IP-Internets

Tim Salo salo at networkcs.com
Thu Oct 14 18:24:33 UTC 1999


> Date: Thu, 14 Oct 1999 11:02:04 -0400 (EDT)
> From: Bulent Yener <yener at research.bell-labs.com>
> Subject: IP-Internets
> 	[...]
> 2- how commonly is IP over ATM used?

   From the ATM Forum Board of Directors Report - Rome, Italy, April 23,1999:
   
   ... Fred [Baker, chair of the IETF] stated that 75% of all Internet traffic
   today touches an ATM device and acknowledged the importance of the role
   of ATM in providing traffic engineering in today's networks. ...

I don't really know where this number comes from nor whether it is
really true.

A number of facilities-based carriers are either migrating or talking
about migrating from ATM to some sort of IP-over-fiber solution.  I
believe that the economics of ATM versus IP-over-fiber solutions are
tremendously different for those who own fiber compared to those who
don't own the fiber.

> Do network operators really care about the  cell-tax?
> 	[...]

Define "care".  Certainly, one sees a lot of whining about the ATM
"cell tax".  On the other hand, if Fred Baker is correct, ATM is heavily
used in the Internet.  Having said that, I believe that any ISP that
selects a service on the basis of some sort of overhead measurement, rather
than an evaluation of cost versus performance, is confused.

-tjs




More information about the NANOG mailing list