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[ NNSquad ] Re: Characterizing broadband networks without client software


At 11:26 AM 11/24/2007, Bob Frankston wrote:

What makes it especially interesting is the sense that broadband is provisioned using traditional network/telephony thinking.

I disagree. We actually developed our own methods of provisioning our networks and shaping our traffic on our own -- based on what the majority of our customers wanted.


I'm trying to figure out how to articulate it but concepts like traffic shaping and even MPLS would seem to bias the network towards a particular kind of traffic. This is the insidious bias I've mentioned in the past.

It isn't insidious.... It's necessary. If you don't shape the traffic, your users will -- by exhausting the available bandwidth with things like P2P piracy, leaving none for other users' legal and more urgent applications.


With the descriptions of the queue delays you get a sense that managing scarce resources that is deeply embedded and implicit in the psyche of these network planners.

Naturally. It's vital to our business.

You also get a sense of the consequences of building on top of tradition networks as in the delays waiting for your slot in the TDM stream.

Actually, "waiting for your slot in the TDM stream" costs nothing -- just a small bit of latency. What's more insidious is the "bit tax" imposed by ATM and similar protocols. (IP imposes less overhead on data but much more on voice, making it a poor choice for voice communications. But people are forcing the Internet model onto telephony, which IMHO is as much a mistake as some people claim the reverse to be.)


If you look at 3G cellular architecture (there was a fine issue of IEEE Communications on EVDO a while back) you see similar the policies built in below the IP layer that limit the use of the network as simple infrastructure.

People's needs aren't simple. And one size does not fit all.

--Brett Glass

    [ This thread can continue for a bit so long as it
      concentrates on the *technical* aspects under discussion.
      If it strays too far from that focus, it's toast.

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                          NNSquad Moderator ]