[2110] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Trickle Down? How About Bubble Up?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Jack Haverty)
Mon Jan 27 12:39:15 1992
Date: Mon, 27 Jan 92 09:37:35 PST
From: Jack Haverty <jhaverty@us.oracle.com>
To: vjs@rhyolite.wpd.sgi.com
Cc: com-priv@psi.com
In-Reply-To: Vernon Schryver's message of Mon, 27 Jan 92 03:10:29 -0800 <9201271110.AA14609@rhyolite.wpd.sgi.com>
"...This is not so for mail, if both dial up machines have properly configured
backup MX forwarders which are always on line...."
This falls under what I called "some effort to make sure they're both online".
It requires designing an MX "topology" and then configuring and operating the
"always on line" machines. If you choose the approach of one or a few central
such machines, then the admin part is easier, but operating costs may be quite
high - e.g., if the dial-up system in Argentina wants to send mail to the
dial-up system in Chile, it may result in two long-distance calls to the US to
accomplish that. If you scatter MX machines all over the world, then you have
the problem of finding/training local personnel to keep them running - and may
still have lots of unnecessary long-distance traffic.
I should say "we" in the paragraph above. Actually, at Oracle we're trying the
different approaches - e.g., Malaysia and Korea do dial-up IP (via Telebit), but
Brazil and Mexico do UUCP. Both can be made to work.
It's do-able, but certainly some effort in both cases... IP is different but
similar to UUCP of course. Which is "better"? Maybe someone has some real
data? Collecting such info is on our to-do list, but the technology and
products available do not provide much help in that arena so it's harder than
you would like to get real data.
Jack
