Service Flow
Minimizing customer intervention and truck roll is very important for WiMAX deployments. The Provisioned Service Flow Table, Service Class Table, and Classifier Rule Table are configured to support self-installation and auto-configuration. When customers subscribe to the service, they tell the service provider the service flow information including the number of UL/DL connections with the data rates and QoS parameters, along with the types of applications (for example, Internet, voice, or video) the customer intends to run. The service provider preprovisions the services by entering the service flow information into the service flow database. When the SS enters the BS by completing the network entry and authentication procedure, the BS downloads the service flow information from the service flow database. Figure 1 provides an example of how the service flow information is populated. It indicate that two SSs, identified by MAC address 0x123ab54 and 0x45fead1, have been preprovisioned. Each SS has two service flows, identified by sfIndex, with the associated QoS parameters that are identified by qosIndex 1 and 2, respectively. qosIndex points to a QoS entry in the wmanIfBsServiceClassTable that contains three levels of QoS: Gold, Silver, and Bronze. sfIndex points to the entry in the wmanBsClassifierRuleTable and indicates which rules shall be used to classify packets on the given service flow.
When the SS with MAC address 0x123ab54 registers into the BS, the BS creates an entry in the wmanIfBaseRegisteredTable. Based on the MAC address, the BS will be able to find the service flow information that has been preprovisioned. The BS will use a dynamic service activate (DSA) message to create service flows for sfIndex 100001 and 100002, with the preprovisioned service flow information. This can be seen in Figure 1. It creates two entries in wmanIfCmnCpsServiceFlowTable. The service flows will then be available for the customer to send data traffic
