the Internet Backbone
William Allen Simpson
bsimpson at morningstar.com
Sat Apr 6 18:59:03 UTC 1996
> From: Paul Ferguson <pferguso at cisco.com>
> At 03:34 PM 4/5/96 +0800, Vadim Antonov wrote:
> >Paul A Vixie <paul at vix.com> wrote:
> >>Last time this term came up, I opined that there was no "backbone" any more
> >>and that 1996's Internet had a "hairball topology." Vadim, among others,
> >>disagreed with me but we didn't pursue the topic. Perhaps we should have.
> >
> >Well, "backbone" is too vague. I rather prefer to think of Internet
> >topology as of "tiers". The nodes in upper-levels cast "cones of
> >influence" in lower tiers. Nodes from lower tiers belonging to
> >different cones of influence do not generally speak to each other,
> >and so have to purchase transit from higher tiers.
> >
>
> Well, I kind of liked the term 'blobs' [credit to Jerry Scharf]. :-)
>
I agree with Paul Vixie, there is no true backbone, although there are
two possible contenders for the title.
Tiers were called "bubbles" by Noel Chiappa, if I remember correctly.
I rather like bubbles instead of cones or tiers, as it matches the old
political "spheres of influence".
WSimpson at UMich.edu
Key fingerprint = 17 40 5E 67 15 6F 31 26 DD 0D B9 9B 6A 15 2C 32
BSimpson at MorningStar.com
Key fingerprint = 2E 07 23 03 C5 62 70 D3 59 B1 4F 5E 1D C2 C1 A2
More information about the NANOG
mailing list