Patent ID: 7103037

Claim:
A method for managing the state maintenance and traffic maintenance between Signaling Gateway Processes (SGPs) and Application Server Processes (ASPs) when a Switched Circuit Network (SCN) signaling is transported over Data Networks between at least one of said SGPs and at least one of said ASPs, said method comprising the steps of: establishing transport connections in the Data Network using a Transport Protocol between SGPs and ASPs; allocating specific User Adaptations (UAs) layers in said SGPs and ASPs for adapting the SCN signaling to be transported; exchanging messages between the UA layers of connected SGPs and ASPs, wherein one Signaling Gateway node (SG) is comprised of the group of SGPs that perform signaling conversion functions for a given set of SCN destinations; assigning and storing data in the ASPs regarding the configurations of at least one of the SGPs and the SGs; sending messages from the SGPs to the connected ASPs about the availability of the SGPs for processing at least one of maintenance messages and signaling traffic messages; obtaining the availability status of the SGPs from said at least one of the maintenance messages and the signaling traffic messages and storing said status in the ASPs; obtaining the availability status of the SGs from the individual status of the SGPs that comprise each SG and storing said status in the ASPs; and using said status information and said configuration data of the at least one of the SGPs and the SGs to manage the connectivity with destinations in the SCN.