A plan is a configuration containing a set of modifications for the actual configuration. Plan contains only modifications and it can be viewed on top of the actual configuration. Plan can include the following types of modifications:
Add new managed objects with mandatory parameters (create operation). Remove an existing managed object (delete operation).
Modify parameters (including administrative state) of an existing managed object in a certain configuration (update operation). The distinguished name or version cannot be modified using a plan. Modifying parameters of some future version of managed object in target configuration is not possible.
There can be four possible kind of plans differ from each other by the purpose for what they were created.
Temporary plans - these plans are related to different kind of operations.
Exception plans - these plans are related to the Policy Based Compare feature, for example, checking the actual configuration against templates and creating correc- tive delta plans. Exception plans also defines objects with exceptions to template parameters (differences that should be kept unchanged).
For more information, see Configuring the network using plans.
4.2.1
Constraints for naming plans, templates and site templates
When naming plans, templatesand site templates, remember that some special charac- ters are not allowed. The following table lists the illegal characters in plan, template names and site templates:
4.3 Reference configuration
The reference configuration is stored in the system as a separate data set from actual and planned configurations. Reference configuration can describe the desired configu- ration that should be kept in the network, but it can also describe the target configuration of the network. For both cases it is possible to find out if there have been changes in the actual configuration in the network, and if the changes are valid and expected.
For more information, see CM Reference Help.
4.4 Templates
Templates define a collection of parameter values for a particular managed object class. Templates are used for two purposes:
They define managed object parameters for new planned (CREATE) managed objects that define how the object should behave. Parameter values in plans override the corresponding value provided by the assigned template.
They identify the object’s type, for example, pico, micro, and macro for BTS. This
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objects. For this purpose, the template can be assigned both for new planned (CREATE) and existing actual managed objects.
There are two types of templates: user and system templates.
4.4.1
System templates
There is a single system template supporting the latest network element version for each managed object class. The system template values are defined according to the latest release of the network element. Versioning of templates is not supported in system tem- plates. These templates are provided as part of NetAct Configurator and they cannot be edited by users.
4.4.2
User templates
Multiple user templates can exist for a single managed object class or there can be none. A user template only contains values that differ from the system template as the system template is always automatically used under the user template to provide all missing values.
4.4.3
Using templates
A template is primarily used to define an initial parameter set for a new managed object by assigning a template to the object. The user can define assignments for each planned object manually in CM Editor. Assignment information can also be imported as part of the plan into NetAct Configurator using CM Operations Manager. The assignment is shown as the name of the template in user interfaces. Values from the assigned template for new managed objects are automatically utilised by CM Analyser, CM Editor, and CM Operations Manager the same way as they would have been defined directly in plan.
Template assignment is non-network data for the managed object. When the plan is pro- visioned, the defined template assignment is stored into the actual configuration. For working with non-network data, see Non-network objects and parameters.
If no template is assigned for the managed object with create operation, values for all mandatory parameters must be defined manually for that object in the plan.
In case of adjacencies, templates are assigned based on adjacency source and target cell template names. Therefore, the user must create adjacency templates according to this pattern.
In case the existing source and target cells do not have templates defined, the templates can be assigned for the existing cells. Parameters of the cells are not overwritten, only the object is associated with the template. The adjacencies created afterwards can then utilise the source and target cell based templates.
In case of GSM adjacencies, it is possible to let the system assign template automati- cally based on cell type definitions. Cell type based template assignments are config- ured in the Configurator configuration file $ETCROOT/rac/conf/rac_celltype.cf. If cell types are not used, the source and target cell template names are used to con- struct the name of the adjacency template.
It is possible to define several structures for a structure parameter in a user template. In one structure each attribute may or may not have a value in the user template. When working on the plan, it is possible to enter the planned value for some attributes in a structure and leave some attributes without a value. In this case, if a user template is assigned to the object, the missing values are picked up from the user template when provisioning the plan.
4.4.4
Administering templates
User templates are created and modified using CM Editor. New templates can also be defined in XML files and imported into NetAct Configurator using the CM Operations Manager tool. Only user templates can be modified and imported by the user. With CM Editor and CM Operations Manager the user can also delete templates that are not used. Deletion of a template is only possible if it is not assigned to any managed object in the plan or in the actual/reference configuration. Renaming existing templates is not currently possible. For list of naming rules for plans and templates, seeConstraints for
naming plans and templates.