Innovations in Tariscope 4.0

SoftPI is preparing to issue a new version of Tariscope. This is Tariscope 4.0.

Tariscope is an innovative solution that combines a call accounting system and telecom billing system.

As with previous versions of Tariscope, there are two editions:

• Tariscope Enterprise is a call accounting software for companies that have PBX (VoIP PBX) systems;
• Tariscope Provider a telecom billing solution for telecommunications service providers of telephony and Internet.

The new version includes many innovations to facilitate and improve the work with the Tariscope system. First of all innovations have touched the main program. It is called Tariscope as the whole system. We list the main innovations.

1. All you need is located on the Welcome view

A new Welcome view was added to Tariscope. It displays a list of links providing quick access to a required working mode and the Tariscope news. This view is shown Figure 1.

Figure 1

On the left side of the Welcome view the three sections are displayed:

• Start. It contains links to quickly select the desired mode.
• License info. It displays information about the Tariscope license.
• Recent documents. The section contains a list of recent documents.

The Start section contains the following links:

• Connect/Disconnect. It provides a connection to the Tariscope server or disconnection from it.
• Administration. The link opens the Management view where you can setup and manage Tariscope.
• New view. The link allows to open a new view.
• New report. The link allows to generate a new report.
• About. Displays information about the program.

In the right part of the Welcome view a brief summary of the latest news contained on the Tariscope site is displayed. This allows the Tariscope user to be always aware of the latest developments related to Tariscope.

2. You see all you need

Now the Tariscope program allows to simultaneously display multiple views. This can be useful in the following cases: the comparison of data from two views or reports; for simultaneous monitoring of the various data sources; simultaneous opening of a subscriber (customer) account and his call information, and in other cases. In fact, you have a dashboard. This is especially effective when working on a big screen. The user can determine the number, location and size of the views displayed on the screen. An example of displaying three views is shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2

3. Fast display of view

When you open a new view of calls or IP traffic, even when using the initial filter, because of the large number of records in the database that satisfy the query criteria, a high load of the Tariscope server by other requests the display of view may take a relatively long time. To eliminate this delay, a new feature was added to Tariscope that limits the initial number of entries. One thousand entries are only displayed. Information on this appears in the form of an information line at the top of view on a yellow background. An example of such a line can be seen in Figure 2. If you need all the records that match the query, you should click on the link "click here" on this line.

The number of rows displayed in a view is specified in the status bar of the program, as shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3

In addition to the total number of the rows in the view, the status bar displays the parameters of the current cell (Row, Column) and the query execution time.

4. New view type

A new type of view was added to Tariscope. This is the Services view. This view is useful for the Tariscope Provider users. The Services view allows you to display all the desired services, which have been charged taking into account the specified filtering parameters. All of the same operations as for the view of calls or IP traffic are applicable to this view. You can filter, sort, group data, set bookmarks, generate reports, etc. When creating a new view, as well as for view of calls or IP traffic, a filter window is opened that lets you select only desired services (Figure 4).

Figure 4

After setting filtering options the Services view opens.

5. Filters

Filtering data is probably one of the most frequently used functions in Tariscope. Therefore, to do this procedure more convenient it has been completely redesigned the filtering mode with using SQL queries. Recall that the Tariscope data can be filtered in various ways:

• Filtering on data of the selected value in the view. The user selects a table cell, the value of which he wants to accept or exclude and selects the appropriate menu item.
• By using so-called plain filter when a user can specify values for more than 20 parameters.
• Using SQL query.

SQL filtering is the most powerful option, which provides a choice of data practically on every possible values of the database fields united together different logic functions. But as a rule, the creating of such queries requires the knowledge of SQL language. The new interface mode allows to build a huge number of such queries almost without any knowledge of the SQL language. An example of the program window for creating SQL queries is shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5

Using the drop-down list, the user can select the desired filtering field, a function that will be applied to it, enter or select a field value, a value of the logical operator, which combines multiple conditions. As it was previous versions, for users who know the SQL language there is the possibility of direct entry of SQL query.

7. Searching for information

The searching information mode was redesigned. All search results (number of rows, columns, and the value that satisfies the search) are displayed in a separate panel. 

This allows the user to immediately estimate how many rows in the relevant search terms and not to repeat the operation to find the next value. An example of the search window is shown in Figure 6.

Figure 6

8. Ease of working with views and filters

For the convenience of working with the saved views and filters Tariscope now contains the appropriate panel. An example of the panel with views is shown in Figure 7.

Figure 7

Tariscope 4.0 allows you to create, delete, rename views. Tariscope allows to keep them in different folders, which can have a hierarchical structure without restrictions on the nesting level. You can call the window for changing the filter used for the view without opening the view.

You can be exported data of the panel to various file formats.

The filter panel has almost all the same features as the view panel.

These new features make much easier to work with views and filters.

9. Panel of activity log

In addition to panels of views and filters in Tariscope 4.0 the panel of activity log (Output) was added (Figure 8). This log is primarily designed to detect erroneous operation of the program and, if necessary, can be sent to developers for rapid solutions to some of the problem in the program.

Figure 8

In addition, it can also be used by the user to get examples of creating SQL queries when he wish to filter data or creating a new report form or upgrading an existing one.

10. Traffic measurement

The Traffic measurement mode was completely redesigned (Figure 9).

Figure 9

The main advantages of the new interface are the followings:

• A download of graphics is executed asynchronously. This is important when you create a graphic using large amounts of data.
• Now you can build a graph of load not only for the day, as in previous versions of Tariscope, and for any period of time.
• The simultaneous creation of graphs based on different views. For example, one view contains data for July and another view contains data for August. It is possible to create a few graphics on one coordinate grid, and on a few coordinate grids.
• You can build a traffic load both on routes / channels and on gateways. Previously, it was impossible to construct a graph for gateways.

Traffic measurement is a separate big topic. A separate article will be devoted to it this year.

11. Payment batch

This feature applies only to telecommunications service providers who use the Tariscope Provider edition. Input of payment batch allows you to export the data on payments of customers from a file provided by a bank or enter them manually. This mode has been completely redesigned. The features were added that improve the user experience. In particular, now the automatic export feature works in asynchronous mode, that allows to perform other tasks in this time.

Other changes

1. Support for 3CX Phone System version 14

As is well known to users of 3CX Phone System version 14 with Service Pack 1 does not support CDR. In Service Pack 2 the CDR feature has been re-introduced and improved significantly. The CDR format was completely changed. In this regard, CDR data processing module for 3CX Phone System has been redesigned. Now Tariscope processes CDR from 3CX Phone System v14 SP2, and earlier versions of the PBX. Tariscope is not required CDR format configuration for 3CX Phone System. The user of 3CX Phone System v14 SP2 has to leave the default settings of CDR in PBX.

2. Support of Avaya Session Manager

Tariscope 4.0 supports the processing of CDR from Avaya Session Manager. Tariscope is not required CDR format configuration for this PBX.

3. Import data from Vodafone

The previous versions of Tariscope contains a mode that allows the user to import calls information, provided by telecommunications service provider. Subsequently, the user can be processed these data, generate reports, and perform other actions except recharging as for the data received from user's PBX. Importing data is performed using a special script. A number of scripts is included in the Tariscope.

The new version of Tariscope 4.0 includes a script to import the data provided by the mobile operator Vodafone (Ukraine). The corresponding script allows you to import a variety of data:

• only call information without the possibility of recharging;
• only call information with the possibility of of recharging;
• only the information about the services;
• at the same time call information and services;
• and others.

Any one of these options depends on the settings of the script. By default, the script imports calls without services and the possibility of recharging.

4. Requirements for software

Requirements for software remained as the previous version of Tariscope, except for the need to install Microsoft .Net Framework 4.5.

Terms of upgrading to Tariscope 4.0

All users who have not expired warranty support can upgrade Tariscope to version 4.0. The rest of the users must acquire post-guarantee support to upgrade Tariscope to version 4.0.