Ascend Deploys Java for Easier Configuration of Network Access Hardware

Ascend Communications of Alameda, Calif. knows that first impressions count. Too many new users of advanced Internet communications hardware recall their first attempts to configure network access devices as ordeals that left them thinking that these products are just plain difficult to use. Since its early days as a company, Ascend has devoted engineering resources to making its products easy to configure and use. Traditionally, the end users for Ascend products have been network and systems administrators who work for to telecommunications carriers and Internet service providers (ISPs). For them, a menu-driven configuration utility that runs on a serially connected VT 100 terminal is easy to use. "Our character-based user interface was familiar and comfortable for the Unix professional," says Tom Bonacci, team leader of an Ascend engineering group in Salt Lake City that focuses on creating configuration and management firmware.

The same interface that looks straightforward to a network administrator can look like hieroglyphics to a small business owner or home-based office worker struggling to bring up an ISDN connection for the first time. The debut of the low-end Pipeline series brought Ascend a new type of customer who has a much lower tolerance for the intricacies of set-up parameters than do network administrators. Having to choose among eight connection profiles for Ascend's Pipeline ISDN routers is more bewildering for users who are not network professionals than it is for a network administrator to select among the 99 different connection profiles available for the top-of-the-line MAX 4004 network access switch.

To make its existing products easier and faster to configure for both novice and expert users, Ascend has put two separate teams of Java programmers to work creating configuration utilities for products at both the high and the low ends of its product line. For its Pipeline series, Ascend released the Java-Based Pipeline Configurator (JBPC) in the fourth quarter of 1996. No longer do end users need to be directly connected with a serial cable and a VT100 terminal or terminal emulation software to configure their units. The JBPC is a graphical utility that allows users to configure and save parameters over the same Ethernet connection that is used for network traffic.

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Despite having experienced a few setbacks as Java goes through growing pains, Ascend is committed to using Java as the development environment for creating graphical configuration tools to replace its existing menu-driven, character-based software. "We've made a substantial investment in Java because our products run on so many different platforms. We need configuration capabilities that look and work consistently across all of our platforms," says Pipeline product manager Bert Forbes.

"In the future, developing in Java will increase the speed at which we can integrate new features into our software and make new releases quickly available to users on all of the popular desktop platforms," says Forbes. He uses the future tense when speaking of the benefits of Java's cross-platform capabilities because some of these benefits are not yet tangible. According to Len Alley, a lead programmer for the JBPC, some of the function calls in Java do not yet work identically on all platforms. Therefore, Ascend had to do a phased implementation of the initial release of JBPC, first supporting 32-bit Win 95 and Windows NT desktops and then introducing support for 16-bit Windows, Macintosh and Unix systems. Another problem for releasing Java applications on Microsoft platforms is that Microsoft has not yet resolved the issue of run-time licenses for its Java compiler.

A compelling benefit of the Java-based configuration utility for Pipeline products goes beyond the graphical user interface to provide "smart" configuration assistance to narrow the number of configuration parameters. The configurator can, for example, automatically detect configuration parameters such as the switch type and service provide identification (SPID) and determine which channels of an ISDN line are in use. After a user is prompted for the basic information needed to configure and test their unit, he is she is connected to the forms for registering the new unit on-line with Ascend. By registering their product, users can test their ISDN - Basic Rate Interface (BRI) line as well as their Pipeline configuration. Forbes estimates that it takes about 15 minutes to configure a two-port Pipeline using the QuickStart utility. For network administrators or other users who wish to "look under the hood" and configure units without the QuickStart utility, the full range of configuration options are available through an advanced setting that allows access to all Pipeline parameters. A power user can create a template configuration that can be saved as a file and updated to multiple Pipeline units.

Ascend's Java-based Pipeline Configurator
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A team of engineers in Salt Lake City which includes five Java programmers is working on continuous enhancements to the application software that comes bundled with Pipeline products. The JBPC is now included on the Pipeline Companion CD-ROM and is also downloadable for registered Pipeline customers at Ascend's ftp site (ftp.ascend.com). Why not via the Internet? Java has security restrictions that prevent applets from communicating with a remote server. Therefore, JBPC runs as an application rather than an applet. When it becomes possible to have a "trusted" applet with security features that allow communication between servers, JBPC will run as an applet inside of Web browsers.

Although the JBPC was released before the configuration utility for the MAX 4000 series, the idea of using Java for configuration firmware first took root at the high end of Ascend's product line. Early in 1996, a group of engineers at Technology Associates Incorporated (TAI) in Chesterfield, Missouri proposed a Java-based configuration project to Ascend. Some of the senior programmers at TAI had learned Java (then called Oak) when they were working on advanced telecommunications projects at a research facility for Southwestern Bell (now called SBC Corp.) in St. Louis. When SBC moved its research facility to San Antonio, Texas, some of the researchers were looking for a new project they could do locally. In February 1996 a group of engineering managers from Ascend challenged TAI to develop a prototype configuration utility. TAI answered the challenge with a prototype that ran as a demonstration in the Ascend booth at the InterOp trade show in Las Vegas last March.

By late spring, a team of six experienced Java developers went to work on applets that would apply intelligent agent technology to the problem that network administrators face when they set up MAX 4000 WAN access switches which can accommodate up to 96 T1, ISDN, or Frame Relay sessions and support over 20 different WAN protocols. In addition, six expansion slots can accommodate a variety of interfaces including Ethernet, Serial WAN, digital modems and ISDN-BRI client and host. The total count of configurable parameters on the MAX 4004 exceeds 23,000.

The sheer volume of options adds complexity to the configuration process. "With highly configurable products, network and systems administrators must constantly consult the documentation as they figure out how to set the parameters for their unique implementation. A Java-based application can ease the configuration task by organizing and presenting volumes of information that would otherwise be overwhelming," says Dale Rentrop, director of product development at TAI.

TAI began developing a new configuration utility with the most complex product in the line because the capabilities of the MAX 4000 line are a superset of those found in Ascend's other Internet access switches. Soon after the release of the configurator for the MAX 4000, the software will be ported to the MAX 2000 and 1800 product lines.

Once the configuration utilities are launched across the product line, the Java developers at Ascend and TAI engineers have already charted over a year's worth of projects for making Ascend products line easier to manage and update. Still on the drawing board are plans for management consoles, a simplified version for office Pipeline customers and more sophisticated monitoring for the network administrators who oversee WAN access switches. Ascend also envisions developing an applet that would notify customers whenever a new release of firmware for a product they own is available on its Web site, an applet that will make it easier for a Pipeline user to take control of bringing ISDN lines up and down, and statistical reporting features that would allow users to monitor how their ISDN channels are being used. "We expect that very soon Java will work consistently across platforms. Then we will be able to implement new features and distribute them quickly to all of our customers," says Bennachi.