text: those of ordinary skill in the art will realize that the following description of the present invention is illustrative only and not in any way limiting . other embodiments of the invention will readily suggest themselves to such skilled persons after a perusal of the within disclosure . in accordance with a presently preferred embodiment of the present invention , the components , processes and / or data structures may be implemented using c ++ programs running on high performance computers ( such as an enterprise 2000 ™ server running sun solaris ™ as its operating system . the enterprise 2000 ™ server and sun solaris ™ operating system are products available from sun microsystems , inc . of mountain view , calif .). different implementations may be used and may include other types of operating systems , computing platforms , computer programs , firmware and / or general purpose machines . in addition , those of ordinary skill in the art will readily recognize that devices of a less general purpose nature , such as hardwired devices , devices relying on fpga ( field programmable gate array ) or asic ( application specific integrated circuit ) technology , or the like , may also be used without departing from the scope and spirit of the inventive concepts disclosed herein . in accordance with one embodiment of the present invention the b - channel imitation may be handled by a aaa service implemented within a protocol gateway ( pgw ). pgws are devices which couple users via a network access server ( nas ) to the data communications network by dynamically converting protocols . the term gateway is not meant to be limited to a single type of device , as any device , hardware or software , that may act as a bridge between the user and the network may be considered a gateway for the purposes of this application . in accordance with one presently preferred embodiment of the present invention , the pgw may be a software service operating on a general purpose computer running the user control point ( ucp ) software package available from cisco systems , inc . of san jose , calif . the authentication , authorization and accounting ( aaa ) service performs user authentication , user authorization and user accounting functions . it may be a cisco acs ™ product such as cisco secure ™, available from cisco systems , inc . of san jose , calif ., or an equivalent product . in accordance with a presently preferred embodiment of the present invention , the remote authentication dial - in user service ( radius ) protocol is used as the communication protocol for carrying aaa information . radius is an internet standard track protocol for carrying authentication , authorization , accounting and configuration information between devices that desire to authenticate their links and a shared aaa or aaa proxy service . those of ordinary skill in the art will realize that other authentication protocols such as tacacs + or diameter can be used as acceptable authentication communications links between the various communications devices that encompass the data communications network and till be within the inventive concepts disclosed herein . in accordance with the present invention retail users such as usera @ isp . net and userb @ isp . net and wholesale users such as corp a and corp b will subscribe with an isp or telco providing internet connectivity for a certain maximum number of b - channels at particular pops on the network . for example , the wholesale users could subscribe to a maximum number of b - channels of 15 and 25 , respectively , at a particular pop while the individual users might subscribe to 2 . if the maximum is exceeded at the pop then the next attempted b - channel connection can be handled in a number of different ways . first , it can simply be refused . second , it can be accepted up to an “ absolute maximum ” of , say , 25 and 35 , respectively for the wholesale clients and 3 for the individuals . this absolute maximum provides some warning room before denying service to a user . optionally , customers can be warned when they are exceeding the maximum without suffering a denial of service . they may also be charged an extra fee for the extra service , if desired . the extra fee would be charged by initiating a special radius accounting packet in response to the b - channel connection over the maximum and sending it to the proper aaa service . ideally the customers would adjust their service contracts to the level of use they are actually making of the b - channels at the pop . to implement the invention , it is necessary to keep track of data not previously tracked in a data communications network . local database 40 shown in fig3 maintains a list identifying customer “ groups ” that have subscribed to b - channel access . each group identification has associated therewith a value for “ maximum b - channels ” which indicates the number of b - channels that the group is ordinarily entitled to at the particular pop . in the example of fig3 corp a is entitled to 15 and corp b is entitled to 25 . normally this means that if a user from corp a dials into a pop requesting a b - channel or an additional b - channel , the isp or telco is required to service the user as long as the user &# 39 ; s connection won &# 39 ; t exceed the maximum number of b - channels assigned to corp a at the pop . note that the “ group ” may be based on network domain name such as “ corpa . com ”, or on some other determinable characteristic such as an individual user &# 39 ; s fqdn ( e . g ., joe @ isp . net ). since the dnis id and / or the clid may be used , it is possible to group users by the telephone numbers that they call from or dial into rather than by fqdn or domain . hence a group may have any number of diverse users in it . the term “ group ” will be used herein for simplicity , but it is meant in this broader sense to be inclusive of any such determinable group of users . optionally an “ absolute maximum b - channels ” value may be kept to indicate how many b - channels the group may actually get before denial of service . in the example of fig3 corp a is entitled to 25 and corp b is entitled to 35 . as pointed out above , there may be an extra charge levied for exceeding the maximum b - channels value up to the absolute maximum b - channel &# 39 ; s value . local database 40 also keeps a count of the current number of b - channels in use by each group at the pop . when b - channels are added by a group , the count is incremented . when they are dropped , the count is decremented . since a b - channel may be added or dropped at any of the nases nas 1 - nas 9 as illustrated in fig4 a mechanism for synchronizing the data contained in the local cache databases 52 a , 52 b and 52 c associated with corresponding proxy / aaa services 1 , 2 and 3 within pop , is required . this current count is preferably maintained by the broker - publisher system described in more detail below . an isp or telco may wish to take action in a conservative manner , as by adding a fixed number of “ grace ” b - channels to avoid penalizing a client before the client has clearly exceeded the terms of its service contract by more than a reasonable level . on the other hand , the “ grace ” number may also be set to zero . the local database 40 may also contain additional information as desired . local database 40 is associated with each nas of each pop on the data communications network and may be stored in local cache memory associated with the nas and located at each pop or in any other convenient fashion . there is no requirement that they be stored at the pop , it just may be convenient to do so . fig4 is a simplified block diagram of a data communications network 50 in accordance with a presently preferred embodiment of the present invention . the network includes pop 1 . pop 1 has plural proxy / aaa services 1 , 2 , 3 as shown , each with a corresponding local cache 52 a , 52 b and 52 c in which is maintained an associated local database 52 as shown . each proxy / aaa service is coupled to one or more nases as shown . a multi - channel ppp b - channel connection 58 has been raised between an isdn nas at pop 1 and a user . the multiple channels may span more than one nas . fig5 is a flow diagram illustrating the b - channel connection process for an isdn user in accordance with a presently preferred embodiment of the present invention . at block 60 the user attempts to make an initial or additional b - channel connection to a nas at pop 1 . at block 62 the group of the user is determined . this may be done in one of several ways as discussed above , but most commonly involves parsing the fqdn of the user to determine his domain or , if an individual , his fqdn . at block 64 the local database 40 is searched for the group entry corresponding to the user . if additional b - channels are available ( i . e ., absolute maximum b - channels is not exceeded ) then control transfers to block 70 . otherwise , the b - channel request is rejected at block 66 and optionally the group administrator and / or user is notified in a conventional manner as set forth in the process at block 68 . optionally , some sort of “ grace ” level may be applied at block 64 so that rejection of the b - channel connection request does not occur precisely at the level specified in the service agreement with the domain . at block 70 , the b - channels in use count in the local database 40 is incremented . at block 72 the user is permitted to make the b - channel connection . the user must still be authenticated and authorized , presumably by an aaa service at pop , or at a remote site . when a user drops the b - channel , e . g ., at log out , it is important to decrement the b - channels in use counts so that an accurate count is always kept . fig6 shows how this is done . at block 74 the user drops the b - channel , as by initiating the log out process . at block 76 the b - channel count in local database 40 is decremented . fig7 is a system block diagram of a portion of data communication network 80 in accordance with a presently preferred embodiment of the present invention . network operations control center ( noc ) 100 is located centrally on the network 80 . there may be more than one noc on a particular data communications network . typically each wholesaler will have at least one noc . the primary mother cache ( pmc 102 ) and secondary mother cache ( smc 104 ) are memory storage components associated with noc 100 . an access database adapter 106 is in communication with pmc 102 and smc 104 as well as an information bus 108 . this adapter , and other adapters provide bi - directional mapping of information between components and other services comprising the data communications network 80 . adapters , such as the access database adapter 106 subscribe to and publish events . an event is an independent entity which contains an unspecified amount of non - time critical information . for example , the access database adapter 106 receives commands to publish an event . the information contained in the event may be found in the request or the access database adapter 106 may communicate with the pmc 102 to find the required information . the event is then published to other services and components within the data communications network across an information bus 108 which may be the data communications network itself . of course this is only one way to achieve data synchronization — one can easily implement a centralized model or a fully meshed communication model to achieve the same end . the information bus 108 that serves as the transportation medium for the presently preferred embodiment of the present invention can be common object request broker architecture ( corba )- based the corba - based information bus is capable of handling the communication of events to and from objects in a distributed , multi - platform environment . the concept of a corba - based information bus is well known by those of ordinary skill in the art . other acceptable communication languages can be used as are also known by those of ordinary skill in the art . other transportation models are available as well , such as the distributed component object model ( dcom ), which will readily achieve the same end . corba provides a standard way of executing program modules in a distributed environment . a broker 110 , therefore , may be incorporated into an object request broker ( orb ) within a corba compliant network . to make a request of an orb , a client may use a dynamic invocation interface ( which is a standard interface which is independent of the target object &# 39 ; s interface ) or an object management group interface definition language ( omg idl ) stub ( the specific stub depending on the interface of the target object ). for some functions , the client may also directly interact with the orb . the object is then invoked . when an invocation occurs , the orb core arranges so a call is made to the appropriate method of the implementation . a parameter to that method specifies the object being invoked , which the method can use to locate the data for the object . when the method is complete , it returns , causing output parameters or exception results to be transmitted back to the client . in accordance with a presently preferred embodiment of the present invention an enterprise application integration ( eai ) system is used to broker the flow of information between the various service and adapters comprising the data network management system of the present invention . an example of an eai system that can be incorporated in the presently preferred invention is the activeworks integration system , available from active software of santa clara , calif . as shown in fig8 such an eai system uses an information broker 110 as the hub of the system . the information broker 110 acts as the central control and storage point for the system . the information broker 110 can reside on a server and serves to mediate requests to and from networked clients ; automatically queuing , filtering and routing events while guaranteeing delivery . the information broker 110 is capable of storing subscription information and using such subscription information to determine where published information is to be sent . referring back to fig7 the information broker 110 is shown as being located at a point along the information bus 108 . in most instances , the broker will be located within the same noc 100 as the host that runs the access database adapter 106 application . another key feature to the eai system of fig8 is the use of service adapters (“ sa ”) 112 and 114 that allow users of the eai system to integrate diverse applications and other information when using the integration system . service adapters 112 and 114 provide biidirectional mapping of information between an application &# 39 ; s native format and integration system events , enabling all custom and packaged applications , databases , and internet and other network applications to exchange information . as shown in fig8 the service adapters 112 and 114 run in association with the various services 116 and 118 from which information is published and subscribed on to an information bus 108 that has its hub at the broker 110 . referring back to fig7 the information bus 108 is in communication with a point of presence ( pop ) ( pop 1 ) within the data communications network 80 . pop 1 is one of many pops with which the information bus 108 is in communication . located within pop 1 is a host or node which may comprise one or more computing devices on which may be running some or all of the services shown in fig7 . the mode is in communication with the information bus 108 through a control adapter 116 which provides control communications with the various services such as a pgw 118 through their respective service adapters 114 , via service adapter 112 or control adapter 116 . those of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that the services shown are not intended to be limiting and that other services and other service configurations can be used without departing from the inventive concepts herein disclosed . the system services may also be distributed over two or more servers to provide improved performance and redundancy . the protocol gateway service 118 is used to couple the network user to the data communication network . the protocol gateway service 118 functions as an interface to the nases that allows access requests received from a user to be serviced using components that may communicate using different protocols . a typical protocol gateway service 118 may be able to support different user access methodologies , such as dial - up , frame relay , leased lines , cable , dsl ( digital subscriber line ), and the like . thus , in one embodiment of the invention , the broker - publisher system described above is used to publish isdn b - channel log - in events from the pgw 118 or other access port of the data communications network 80 to the other ( subscribing ) pgws ( proxy / aaa services ) and / or their corresponding local databases within pop 1 . this is done so that the local databases may receive the current b - channel use information so that the decision to accept or reject an additional log - in attempt may be made locally at the proxy / aaa within the pop . thus , in an example of the operation of this invention , a user “ usera ” will perform an isdn dial - in to pop 1 and come in on nas 1 . since this is the first group member to log - in at this pop , the proxy / aaa service associated with nas 1 will obtain authentication from an appropriate aaa server at usera &# 39 ; s home domain . since it is convenient to store these records locally , they will preferably be cached locally and published to all local proxy / aaa services within pop 1 adding an entry for usera &# 39 ; s group . the first b - channel connection will proceed to completion and a publication event will inform all proxy / aaa services within pop 1 of that connection . now , if usera attempts to initiate another b - channel connection at pop 1 , no matter what nas he comes in on at pop 1 , the corresponding proxy / aaa service will have the needed information to ( 1 ) authenticate without further effort ( by checking the local cache ) and ( 2 ) accept or deny the attempt based upon a current b - channel count . an additional benefit of the present invention is that it allows usera to be provisioned ( if necessary ) with an ip address once rather than at each subsequent b - channel connection . since only one ip address is necessary , this preserves ip address resources and avoids confusion as to the ip address being used by usera . while embodiments and applications of the invention have been shown and described , it would be apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art , after a perusal of the within disclosure , that many more modifications than mentioned above are possible without departing from the inventive concepts herein . the invention , therefore , is not to be restricted except in the spirit of the appended claims .