Creation Techniques for Software Development and Deployment, Agent-Based Management, Virtual Home Environment, Integrated and Scalable Solutions for Telecommunications Management. This shows that the issues related to communications management, architectures, and service creation are still of great interest, while the virtual home environment is emerging as a new key topic in IS&N. In summary, this book reflects the state of the art in research on IS&N topics, with the focus mentioned above, not only from European Union co-funded projects (mainly in the ACTS programme), but also from research organisations around the globe. February 2000 Jaime Delgado George D. Stamoulis Alvin Mullery Didoe Prevedourou Keith Start Previous IS&N Conferences and Proceedings The first IS&N conference was organised in 1992 in Paris, France. Since then, the IS&N conferences have been held almost every year, with proceedings published as part of the Lecture Notes in Computer Science (LNCS) series of Springer-Verlag. These are as follows. "Towards a Pan-European Telecommunication Service Infrastructure - IS&N'94", Hans-Jiirgen Kugler, Al Mullery, Norbert Niebert (Eds.), Aachen, Germany, September 1994, LNCS 851, ISBN 3-540-58420-X. "Bringing Telecommunication Services to the People - IS&N'95", Anne Clarke, Mario Campolargo, Nikos Karatzas (Eds.), Heraklion, Greece, October 1995, LNCS 998, ISBN 3-540-60479-0. "Intelligence in Services and Networks: Technology for Cooperative Competition - IS&N'97\ Al Mullery, Michel Besson, Mario Campolargo, Roberta Gobbi, Rick Reed (Eds.), Cernobbio, Italy, May 1997, LNCS 1238, ISBN 3-540-63135-6.

Paving the Way for an Open Service Market We live in an age when powerful communications technology is becoming available to everyone. From our home we can send and receive not only analogue voice, but also growing volumes of digital information and even intelligence in the form of agents. We are becoming increasingly mobile and are expecting the same level of connectivity in the home, in the office, and on the road. The regulatory and commercial environment in which we communicate is changing. The telecommunications market is becoming increasingly competitive. The Internet is erasing the borders between information technology and telecommunications. And the way we do business is ever more dominated by electronic exchanges of information. Is our technology ready for the open market of networks and services? Can we manage the growing complexity of computing and telecommunications technology and place it at the service of the people? The challenge for the research community is to develop the tools and techniques that will ultimately bring the full power of communications and information to everyone, in a way that everyone can easily use. The Sixth International Conference on Intelligence in Services and Networks (IS&N 99) is all about technology for paving the way to the open services market. Since the first IS&N conference in 1992 the focus of the IS&N program has continually shifted. We see existing technologies maturing while new ones emerge, but the bottom line has always been putting technology at the service of the people."

This book consitutes the refereed proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Intelligence in Services and Networks, IS&N'98 in Antwerp, Belgium, in May 1998. IS&N'98 was devoted to Technology for Ubiquitous Telecom Services. The 40 revised full papers presented in a homogeneous style and editing were selected from more than 80 submissions. The book is divided in sections on quality of service, service management, agent technology and applications, architechtures, mobility, platforms, electronic commerce, service creation, network management, gateways to CORBA, and security.

Intelligence in Services and Networks focuses on exploring how best the inherent intelligence in networks may be employed and enhanced to provide, firstly, flexibility and open competition in the provision of communications-based services and, secondly, the means for managing and administering end-to-end communication systems that span many independent network operators and service providers. The emphasis in this area of research is on applying the best techniques for system specification and corresponding software development, as a basis for the creation of open platforms, and subsequent standardisation. Resolving this issue is key to the successful deployment of advanced communications in the deregulated and highly competitive environment that will underpin any futher "information society."

This volume constitutes the proceedings of the Second International Conference on Intelligence in Broadband Services and Networks (IS&N '94), held in Aachen, Germany in September 1994. The book addresses the design of telecommunication services in the rapidly changing technological and regulatory environment. The 47 revised papers presented in the volume reflect work done under the CEC RACE project "Intelligence in Services and Networks" as well as individual research done independently. The volume is organized in 11 chapters, all introduced by surveys by the session chairpersons. Among the topics covered are: the context of IS&N, user interfaces, component models and service creation, TMN implementation, service management, and beyond IN.