Introducing NetQCheck

Keeping customers for the long term is vital to the survival of any business. So when your customer calls support to complain that the VoIP quality is unacceptable or the stock trading application is failing, or the throughput speed is slow; what can the support engineer do to validate, confirm and resolve the problem, when that problem may be taking place in another city or even another country using networks, over which, you have no ownership or control, including the customers own network.

What is NetQCheck?

NetQCheck technology delivers a comprehensive testing framework that can be embedded into network applications and/or devices for testing, analyzing and reporting connectivity problems. NetQCheck effectively smart enables any network device or application that is connected to a TCP/IP network so it can test TCP and UDP protocols, explore routes to quickly identify quality issues, especially in the last mile, that affect the customer. NetQCheck delivers a highly portable OEM API which can operate on any compliant platform, such as a VoIP phone handset, firewall, multimedia set-top box, mobile phone or simply a Windows /Unix PC client workstation.

Why Use NetQCheck?

NetQCheck enables support groups and engineers to quickly and accurately test connections directly from any remote device or application to identify and resolve the cause. Network service problems that go unresolved are the single biggest reason why customers switch provider. When your application fails, customers rightly complain. The challenge for any application service provider is to solve any problem quickly with minimal disruption to the customer; in short to keep the customer happy.

That said, when an application relies on public or private IP networks, managing and delivering quality is a difficult, time consuming and costly exercise. An IP network is only a best effort provider, there are no guarantees of delivery. This places service providers in a difficult no-win situation. On the one hand, clients demand ownership of service delivery 'end-to-end' but on the other hand the provider has no ownership of the network infrastructure, including the clients own network, that delivers the service end-to-end.

NetQCheck Platform Support

NetQCheck is specifically designed to be portable, enabling support of any platform that uses TCP/IP and is reasonably conformant to standards. This includes major network appliances like routers, firewalls, switches as well as set-top boxes, VoIP phones, cell phones, network display monitors, network printers, Windows/Unix PCs and Servers, handheld wireless devices etc. Basically any device that supports a TCP/IP network connection.

The Visualware AccessCT appliance is an example of an NetQCheck testing appliance. AccessCT supports testing TCP throughput, data flow quality, UDP VoIP and UDP Capacity, as well as end-to-end route discovery and performance. In this example device, NetQCheck is integrated with TCP directly to identify and report on TCP problems such as lost or corrupt data, order of data, duplicates etc.

How do I use NetQCheck?

NetQCheck provides a flexible API to support a broad range of accurate network test methods that can be embedded into any network device or application. NetQCheck test methods are designed to smart enable network devices so they can test, measure and report. NetQCheck is designed to help resolve connectivity problems that impact quality of service.

NetQCheck enabled devices and applications can initiate and conduct connectivity tests directly in the last mile through local or remote management. This delivers in-depth results to support groups and engineers anywhere in the world for fast analysis and resolution.

NetQCheck Benefits

Resolving remote connectivity problems that affect customers consumes time, resources and money. NetQCheck reduces costs and improves customer retention by quickly helping to resolve connectivity problems that occur in the last mile and beyond and impact the customer.

NetQCheck allows support groups to instantly initiate in-depth testing from an NetQCheck compliant device or application to one or more points in the network. This allows access to the results anywhere in the world. Through this process NetQCheck helps resolve connectivity issues quickly that impact customers, regardless of the customer location.

NetQCheck provides much needed visibility to important data that helps to identify congestion and regulation events that are present in the last mile as well as networks beyond the last mile.