RE: Exchanges that matter...

[Todd Graham Lewis <lists () reflections mindspring com>]

On Tue, 3 Dec 1996, Danny Stroud wrote:

> Actually, I think the issue is not about moving. It is more about developing 
> *new* facilities now to handle the forecasted demands.

Certainly a valid pov.

> As the Internet becomes 
> more pervasive and the expectations of the users (and investors) become 
> higher, we (the Internet access provider community) will need to have better, 
> cheaper, faster, more resilient, etc. etc. networks.

Yep, uh huh.

> I find it hard to fathom 
> a completely pervasive network routing through a few exchange points.

Why not?  More below.

> As the 
> national telco infrastructure evolved over the last few decades (with CO's on 
> just about every corner) so will go the Internet.

But with most of the major backbone providers we're rapidly approaching
POPs in every city as it is, and any finer granularity really doesn't make
much sense, except maybe in the mega-cities. 

Exchange points are not analogous to COs; major routing problems ensue as
the number of exchange points increase.  E.g., if there were three EPs per
continent, and if each major network connected to these three EPs, and a
requirement for connecting to the EPs was that you have a fully redundant
backbone, what would be the problem?

> I admire the foresight of 
> those attempting to develop new exchange points. I do not envy the uphill 
> battle they have before them. des

I don't envy them either, but I'm beginning to question the "a chicken in
every pot and a NAP on every corner" approach to network design.  Of
course, I don't strictly have to worry about these things; that's why I
and AOL and most network operators have upstream network providers.

__
Todd Graham Lewis             Linux!                 Core Engineering
Mindspring Enterprises  tlewis () mindspring com   (800) 719 4664, x2804

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