Messaging spec speeds information sharing

Ericsson, Lucent and Nortel have set up an alliance to give users greater control over their voice, data and messaging services.

The Presence and Availability Management (PAM) forum has developed a specification that allows communications systems to securely share authorised information about a subscribers' identities, presence and availability across wireless and wired networks.

Guda Venkatesh, a Bell Labs research scientist and joint-author of the initial specification, said sharing presence information without compromising privacy would provide the convenience that people desire.

"Making this capability available in an open, industry standard application programming interface is the key to rapid development of interoperable services that subscribers can customise to suit their individual needs," Venkatesh said.

PAM will enable users to define a single set of personal preferences for their email and fax messages as well as for web browsers, pagers, wireless content and caching engines. It will also give users greater control of how they can be contacted.

Venkatesh said the consortium views this as a step towards making it possible for software developers and service providers to bring more customisable and interoperable communications services to market.The forum's standard is based on a set of specifications developed by Bell Labs and Novell. Other members of the group include communications services specialists Ayeca, Bantu, BuzMe, Conita Technologies, Evolving Systems, Illuminet Holdings and Invertix.