DOs and DONTs for small ISP

Mon Jun 3 17:45:19 UTC 2019

On Mon, Jun 03, 2019 at 01:48:33PM +0000, Mel Beckman wrote:
> I’m constantly amazed at the number of even medium-sized ISPs that have no network monitoring. An NMS should go in as the first software component — before billing starts and the provider is on the hook to deliver. 

	often people are using tools like quickbooks to start, these don't support integration with networking tools.  You see tools like Sonar or powercode in use.  Some of this is changing with newer tools like UNMS and UCRM in some spaces, but often these are vendor locked or don't integrate well.

> The second lacking component is a ticket system, which is silly because turnkey cloud services are not expensive, and open source solutions abound for budget-limited operators. 

	The number of people who can't do sysadmin functions is high.  there's a reason SaaS is a thing, but the costs are often enough to force someone to roll their own.  Take something like powercode with a $1/subscriber fee which adds up quickly.

> The third component failure is security, including weak and default (!) passwords, failure to use real certificates, and the complete lack of 2FA or MFA. Security also requires data surveillance, in the form of net flow analysis.

	Much of this is because hardware has defaults that aren't sane or lack some ZTP or provisioning that you can do.  How do you do this with UBNT, Tik or other cost optimized hardware?

> The “two guys and a router” business model must be upgraded with more planning and a cohesive operating plan.

	Most large networks are run with small teams, while usually more than 2 it's often not more than 10 to do the arch + eng work necessary.  If you have more, they're often doing installer work not actual eng work.

	- Jared

> > On Jun 3, 2019, at 5:05 AM, Mehmet Akcin <mehmet at akcin.net> wrote:
> > 
> > hi there,
> > 
> > I know there are folks from lots of small ISPs here and I wanted to check-in on asking few advice points as I am involved building an ISP from green-field.
> > 
> > Usually, it's pretty straight forward to cover high-level important things, filters, routing policies, etc.but we all know the devil is in the details. 
> > 
> > I am putting together a public DOs and DONTs blog post and would love to hear from those who have built ISPs and have recommendations from Billing to Interconnection, Routing policy to Out of the band  & console setup, Software recommendations, etc. Bottom line is that I would like to publish a checklist with these recommendations which I hope will be useful for all. 
> > 
> > thanks in advance for your help and recommendation.
> > 
> > Mehmet
> > 
> > 

-- 
Jared Mauch  | pgp key available via finger from jared at puck.nether.net
clue++;      | http://puck.nether.net/~jared/  My statements are only mine.