Camara Project
The Camara Project is an initiative within the Linux Foundation aimed at creating a federated platform solution for exposing operator network capabilities to external applications through standardized APIs. It is a collaborative effort that involves the GSMA Operator Platform Group and a wide range of industry stakeholders, including telcos, ISVs, device manufacturers, and cloud service providers[1][2][3].
The project's main goal is to simplify the complexity of telco networks by providing easy and seamless access to network capabilities through APIs that are user-friendly and satisfy data privacy and regulatory requirements. This is particularly important in the 5G era, where enhanced and service-tailored customer experiences are crucial[1].
Camara focuses on the development, definition, and testing of these APIs, ensuring that they are harmonized and available across different telco networks and countries. This harmonization is achieved through agile and fast code creation with developer-friendly documentation. The APIs are open-source, licensed under Apache 2.0, and their definitions and reference implementations are free to use[1][2][3].
The project supports a variety of use cases, such as edge computing, low latency workloads, and programmable networks. By standardizing the way network and telco APIs are exposed and making them interoperable, Camara aims to prevent fragmentation among telco and cloud developers and enable faster and more versatile advancement of global portability and broad industry adoption of new features and capabilities[2][3].
Camara's scope is limited to customer-facing northbound APIs, which include Service APIs intended for end consumers and integrated by developers to invoke certain telco capabilities, and Service Management APIs intended for end consumers to manage or get data about offered Service APIs in application runtime. The project does not cover east-west federation or roaming APIs[4].
The Camara Project is supported by leading industry organizations and has seen significant participation from companies and individuals, with over 230 companies and more than 650 individuals involved. It has developed 12 API families, each addressing different aspects of network functionality, and continues to grow and evolve with the aim of becoming the one-stop destination for all customer and developer-centric northbound APIs[6].
Citations:
[2] https://www.nearbycomputing.com/camara-project/
[4] https://camaraproject.org/scope/
[5] https://developer.orange.com/apis/camara