Internet Info 1994 March/Internet Info CD-ROM (Walnut Creek) (March 1994).iso/inet/isoc/isoc_news/issue1-3/n-1-3-012.10a

Text File | 1993-03-01 | 6KB | 115 lines

N-1-3.012.10, "Status of the European IP Backbone, EBONE", by Bernhard
Stockman, <[e-mail]>


EBONE was established as a European Backbone in Spring 1992, providing
IP and CLNP services.  This was possible due to generous contributions
from many national and international networking organizations from the
R&D and commercial sectors.  A core backbone consisting of five
interconnected EBONE core nodes, and the EBONE Border Systems (or
EBS's) were defined and implemented.  The EBS's are located in
Amsterdam, London, Geneva, Montpellier, and Stockholm.  EBONE is
connected to the US networks via lines from Stockholm (768 Kbps),
London (512 Kbps), and Geneva (1544 Kbps).

The EBONE Action Team (EAT), consisting of technical representatives
from the EBONE member organizations, has the engineering
responsibility of the EBONE.  So far, EAT has specified an EBONE
Implementation Plan, an EBONE Routing Plan, and an EBONE Operations
Plan which together gives the framework for the implementation and
provision of the EBONE services.

An EBONE Operations Team (EOT) was defined and nominated to provide
the day to day operations of the backbone according to the EBONE
Operations Plan.  The EOT consists of representatives from the EBONE
Border System sites and the EBONE Network Operation Center staff.  The
EBONE NOC was nominated to be KTH in Stockholm, Sweden, which also
provides NOC services for the NORDUnet and SUNET networks.

Today's current situation

EBONE has developed very rapidly during this spring and summer.
Requirements for information and connectivity have been received from
many new organizations which now are under implementation.  Central
and East European countries have shown serious intentions to connect
to the EBONE.  For this reason, a possible extension with a new EBONE
Border System in Austria is now under evaluation.

One major change in the EBONE core layout will occur when the EBONE
Border System in France is moved from Montpellier to Paris as a
consequence of the establishment of the French national academic
network, RENATER.  To the French EBS in Paris, a 512 Kbps line to the
US will be connected this coming October.

The EBONE routing implementation has been an ongoing challenge.  To be
able to provide redundant US backup where all the EBONE to US lines
are utilized, advanced policy based routing has to be implemented.
This has been achieved using BGP-III both as the external gateway
protocol and as internal routing protocol (iBGP).  For many reasons,
it will not be possible to use default routing within the EBONE and
full routing has to be implemented.  This requires support today for
over 7,000 networks.  To implement this, a major upgrade of all EBONE
Border System routers will be necessary and is foreseen to happen in
the beginning of autumn this year.

A joint effort for inclusion of EBONE routing information in the RIPE
NCC database is ongoing.  The goal is to be able to generate loadable
EBS configurations directly from the RIPE NCC database.

A integration of ISO CLNS as a full EBONE service is planned for
autumn.  An implementation plan is under way and being worked on by
the European CLNS project group.  Results will be presented at the
EBONE Action Team meeting in Stockholm, September 3.

A major EBONE member meeting will be arranged in Vienna, September 23,
where the continuation of the EBONE is to be discussed.  This shall be
seen in the light of recent activities in European academic
networking.

EBONE and Europe

A call for tender for a follow-up of the CEC funded COSINE IXI pilot
X.25 network was issued some time ago.  Recently one of the bidders,
Netherlands PTT Telecom, the current provider of the IXI pilot
service, was nominated to provide the follow-up named, IXI Production
Service (IXI-PS).  The IXI-PS will deliver an IP service.  An IP
router will be developed and integrated with the X.25 switches by the
vendor of these switches.  These switches were used in the IXI pilot
and will initially also be used for the IXI-PS.  The performance of
the IXI-PS IP service is limited by the general performance of the
X.25 technology to provide a guaranteed packet forwarding rate of 300
packets per second initially, and around 400 packets per second in
1993 at access points.  With an average packet size of 128 bytes, this
gives a maximum throughput of 307 Kbps and 410 Kbps.

So far, the technology chosen to implement the IXI-PS IP service is
unknown and no interoperability guarantees with other Internet
networks exist.  Accordingly, many concerns have been raised with both
the performance and the interoperability of this service.
Independently performed interoperability tests of the IXI-PS IP
service have been requested by RIPE and EBONE representatives.

To be able to have a coordinated provision of networking services for
the European R&D sector, there are now ongoing efforts to establish a
limited company (currently named the Operational Unit (OU)).  Possible
shareholders (and by the influence of the OU) is limited to European
national R&D networks.  The role of the OU, once established, is not
yet clear.  There are at least two possible scenarios.  The OU may act
as a clearing house, buying network services from possible providers
and resell this to the European R&D sector.  By acting on behalf of
the national R&D networks, it is assumed that favorable prices may be
negotiated with network service providers.  The OU may, on the other
hand, provide networking services within itself and by that be in
competition with other possible providers.

One assumption made is that the OU initially shall resell the IXI-PS
X.25 service, the IXI-PS IP service and the EBONE IP service.  As a
consequence, the IXI-PS and the EBONE could be regarded as being in
competition with each other.  If the OU can be neutral and provide the
IXI-PS and EBONE IP services on equal terms, is dependent to a large
extent how the OU will be implemented and managed, which is currently
unknown.