CDR comparison manual
5gVision CDR comparison is part of the 5gVision suite of products for monitoring, alerting, packet sniffing, rate management, routing, and billing that share a common web interface: quick, intuitive, and flexible.
Overview
The CDR comparison module allows you to compare your CDRs with your partners' in case of disputes and get a report on types of mismatches together with CDR samples both in the web table, and in downloadable files.
The final result of a comparison is a report with all CDRs allocated to one of the following categories:
You may investigate CDR samples per each match/mismatch type right in the web interface, or download one or several files with full CDRs falling into the selected mismatch categories.
The final result of a comparison is a report with all CDRs allocated to one of the following categories:
- Matched
- Mismatch: cost only
- Mismatch: duration, non-hung calls
- Mismatch: duration, hung calls
- Mismatch: time, minor
- Mismatch: time, major
- Connected only in File 1
- Connected only in File 2
- Earlier than mutual CDR interval
- Later than mutual CDR interval
- Duplicate calls in File 1
- Duplicate calls in File 2
- Matched only by SRC/DST numbers
- No match by any field
- Error
You may investigate CDR samples per each match/mismatch type right in the web interface, or download one or several files with full CDRs falling into the selected mismatch categories.
Preparation steps
To access the CDR comparison module, please create a CDR comparison screen (see Menu tree for information on how to add it).
The first step in a comparison procedure is to load .csv CDRs files to the server. You may load and compare as many files as you need on each side. Say, you may compare 10 individual files of your own CDRs with one .zip file containing 5 CDR files of your partner. Files will be merged on each side before comparison.
File upload is performed in the CDR files tab of the CDR comparison screen using the Upload CDR file button or by just dragging and dropping a file to the CDR files table.
Once loaded, files stay in this table and can be used multiple times for different comparisons.
There are 2 demo files pre-loaded to the system that you may use for testing.
The next step is to configure CDR fields so that the system knows what are the positions of the columns we need for comparison in the files (in the very least we need: duration, DST number, CDR date, but the more positions for the columns we have, the more precise the comparison would be).
An exception to this would be SRC numbers, if they are not reliable (for instance, you send just one SRC number for all calls to your vendors) - it is better not to fill their position so that they are not compared. Or you may fill the position anyway, but dont fill the Compare digits, SCR number field in Tolerances table.
Most of the time, your and your partner' files will have different sets of columns, so you will need to setup 2 separate CDR field configs. Once you have a config for your partner, you may reuse it next time, as it is likely, that every time your partner sends CDRs to you - they will be in exactly the same format.
The Tolerances config allows you to tell the system which differences in CDR fields should still be considered a match. For instance, call start times may differ by several seconds, or sometimes even minutes, but if the duration and DST numbers are same - the 2 CDRs most probably belong to the same call.
The fields configs for demo CDR files and the TEST tolerance config are preloaded as an example.
The system automatically calculates the shift in CDR times (due to time zones or time discrepancies of your and your partner's switches), so there is no need to tell the system which time zone the files are in.
The first step in a comparison procedure is to load .csv CDRs files to the server. You may load and compare as many files as you need on each side. Say, you may compare 10 individual files of your own CDRs with one .zip file containing 5 CDR files of your partner. Files will be merged on each side before comparison.
File upload is performed in the CDR files tab of the CDR comparison screen using the Upload CDR file button or by just dragging and dropping a file to the CDR files table.
Once loaded, files stay in this table and can be used multiple times for different comparisons.
There are 2 demo files pre-loaded to the system that you may use for testing.
The next step is to configure CDR fields so that the system knows what are the positions of the columns we need for comparison in the files (in the very least we need: duration, DST number, CDR date, but the more positions for the columns we have, the more precise the comparison would be).
An exception to this would be SRC numbers, if they are not reliable (for instance, you send just one SRC number for all calls to your vendors) - it is better not to fill their position so that they are not compared. Or you may fill the position anyway, but dont fill the Compare digits, SCR number field in Tolerances table.
Most of the time, your and your partner' files will have different sets of columns, so you will need to setup 2 separate CDR field configs. Once you have a config for your partner, you may reuse it next time, as it is likely, that every time your partner sends CDRs to you - they will be in exactly the same format.
The Tolerances config allows you to tell the system which differences in CDR fields should still be considered a match. For instance, call start times may differ by several seconds, or sometimes even minutes, but if the duration and DST numbers are same - the 2 CDRs most probably belong to the same call.
The fields configs for demo CDR files and the TEST tolerance config are preloaded as an example.
The system automatically calculates the shift in CDR times (due to time zones or time discrepancies of your and your partner's switches), so there is no need to tell the system which time zone the files are in.
Comparison request
Finally you can go to Requests tab and start a new comparison. A new window will open with the following parameters:
The status of the request is displayed in the Done, % field. Please click refresh to update it. The progress percentage is only a rough estimate. When it is 100% done, you will be able to view the comparison report using the corresponding button:
For each mismatch type CDR samples are available and can be viewed using the View CDR samples button or the context menu item. Matched CDRs will have the same Pair ID which will allow you to easily see the 2 CDRs that were matched (or partially matched).
- Compared files, 1st set - select the first loaded file(s) from the drop-down menu.
- CDR fields config, 1st - select config for the first compared file.
- Compared files, 2nd set - select the second loaded file(s).
- CDR fields config, 2nd - select config for the second compared file.
- Tolerance config - select a tolerance config to be used in this comparison.
- CDR sample size in DB - this value indicates how many sample CDRs will be stored in the system DB for every mismatch type.
- Create CDR files by mismatch type - after the request is complete, you may download files generated for the Unmatched CDRs only types, or all types, including the matched CDRs (usually most CDRs will match, so choosing the All CDRs option might take longer for bigger files to generate).
- Maximum rows in each CDR file - limit a number of rows in each CDR file to avoide creation of huge files. Most probably, you wont need 10 million CDRs for investigation.
- Comment - just a comment so that it is easier to remember for you which comparison request it was.
The status of the request is displayed in the Done, % field. Please click refresh to update it. The progress percentage is only a rough estimate. When it is 100% done, you will be able to view the comparison report using the corresponding button:
For each mismatch type CDR samples are available and can be viewed using the View CDR samples button or the context menu item. Matched CDRs will have the same Pair ID which will allow you to easily see the 2 CDRs that were matched (or partially matched).