Diameter: New Generation AAA Protocol Design, Pr actice, and Applications

This book is for everyone who wants to understand Diameter and its applications. Today's system architects and designers have to understand a range of technologies to solve specific use cases and the challenge for these readers is to understand the wider picture in order that they can fit the different protocols together. The authors begin by describing the foundation of Diameter in a step-by-step fashion, from a simple two party exchange to a multi-party exchange involving complex routing.It features an important chapter on Diameter Applications, focusing on existing implementations and the work of 3GPP; at least 32 applications have been defined and/or used in 3GPP networks. This area is also key due to the size of 3GPP networks, the heavy interoperability process performed by vendors and operators, and feedback form operational fields. The result is a unique, coherent, and comprehensive appraisal of a newly-evolving technology, written by authors at the forefront of its development. The book assumes a basic familiarity with how TCP/IP protocols work and, for the freeDiameter section, a basic understanding of UNIX is required.Throughout the book the authors provide examples using freeDiameter, an open source implementation of Diameter. FreeDiameter can be downloaded and various tutorials, slides and examples can be found on the accompanying website. Contents include chapters on: What is AAA? / What is Diameter? / freeDiameter / Fundamental Diameter Concepts and Building Blocks / Communication between neighboring Peers / Diameter Security / End-to-End Communication / Applications / Accounting / Diameter Credit Control Application / Interworking RADIUS and Diameter / Guidelines for Extending Diameter