Definition of terms
Different SDOs and communities use different terminology related to NFV/Cloud/SDN. This list tries to define an OPNFV terminology, mapping/translating the OPNFV terms to terminology used in other contexts.
- ACT-STBY configuration
- Failover configuration common in Telco deployments. It enables the operator to use a standby (STBY) instance to take over the functionality of a failed active (ACT) instance.
- Administrator
- Administrator of the system, e.g. OAM in Telco context.
- Consumer
- User-side Manager; consumer of the interfaces produced by the VIM; VNFM, NFVO, or Orchestrator in ETSI NFV [ENFV] terminology.
- EPC
- Evolved Packet Core, the main component of the core network architecture of 3GPP’s LTE communication standard.
- MME
- Mobility Management Entity, an entity in the EPC dedicated to mobility management.
- NFV
- Network Function Virtualization
- NFVI
- Network Function Virtualization Infrastructure; totality of all hardware and software components which build up the environment in which VNFs are deployed.
- S/P-GW
- Serving/PDN-Gateway, two entities in the EPC dedicated to routing user data packets and providing connectivity from the UE to external packet data networks (PDN), respectively.
- Physical resource
- Actual resources in NFVI; not visible to Consumer.
- VNFM
- Virtualized Network Function Manager; functional block that is responsible for the lifecycle management of VNF.
- NFVO
- Network Functions Virtualization Orchestrator; functional block that manages the Network Service (NS) lifecycle and coordinates the management of NS lifecycle, VNF lifecycle (supported by the VNFM) and NFVI resources (supported by the VIM) to ensure an optimized allocation of the necessary resources and connectivity.
- VIM
- Virtualized Infrastructure Manager; functional block that is responsible for controlling and managing the NFVI compute, storage and network resources, usually within one operator’s Infrastructure Domain, e.g. NFVI Point of Presence (NFVI-PoP).
- Virtual Machine (VM)
- Virtualized computation environment that behaves very much like a physical computer/server.
- Virtual network
- Virtual network routes information among the network interfaces of VM instances and physical network interfaces, providing the necessary connectivity.
- Virtual resource
- A Virtual Machine (VM), a virtual network, or virtualized storage; Offered resources to “Consumer” as result of infrastructure virtualization; visible to Consumer.
- Virtual Storage
- Virtualized non-volatile storage allocated to a VM.
- VNF
- Virtualized Network Function. Implementation of an Network Function that can be deployed on a Network Function Virtualization Infrastructure (NFVI).
