, such as call actions: send_dtmf, send_info, send_info_ack, transfer, redirect, and hangup.
Operations, Administration, and Maintenance (OA&M) enhancements include new configuration menus, pages, and updates to the following PowerMedia XMS Admin Console functions.
The VXML Interpreter Configuration page accessed from the VXML configuration menu is used to configure general settings for the VXML Interpreter, in addition to the local web server settings.
The Global Configuration, Speech Server 1 Configuration, and Speech Server 2 Configuration pages accessed from the MRCP Client configuration menu are used to configure the MRCP Client and speech server.
The RESTful API Configuration page accessed from the RESTful API configuration menu is used to configure several aspects of the RESTful call control and media API.
The HTTP Client Configuration page accessed from the HTTP Client configuration menu is used to configure cache on the HTTP client.
The Time page accessed from the System configuration menu provides the option to configure and set the NTP Server (Network Time Protocol).
The Upgrade page accessed from the System configuration menu provides the option to upgrade the system by uploading a system upgrade package.
The NFS Mount Points page accessed from the System configuration menu allows Network File System (NFS) version 4 file systems, offered by external servers, to be mounted on PowerMedia XMS. Resources used by PowerMedia XMS, such as media files or VXML scripts, may be kept on an external file server, but may be needed by for handling calls.
The MSML CPA Configuration page accessed from the MSML configuration menu includes support with parameters for call progress analysis (CPA) tone configuration.
PowerMedia XMS includes the following MSML enhancements.
PowerMedia XMS adds support for MSML Domain Name System (DNS) translation for HTTP request.
In the previous release, the MSML Media Server uses only the h_addr value returned from the Linux system call gethostbyname() as the IP address for the HTTP request, and if is not accessible, the MSML operation is terminated.
In this release, this feature extends the MSML Media Server such that upon failure of the initial HTTP request using the first IP address in h_addr_list, an attempt is made for each remaining IP addresses in the array until an entity is successfully reached and processes the HTTP request or the list is exhausted.
PowerMedia XMS adds support for Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) version 1.1 as defined in IETF RFC 2616 when in MSML mode. This feature enables PowerMedia XMS supports for HTTP message exchanges, in connection with processing MSML request, between web servers that are compliant with version 1.1 of the HTTP protocol. PowerMedia XMS now processes MSML media request (i.e. dialogs) that designate a remote location for the target source file to be retrieved for playback or storage when recording using HTTP 1.1 GET and PUT operations respectively.
Note: Some features defined in RFC 2616 may not be fully supported.
PowerMedia XMS adds support for forwarding media server ID to application server (AS). This feature will allow the MSML Media Server to utilize the Location response-header returned from the destination server storing the file in conjunction with a record operation. The Location value will be copied from the HTTP PUT response (201 Created) and returned to the application in a final response message (INFO).
PowerMedia XMS adds support for MSML <record> element append attribute. The append attribute is a boolean and when set to "true" will append a recording operation to an existing file in cases where the destination file already exists. The default value is "false" and is only applicable for locally stored files. The attribute is ignored if the scheme is HTTP.
PowerMedia XMS adds support for video text and image overlay on MSML conferencing. These new capabilities include support for both static and scrolling text and image overlays.
PowerMedia XMS introduces virtualization support for two commercially available hypervisors, KVM and VMware. Host platforms running VMware ESXi 5.x or KVM with RHEL 6.2/CentOS 6.2 are required for best performance. For KVM, it is required that guest install runs RHEL 6.2/CentOS 6.2/Oracle 6.2 or higher.
Virtualization systems chosen for PowerMedia XMS should be configured for enterprise or private virtual environments that permit customization of virtual machine (VM) settings and hypervisor performance tuning. Virtual environments running PowerMedia XMS must also restrict the number of VMs hosted on a single platform to facilitate the real-time low-latency scheduling demands required for high quality media processing. Density capacity in virtual environments may vary and are generally a factor of the host platform capacity and the number of VMs running PowerMedia XMS. In general, the aggregate density of all VMs running PowerMedia XMS will be less than the bare metal capacity of the platform. Testing has shown hypervisor overhead to reduce density by 15-20 percent. Additionally, running more VMs require extra overhead for hypervisor scheduling of resources between real-time systems.
The following documents provide tips and best known methods for optimal performance tuning, and are recommended guides when configuring virtual environments running PowerMedia XMS:
KVM documentation:
Note: For KVM, the OS type and Version setting is essential when creating the VM (see Section 6.3 "Creating guests with virt-manager" for more information). This setting triggers the correct setting for several other parameters.
VMware documentation:
http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/techpaper/VMW-Tuning-Latency-Sensitive-Workloads.pdf
http://www.vmware.com/pdf/Perf_Best_Practices_vSphere5.0.pdf
PowerMedia XMS adds support for Oracle Enterprise Linux 6.2 64-bit with Unbreakable Linux Kernel (UEK).