[1840] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Understanding the decision to Build a Big T-3
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Jordan Becker)
Thu Jan 2 18:57:09 1992
Date: Thu, 2 Jan 92 18:39:08 EST
From: Jordan Becker <becker@ans.net>
To: com-priv@psi.com
> <<MESSAGE from>> Gordon Cook 01-JAN-92 22:27
> cook@tmn
> In his open letter to the Internet Community Al Weis said:
>
> "Unlike the T1, the T3 network was built to accommodate the needs of NSF-
> sponsored institutions plus other potential users, including commercial
> users. This additional capacity was built using ANS funds. Any
> competitive advantage gained by ANS is appropriate, considering the risks
> involved and the experience gained in building the T3 network."
>
> Al, Hans Werner, Erik, Jordan or anyone who knows what I am missing please
> educate me. For I am confused by Al's statement which implies that the
> T-3 network COULD have been built in such a way as to ONLY accomodate the
> needs of NSF sponsored institutions without the "additional capacity" that
> used ANS funds. How is this possible? I thought T-3 was T-3 was T-3.
The basic design of these networks take into account several performance
objectives including latency, throughput, reliability, serviceability, and
scalability to support more user traffic, more routing exchanges, and more
direct attached peer networks. The T3 network was designed as a core network
that directly interconnects to peer client networks. This allows the T3
network to grow incrementally to support new direct attached peer networks
without a significant negative impact on the other performance objectives or
the existing peer networks.
I think Al's statement implied that a T3 core network infrastructure
supporting attachments only to the NSF sponsored sites would be less rich in
terms of equipment and transmission facilities. The additional infrastructure
afforded by the fees from non-NSF sponsored attachments and services benefits
all users of the T3 network.
> Whatever the difference, apparently there was a choice: build a T-3 to
> serve just the needs of the academic community or build a larger
> T-3 that could be sold to "other potential users, including commercial
> users." A decision was made to build the larger T-3. Apparently it was
> made without consulting the community as a whole.
The engineering of both the T1 and T3 networks is an on-going process. There
are often changes made to both the T1 and T3 networks that affect new or
existing users and change the performance characteristics (hopefully for the
better). If all of the decisions to change the network were left to the whole
community, then important changes might not be made in an timely fashion.
Merit consults with NSF on all significant engineering changes, and all
attempts are made to keep the midlevel network operators, ANS customers, and
other affected users apprised of signficant planned engineering changes to the
network.
The NSFNET project enjoys a long tradition of open technical disclosure of the
T1 and T3 network design, and other engineering activities thanks to the
efforts initiated by Hans-Werner Braun and the Merit Internet Engineering
Group. ANS fully supports this practice. A representative from Merit and I
have jointly presented the T1/T3 network status report at recent IETF
meetings, and we will continue to do so as long as we are invited to.
I am personally discouraged that only a few of the principal players in the
commercial Internet community seem to participate actively in these meetings.
Perhaps having more technical interchange among this community would help to
reduce the spread of mis-information and mis-understandings on this mailing
list.
Jordan
