Andy Reinhardt
This fall, IBM will introduce an ambitious set of new communications services, collectively called Intelligent Communications, that span the gulf among different access providers, mail systems, delivery media, and user devices. The aim is to hide from mobile customers the complexity of navigating different networks and addressing schemes, while letting them more easily personalize their service options and user interface through which they communicate.
Intelligent Communications supports a range of media, including public and private E-mail, voice and voice mail, fax, paging, and data. Customers can use a variety of access devices, such as a phone or cellular phone, pager, notebook computer, or PDA (personal digital assistant); the network will automatically transform messages into a
format appropriate for delivery to a given device. And subscribers will be able to establish rules for routing and handling messages so that, for instance, E-mail from the CEO will trigger a page, urgent messages will be forwarded to a fax machine at a hotel, and routine messages will stay in an E-mail box. Intelligent Communications will offer a ``universal'' mailbox, where a subscriber can check for messages of all types.
The service uses the latest communications technologies, especially agents, filtering, and security. ``We use intelligence to mask the complexity of the network, and we use agents to help you gather, prioritize, and automate handling of messages,'' says Doug Sweeney, the IBM general manager for Intelligent Communications. Security provisions include encryption and authentication.
The service is designed to be open and to ride on top of other systems, or, as IBM says, ``to be neutral with respect to devices, networks, and back ends.'' IBM hasn't disclosed its third-party partn
ers yet (these are expected to be carriers), but Intelligent Communications will work with the IBM/Motorola Ardis packet-radio joint venture, as well as with Prodigy, IBM's Advantis value-added network, and the Internet. All the system specifications and interfaces will be published, and IBM is encouraging development of next-generation applications that ride on top of Intelligent Communications.
In concept and architecture, Intelligent Communications is similar to the PersonaLink service announced by AT&T, which uses General Magic's Telescript language and agents. The difference, says IBM, is that PersonaLink is aimed at consumers, whereas IBM's service is for businesses (i.e., to give mobile users access to legacy data). Another distinction is that, at least initially, PersonaLink will require unique devices and software to use it, whereas Intelligent Communications is more like a bridge among existing services. Over time, the services from these two giants, both battling for primacy in computers and
communications, will almost inevitably interoperate, giving users the benefit of choice.
Illustration: Intelligent Communications' Architectural Components
A typical scenario in IBM's Intelligent Communications network would involve one user querying another user's ``alter ego'' to find out how to best route a message of a given type to the recipient at a specific moment; the response provided by the alter ego might be a user pager number or an E-mail address. Subscriber proxies insulate people who are sending messages from having to know the intimate details of a recipient's routing path. Proxies also insulate users from details regarding phones, land-line modems, and other devices. With this flexible architecture, IBM aims to support a range of devices and media types across the network.
IBM Plans Ambitious Network
