INTRODUCTION
OAI Operations and Maintenance (OAM) project group aims to ease the orchestration, monitoring, and maintenance of OAI RAN and Core Network Functions.
WHAT OAM PROVIDES?
This group is responsible for implementing and maintaining different management interfaces proposed by O-RAN Alliance: O1, E2, and Open Fronthaul Interface (M-Plane), and the 3GPP SA5 working group YANG models for the core network.
THE GROUP OFFERS
– FlexRIC an O-RAN standard compliant RAN Intelligent Controller (RIC) and SDK to develop xApps.
– E2 interface to connect any O-RAN standard compliant RIC
– ETSI Multi-access Edge Computing Platform (MEP) and Radio Network Information Service (RNIS) to expose radio statistics to the applications hosted at the edge.
FlexRIC
What is FlexRIC?
FlexRIC is short for “Flexible RAN Intelligent Controller”. It is an O-RAN compliant E2 Agent and near-RT RIC that provides a xApp SDK framework.
Why FlexRIC?
FlexRIC is a highly adaptable and efficient solution designed for various use cases, particularly those requiring low latency or limited resources. It adheres to the zero-overhead principle, ensuring ultra-lean performance. The utilization of both static and dynamic polymorphism enables its flexibility and compatibility with emerging applications.
In terms of architecture, FlexRIC follows a RAT-agnostic and vendor-neutral approach, exemplified by its integration with OAI. To ensure robustness and reliability, FlexRIC undergoes extensive testing with code coverage, profilers, TSan, and Asan. Deploying FlexRIC is straightforward and hassle-free, thanks to its easily deployable nature. Furthermore, its design promotes low coupling, allowing for effortless decomposition, such as with E42. FlexRIC comes equipped with a built-in Service Model (SM) for monitoring and slicing, offering a customizable solution that caters to the diverse needs of 5G use cases. The Application Protocol (AP) and SM are encoding and decoding agnostic, enabling seamless integration with various protocols. Additionally, FlexRIC supports the creation of custom SMs, providing the flexibility to address specific use cases that may not be standardized.
Finally, FlexRIC plays a pivotal role in enhancing the quality and range of Machine Learning algorithms deployed in 5G networks. Its capability to validate these algorithms in real 5G deployments is exemplified by its successful integration with the OpenAirInterface 5G stack.
How does FlexRIC compare with the O-RAN Alliance’s near-RT RIC? The RT controller component of the FlexRIC software suite contains similar functionality with similar overall aims as the O-RAN Alliance’s near-RT RIC. However, it is smaller, compact, handy, easy to deploy, and well-suited to experimentation. We emphasize, as we show in the demo, the O-RAN near-RT RIC.
As a part of this demo, we showcase the following FlexRIC capabilities:
– Integration with OAI’s 5G cellular radio stack
– FlexRIC E2-agent compatibility with the O-RAN RIC
– Monitoring capabilities through “à la carte” designed SMs
– Control capabilities through xApps that perform slicing control at an NSA 5G network
Xapp SDK
xApp is a versatile application specifically developed for the Near-RT RIC platform. It is comprised of one or multiple microservices that are configured to consume and provide specific data upon on-boarding. Notably, xApp is not tied to the Near-RT RIC and can be supplied by any third-party entity. Furthermore, the E42 facilitates a direct connection between the xApp and the RAN, enabling seamless collaboration between the two.
MEP
Multi-access Edge Computing platforms (MEP) are a part of the ETSI MEC architecture. Our implementation of the MEC platform allows different MEC applications to discover MEP-hosted services and register their own service which can be discovered by other MEC applications.
OAI-MEP follows ETSI GS MEC 003 V3.1.1. MEC applications communicate with MEP via mp1 interface and applications hosted at MEP communicate with Radio Access Network (RAN) and Core Network (CN) components via mp2 interface. MEC Radio Network Information Service (RNIS) is based on ETSI GS MEC 012. It collects radio network information via mp2 interface and exposes to interested applications via mp1.This blueprint showcases the abilities of OAI-MEP and OAI-RNIS in ETSI MEC Framework.
OAM ROADMAP – March 2024
The following chart gives the roadmap of future implementations over a period of three to four quarters. As we make progress over the coming quarters, we shall regularly keep updating the chart here to reflect the new milestones covering a similar period.
SPONSORING THE OAI DEVELOPMENT PROJECT
The OSA has launched a supplemental sponsorship vehicle called the OAI DEVELOPMENT PROJECT through which OSA’s partners are invited to donate financial resources to OAI feature developments.
The further funding thus obtained is allocated to the purpose of accelerating the delivery of a feature-rich and stable codebase.
For more details on the working of the OAI DEVELOPMENT PROJECT and sponsorship categories, please download the Charter
For further inquiries, please write to: contact@openairinterface.org