TEIN2 Collaboration (Engineer Concerns)

1. TEIN2 Collaboration(Engineer Concerns) Yu-lin CHANG @ ASNet / APAN-TW 20th APAN Meeting Aug 25, 2005

2. Items of Contribution to TEIN2 • Money, Human resources and offices • Local staffs: engineers, and secretaries in every pop • Office spaces for local staffs • Facilities • Routers, switches, servers, rack spaces... • Circuits • The most complex items! • How many efforts should TEIN2 engineers pay on manage lost of different circuit properties to carry traffics from one node to another node?

3. Human resources and offices • Local Staffs hired by REN • REN usually operated by (or collaborated with) university teachers and students • has budgets to hire engineers and research assistants • Easy to setup a small team for TEIN2 to perform servers maintenance, paper work, etc. • Share office • TEIN2 local staff can share offices with REN • without extra expense (or in lower cost) to rent an office

4. Facilities • TEIN2 calls for facility donation (previous meetings) • New facility • Usually come with contract of maintenance • When original maintenance contract expires  !! • REN usually has contract with local S.I. (service integrators) or vendors  Put TEIN2 facilities into maintenance contract with REN’s facilities  get better (cheaper) service fee  save money $$

5. B REN-1 A TEIN2 A TEIN2 B Circuits – Layer 3 transit • Example, REN-1 transit TEIN2 from A to B TEIN2 traffic “routed” by REN-1 From A to B.

6. A TEIN2 A TEIN2 B Circuit – Layer 2/1 transport • Example, REN-1 transport TEIN2 from A to B B REN-1 TEIN2 traffic “transported” by REN-1 From A to B.

7. Difficulty on Layer 3 • Routing and Troubleshooting • Lots of adjustment/negotiation should be made if someone been inserted into TEIN2 or REN (the donator) routing clouds • What will happened if REN accidentally inject wrong routes into TEIN2 (or vice versa)? • Troubleshooting is a challenge if something goes wrong especially on time-critical issue • Functionality • What will happened if TEIN2 requests something that REN does not support yet? (ex, multicasting, ipv6...)

8. Layer 2/1 makes engineer happy • Pure bandwidth from Engineers’ point of view • No routing negotiation between TEIN2 and REN (the donator)  easy to control routing • Simple debug procedure  easy to identify the responsibility • Not necessary to inform REN before enable new functions (in general case)

9. Layer 2/1 issues? • Possibilities • Light Path • MPLS Layer 2 VPN (Virtual Circuit) • Ethernet VLAN • Simplicity (for TEIN2 engineer) • Light Path ~= MPLS L2 VPN > Ethernet VLAN • VLAN still needs negotiation on some services, ex multicasting ... • Simplicity (for REN engineer, the donator) • Light Path > MPLS L2 VPN > Ethernet VLAN • Entry level of MPLS (as well as VLAN) is high • It is not able to enable VLAN without special equipments on WAN

10. Layer 2/1 issues? • Resilience • MPLS L2 VPN ~= Ethernet VLAN > Light Path • Assumption: does not config protection path for Light Path • The convergence time of restoration MPLS L2 VPN >= Ethernet VLAN Light Path > MPLS L2 VPN >= Ethernet VLN • if config a protection on Light Path, it is possible to get 50ms restoration time (the SDH quality) • Operation Cost • Incl. device: Light Path > MPLS L2 VPN > Ethernet VLAN • Excl. device: Ethernet VLAN > MPLS L2 VPN ~= Light Path

11. Troubleshooting on Layer2/1 • TEIN2 • Facing to REN NOC • Simple and single contact point to a specific bandwidth • REN • Facing to circuit company • Maintain the exist escalate procedure • Simply take TEIN2 as one of customers (very important customer!)

12. ASNet’s Choice • ASNet prefers to provide MPLS L2 VPN Circuit • WDM/SDH switches are still expansive • Ethernet VLAN brings complex management procedures to our engineers • MPLS is enabled on ASNet entire network • A choice based on • Financial guys are happy • Engineers are happy  Hope TEIN2 members are happy too 

13. Thank You!