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hi, Maybe this is out-of-topic ,but I can't find any place where could find answer for this question. If this is intrusive, just ingore it please. my question is : how does ISP do with DSL dial-up sessions which pass the accouting period time. E.g. If a customer subscribe DSL service at 15USD/month for 150hours. If the subscriber used 145hours by 30th May. He get online at 21:00 on 31th, and get offline at 5:00 on June 2th. The radius server could only export the customer's session when he get offline. So, problem comes to accouting system which was designed to calculate customer usage on first day of each month. The cut-off line of each month usage is set to 00:00 on first day of each month. Someone says , ISP should force those session closed at 00:00 on first day of each month, because they must ensure dial-up session of last month sould not be accouted in next month. Is this true ? thanks in advance. Joe __________________________________ Yahoo! Movies - Search movie info and celeb profiles and photos. http://sg.movies.yahoo.com/
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On Fri, May 11, 2007 at 08:17:02PM +0800, Joe Shen wrote:
hi,
Maybe this is out-of-topic ,but I can't find any place where could find answer for this question. If this is intrusive, just ingore it please.
my question is : how does ISP do with DSL dial-up sessions which pass the accouting period time.
E.g. If a customer subscribe DSL service at 15USD/month for 150hours. If the subscriber used 145hours by 30th May. He get online at 21:00 on 31th, and get offline at 5:00 on June 2th.
The radius server could only export the customer's session when he get offline. So, problem comes to accouting system which was designed to calculate customer usage on first day of each month. The cut-off line of each month usage is set to 00:00 on first day of each month.
Someone says , ISP should force those session closed at 00:00 on first day of each month, because they must ensure dial-up session of last month sould not be accouted in next month. Is this true ?
One could always send a session-limit in the radius authentication to keep them under their usage for the month, including sending something that terminates the session at whatever you call 0000 for the start of month. this obviously could cause a spike in auth requests around 0000. the other choices include intelligent accounting software that can take this situation into account. I've not used it in years, but radiator was nice back in the day. - jared -- Jared Mauch | pgp key available via finger from jared@puck.nether.net clue++; | http://puck.nether.net/~jared/ My statements are only mine.
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Looking for postmaster at BellSouth. Please contact me off list. Thanks. Vish Yelsangikar Netflix.
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On Fri, 11 May 2007 20:17:02 +0800, Joe Shen said:
Someone says , ISP should force those session closed at 00:00 on first day of each month, because they must ensure dial-up session of last month sould not be accouted in next month. Is this true ?
Or they could apply a little more kloo, and at 23:59 poll all the active sessions, and bill them "this" month for the time-since connected. In your example, they got on at 21:00, so you bill them this month for 3 hours. Then when their session ends at 05:00, you notice that the session time is more than the time so far this month, and just bill them for 5 hours. Or you can simplify your accounting infrastructure a *lot* by just sending them a bill for $21.95 no matter how much time they spent connected - that's what a lot of DSL providers do, at least in the US.
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Radius can and should report both on and off times, look into your configuration. As far as 1st of the month, consider it virtually closed & open at midnight on 30th/31st in accounting. Example how to do it could be to write a script that when processes radius log at the end of the month and looks at all open sessions adding "end" radius accounting data in there as well as adding start session for next month's log. P.S. I've not ran dialup ISP and used radius for LONG time but did exactly as above for hourly customers before. The biggest issue I remember was when your dialup server itself dies (rare but happened) since then you do not have record of customers getting off, same script was used to virtually "close" sessions. On Fri, 11 May 2007, Joe Shen wrote:
hi,
Maybe this is out-of-topic ,but I can't find any place where could find answer for this question. If this is intrusive, just ingore it please.
my question is : how does ISP do with DSL dial-up sessions which pass the accouting period time.
E.g. If a customer subscribe DSL service at 15USD/month for 150hours. If the subscriber used 145hours by 30th May. He get online at 21:00 on 31th, and get offline at 5:00 on June 2th.
The radius server could only export the customer's session when he get offline. So, problem comes to accouting system which was designed to calculate customer usage on first day of each month. The cut-off line of each month usage is set to 00:00 on first day of each month.
Someone says , ISP should force those session closed at 00:00 on first day of each month, because they must ensure dial-up session of last month sould not be accouted in next month. Is this true ?
thanks in advance.
Joe
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Joe, There are lot of issues here. One thing to consider is that it is not a good policy to "cut off" the client ADSL at 0:00hs... they may complain for that policy ! You may just let him close the session and then, with the accounting stop ticket you may account part of it on the past month and the rest the current month. :) You may also set a maximum connection time for one session (some ISP do this also)... say for example 12 hours... so each 12 hours the RAS closes the connection (the thig is that this timer is for each connection, so you do not close all the connections at same time)... you may do this using standar radius attribute 27 (Session-Timeout) by modifying this attribute in the access-accept response from the radius to the RAS. You may also use interims... but Im not sure if you have traffic information on this... This are some ideas... there are a lot more... Hope it help, Nicolas. On Fri, 11 May 2007, william(at)elan.net wrote: willia > willia > willia >Radius can and should report both on and off times, look into your willia >configuration. As far as 1st of the month, consider it virtually willia >closed & open at midnight on 30th/31st in accounting. Example how willia >to do it could be to write a script that when processes radius log willia >at the end of the month and looks at all open sessions adding "end" willia >radius accounting data in there as well as adding start session for willia >next month's log. willia > willia >P.S. I've not ran dialup ISP and used radius for LONG time but did willia >exactly as above for hourly customers before. The biggest issue I willia >remember was when your dialup server itself dies (rare but happened) willia >since then you do not have record of customers getting off, same willia >script was used to virtually "close" sessions. willia > willia >On Fri, 11 May 2007, Joe Shen wrote: willia > willia >> hi, willia >> willia >> Maybe this is out-of-topic ,but I can't find any willia >> place where could find answer for this question. willia >> If this is intrusive, just ingore it please. willia >> willia >> my question is : willia >> how does ISP do with DSL dial-up sessions which willia >> pass the accouting period time. willia >> willia >> willia >> E.g. If a customer subscribe DSL service at willia >> 15USD/month for 150hours. If the subscriber used willia >> 145hours by 30th May. He get online at 21:00 on 31th, willia >> and get offline at 5:00 on June 2th. willia >> willia >> The radius server could only export the customer's willia >> session when he get offline. So, problem comes to willia >> accouting system which was designed to calculate willia >> customer usage on first day of each month. The willia >> cut-off line of each month usage is set to 00:00 on willia >> first day of each month. willia >> willia >> Someone says , ISP should force those session willia >> closed at 00:00 on first day of each month, because willia >> they must ensure dial-up session of last month sould willia >> not be accouted in next month. Is this true ? willia >> willia >> thanks in advance. willia >> willia >> Joe willia >
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We handle it through RADIUS interim accounting packets. You then get periodic accounting updates. It has its own issues however (think of how busy your RADIUS server becomes receiving, say, 10,000 users worth of interim users off one BRAS by receiving a RADIUS packet every few minutes per user. It quietly adds up.) Adrian
participants (7)
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Adrian Chadd
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Jared Mauch
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Joe Shen
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Nicolás Antoniello
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Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu
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Vish Yelsangikar
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william(at)elan.net