[72271] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: concern over public peering points
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Niels Bakker)
Mon Jul 5 07:03:21 2004
Date: Mon, 5 Jul 2004 13:02:37 +0200
From: Niels Bakker <niels=nanog@bakker.net>
To: nanog@merit.edu
Mail-Followup-To: nanog@merit.edu
In-Reply-To: <20040704231837.J38915@sprockets.gibbard.org>
Errors-To: owner-nanog-outgoing@merit.edu
* scg@gibbard.org (Steve Gibbard) [Mon 05 Jul 2004, 10:19 CEST]:
[..]
> The performance arguments are probably more controversial. The
> arguments are that shortening the path between two networks increases
> performance, and that removing an extra network in the middle increases
> reliability. The first argument holds relatively little water, since
> it's in many cases only the AS Path (not really relevant for packet
> forwarding performance) that gets shortened, rather than the number of
> routers or even the number of fiber miles.
"Not really"? Not always, perhaps. But it's more the rule than the
exception, I think.
> If traffic goes from network A, to network A's router at an exchange
> point, to network C, that shouldn't be different performance-wise from
> the traffic going from network A, to Network B's router at the exchange
> point, to Network C.
Except that, due to "peering games" some companies tend to engage in,
the exchange point where A and B exchange traffic may well be in a
different country from where A, C and their nearest exchange point is.
> Assuming none of the three networks are underprovisioning, the
> ownership of the router in the middle shouldn't make much difference.
> The reliability argument is probably more valid -- one less network
> means one less set of engineers to screw something up, but the big
> transit networks tend to be pretty reliable these days, and buying
> transit from two of them should be quite safe.
The correct phrasing is indeed "one less network" and not "one less
router." It's rarely one device in my experience.
-- Niels.
