Qwest desires mesh to reduce unused standby capacity

Thu Feb 28 13:39:45 UTC 2008

On 28-Feb-2008, at 01:56, Paul Wall wrote:

> UU/MFS tried running IP on the 'protect' path of their SONET rings  
> 10 years ago. It didn't work then.

Well, it works so long as whoever was trying to troubleshoot the  
circuits at 3am on US Thanksgiving understands that having the system  
"switch to protect" is quite bad, in the sense that it causes both  
sides to go down at once (I seem to remember there was a protect paths  
built for each side of the original ring using a loopback).

Other than the unfamiliarity with the concept demonstrated by phone  
companies, I didn't notice any great fundamental problem with the  
idea. The extra 10G of capacity across the Atlantic was arguably more  
useful in the grand scheme of things than the being able to recover  
from a single-point failure at SONET speeds. It's probably fair to say  
there's more real-time traffic on the network today than there was  
then, however.

I have never worked for UU/MFS, lest anybody draw that conclusion.

Joe