Method And Apparatus For Facilitating Communications With A Managed Client Device
A method and apparatus for facilitating communications between a managing server and a client device. The managing server may be an ACS operable to configure a CPE to received connection request from an external server, which thereby brokers initiation of a communication session between the CPE and the ACS. The external server also preferably determines what type of connection request to use and provides configuration parameters to the ACS.
1 . A method for facilitating communication between a managing server and a managed client device, comprising:
receiving at an external server a notification from an ACS (auto configuration server) comprising the ID (identification) of a managed client device; and
determining at least one type of connection request message for sending a connection request to the client device.
2 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising sending the determined type of connection request to the client device.
3 . The method of claim 2 , further comprising sending a response to the ACS indicating that the connection request has been sent.
4 . The method of claim 2 , further comprising sending a response to the ACS indicating that the attempted connection request has failed.
5 . The method of claim 1 , wherein determining at least one type of connection request comprises referring to a device database associated with the external server.
6 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the notification from the ACS comprises data model parameters associated with the client device.
7 . The method of claim 6 , further comprising determining by the external server configuration parameters for configuring the client device.
8 . The method of claim 7 , further comprising sending the configuration parameters to the ACS.
9 . The method of claim 8 , further comprising configuring the client device during a communication session between the ACS and the client device.
10 . The method of claim 6 , further comprising determining by the ACS that the client device connection request parameters are not configured prior to sending the notification to the external server from the ACS.
11 . An external server for facilitating communications between a managing server and a managed client device, comprising:
a processor;
a memory device in communication with the processor; and
a connection request type selection module for selecting a connection request type for associating with a client device.
12 . The external server of claim 11 , further comprising an ACS (auto configuration server) configuration module for provisioning an ACS with parameters associated with a selected connection request type.
13 . The external server of claim 11 , further comprising a CPE (customer premises device) type database on the memory device for storing available types of connection requests.
14 . The external server of claim 11 further comprising a CPE parameters database for storing the parameters associated with an available connection request type.
15 . The external server of claim 11 further comprising program instructions stored on the memory device that when executed send a connection request to the client device.
16 . An ACS for facilitating communications between a managing server and a managed client device, comprising:
a processor;
a memory device in communication with the processor embodying program instructions that when executed cause the ACS to send a message to an external server requesting that the external server broker initiating a communication session between the ACS and a client device identified in the message.
17 . The ACS of claim 16 , wherein the program instructions further cause the ACS to send a message to an external server to request configuration parameters for configuring the client device to respond to a connection request from the external server.
18 . The ACS of claim 16 , further comprising a CPE configuration module for configuring a client device with parameters received from the external server and associated with the client device.