Hello Mychaela,
First would be good to talk to FCC when you apply for commercial frequency, what requirements they have.
The numbering format is the last of your issues. If you provide a telephone service with a real number for dial out/in you must have also emergency services working. If you are a really small operator maybe you will not be required to have lawful interception but in your country you never know unless you discuss it with authorities.
What is happening if your subscriber is outside of your coverage area and wants dial another number? Maybe you will need some local roaming agreements with the big operators.
There is a reason why the other networks running opensource mobile networks like Rhizomatica don't use real numbering plan and keep the networks isolated.
Good luck, I hope you succeed. Let us know the results.
Regards, R.
On 05/06/2022 07:35, Mychaela Falconia wrote:
Hello Osmocom community,
Is there anyone here who uses Osmocom CNI software to operate a "real" cellular phone network (2G or 3G or both) anywhere in USA, or am I going to be the first? By "real", I mean operating a cellular phone network that strives to provide a user experience to its subscribers that is as close as possible to what one would get from a "regular" operator like AT&T or T-Mobile, aside from much much smaller coverage area, perhaps as small as the operator's house and its immediate surroundings. But aside from the tiny coverage area, all other aspects of user experience need to be fully "real": each subscriber gets a real 10-digit phone number in the North American Numbering Plan, can receive calls and SMS at this number, and can place calls and send SMS to the outside world, with the user's real NANP number appearing as the source. The principal difference from a self-contained classic NITB setup is that subscribers' MSISDNs are real NANP, rather than made-up "extension" numbers, plus a PSTN gateway implementation for outside connectivity.
Is there anyone in USA (or anywhere else in the world, substituting your country's "real" numbering plan for NANP) who operates an Osmocom CNI network in this manner? If there isn't, I will be happy to be the first, and I will also be quite happy to publish the source for all of the custom sw components I'm going to develop for this task - which I plan to implement as add-ons to Osmocom CNI, connecting via MNCC, SMPP and GSUP interfaces, rather than patches to Osmocom sw components themselves. However, if I am not the first to embark on such a venture, it would be nice to know how others have done it before me, so I can make a more informed decision as to what I can reuse vs which wheels I would rather reinvent per my own taste.
Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but it is my understanding that Rhizomatica (the most "real" and "production" user of Osmocom CNI I know of) does things differently from what I envision: aside from being in Mexico rather than USA (hence no NANP), it is my understanding (again, someone please correct me if I'm wrong) that they don't give their individual subscribers (end users) direct phone numbers in the Mexican numbering plan, directly reachable from anywhere in the world as +52-xxxxx, instead subscribers get "extension" numbers that are meaningful only inside those special village networks. In other words, a PBX-style network like the inside of a company with phone extensions, rather than direct PSTN phone numbers.
I currently plan on using bulkvs.com as my North American PSTN connectivity back-end provider with real NANP phone numbers, at least for voice - I haven't found a solution for P2P SMS connectivity yet, but because of the complexity of the task, I decided to break it into pieces and focus on just voice at first. However, if someone else has already done something similar, operating your own cellular network where your subscribers get real 10-digit NANP phone numbers instead of just internal extensions, I would be interested in knowing whom you use (or used) as your back-end provider for PSTN connectivity and source of phone numbers, and if anyone was able to get P2P SMS included in the deal.
M~