Mobile agents in the mobile telephone network management

The paper discusses the application of mobile agents in the management of m obile telephone (cellular) networks. We propose the use of mobile agents fo r collecting subscriber information, such as location area identifier and c ell identifier. By using a subscriber profile containing these data the sig naling messages caused by location update could be reduced. We also propose a method to improve the quality of network coverage by collecting measurem ents data by a mobile agent in the mobile station (mobile phone) or at the mobile switching center, By analyzing these data the network provider would be able to discover areas without proper radio signal coverage (black hole s), thereby avoiding expensive and time-consuming measurements done by spec ially equipped vehicles, In addition, we discuss the basic infrastructure r equirements for deployment of the mobile agent technology in cellular netwo rks.