INSIGNIA: a pan European trial for the intelligent broadband network architecture

This article summarizes the work carried out within the ACTS project INSIGNIA, which is targeted at the provision of interactive multimedia services through IN and B-ISDN integration. The basic concepts regarding the integrated approach are discussed with emphasis on the functional architecture. This discussion is followed by a presentation of IN multimedia services which were created based on these principles. An overview of the real-life trials which were conducted on a pan-European basis in order to evaluate the INSIGNIA services is also given. The results of this evaluation are examined from a variety of viewpoints, including functional architecture, user and network equipment, service logic programs and applications, as well as user acceptance and network performance.