~
October 1991
INTERNET MONTHLY REPORTS
------------------------
The purpose of these reports is to communicate to the Internet Research
Group the accomplishments, milestones reached, or problems discovered by
the participating organizations.
This report is for Internet information purposes only, and is not
to be quoted in other publications without permission from the
submitter.
Each organization is expected to submit a 1/2 page report on the first
business day of the month describing the previous month's activities.
These reports should be submitted via network mail to:
Ann Westine Cooper (Cooper@ISI.EDU)
NSF Regional reports - Corinne Carroll (ccarroll@NNSC.NSF.NET)
Directory Services reports - Tom Tignor (TPT2@ISI.EDU)
Requests to be added or deleted from the Internet Monthly report list
should be sent to "cooper@isi.edu".
Back issues of the Internet Monthly Report can be copied via FTP:
FTP> nis.nsf.net
Login: anonymous guest
ftp> cd imr
ls
get IMRYY-MM.TXT
For example, JUNE 1991 is in the file IMR91-06.TXT.
Cooper [Page 1]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTERNET ACTIVITIES BOARD
IAB MESSAGE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 4
INTERNET RESEARCH REPORTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 5
AUTONOMOUS NETWORKS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 5
END-TO-END SERVICES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 5
IRTF RESEARCH REPORT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 5
PRIVACY AND SECURITY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 6
INTERNET ENGINEERING REPORTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 8
Internet Projects
ANSNET/NSFNET BACKBONE ENGINEERING REPORT . . . . . . . . page 11
BARRNET . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 13
BOLT BERANEK AND NEWMAN, INC., . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 13
CICNET. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 14
CIX (COMMERCIAL INTERNET EXCHANGE). . . . . . . . . . . . page 14
CONCERT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 15
CREN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 16
CSUNET (CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY NETWORK). . . . . . . page 18
FARNET (FEDERATION OF AMERICAN RESEARCH NETWORKS) . . . . page 18
ISI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 19
JVNCNET, NORTH EAST RESEARCH REGIONAL NETWORK . . . . . . page 21
LOS NETTOS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 23
MITRE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 23
NEW ENGLAND ACADEMIC AND RESEARCH NETWORK . . . . . . . . page 24
NNSC, UCAR/BOLT BERANEK and NEWMAN, INC., . . . . . . . . page 24
NSFNET BACKBONE, MERIT. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 25
PITTSBURGH SUPERCOMPUTER CENTER . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 27
SAIC. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 28
SAN DIEGO SUPERCOMPUTER CENTER . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 28
SURANET . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 30
UCL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 31
UDEL. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 31
DIRECTORY SERVICES ACTIVITIES
DIRECTORY SERVICES MESSAGE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 33
IETF OSIDS & DISI WORKING GROUPS. . . . . . . . . . . . . page 33
FOX - FIELD OPERATIONAL X.500 PROJECT . . . . . . . . . . page 35
ISI. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 35
MERIT. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 35
PSI. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 35
SRI. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 36
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NORTH AMERICAN DIRECTORY FORUM. . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 37
PSI DARPA/NNT X.500 PROJECT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 38
PSI WHITE PAGES PILOT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 38
CALENDAR OF EVENTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 39
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Internet Monthly Report October 1991
IAB MESSAGE
IAB REPORT
STANDARDS ACTIONS:
Since September 1991, the IAB has taken the following standards
actions, following recommendations of the IESG:
o Draft Standard state for BGP,
RFC 1267: "A Border Gateway Protocol 3 (BGP-3)"
RFC 1268: "Application of the Border Gateway Protocol"
o Proposed Standard state for BGP MIB,
RFC 1269: "Definitions of Managed Objects for the
Border Gateway Protocol (Version 3)".
o Proposed Standard state for "The COSINE and Internet
X.500 Schema".
o Proposed Standard state for "An interim approach to use of
Network Addresses". This spec concerns an NSAP encoding
specifically for use with RFC-1006 encapsulation of the
OSI upper layers.
o Proposed Standard state for "Replication and Distributed
Operations Extensions to Provide an Internet Directory
Using X.500".
o Proposed Standard state for "Multiprotocol Interconnect
over Frame Relay Networks".
o Proposed Standard state for DECNET Phase IV MIB.
o Proposed Standard state for Remote Monitor (RMON) MIB.
o Proposed Standard state for Inverse ARP.
o Proposed Standard state for Bridge MIB.
Bob Braden (Braden@ISI.EDU)
Cooper [Page 4]
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AUTONOMOUS NETWORKS
-------------------
Deborah Estrin and Yakov Rekhter have been working on a unified
architecture for inter-domain routing that combines the benefits
of BGP/IDRP-style hop-by-hop routing and IDPR-style source-
demand routing. Estrin will present their ideas at the November
IETF.
Deborah Estrin (Estrin@USC.EDU)
END-TO-END SERVICES
-------------------
No progress to report this month.
Bob Braden (Braden@ISI.EDU)
IRTF RESEARCH REPORT
--------------------
The IRTF Research Group on Resource Discovery and Directory
Service held its first meeting on October 13th. We are
currently focusing on defining an architectural framework to
allow resource discovery related activities to interoperate,
including:
- advertising resources
- discovering the existence of resources (advertised
or not)
- locating appropriate instances (e.g., a nearby
file replica)
- learning to use discovered resources
- organizing discovered resources
Our meeting considered three sets of issues:
- protocols to support queries between subsystems
- support for attribute-based searches
- scalability of replication and distribution mechanisms
We also discussed possible prototype efforts.
Michael Schwartz (schwartz@cs.colorado.edu)
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PRIVACY AND SECURITY
--------------------
The PSRG met at BBN in Cambridge, MA on September 10-12, 1991.
The middle day of the PSRG meeting was devoted to a PEM Working
Group meeting, with additional attendees joining the PSRG
members for that day.
Most of the PSRG meeting was devoted to continuing discussion of
Internet security architecture issues, a topic which also was
the focus for the last PSRG meeting in May at University College
London. The thrust of this work is a characterization of what
security services are required for various classes of
"applications" within the Internet and an analysis of whether
these security services are provided by existing (application or
lower layer) protocols.
Applications being examined in the context include mail,
directory services, file transfer, remote login, network file
systems, interior and exterior gateway protocols,
teleconferencing, time synchronization, etc. The security
services considered include authentication, integrity, access
control, confidentiality, and non-repudiation.
This analysis will yield a set of recommendations of protocol
security facilities to be used to provide security services for
various applications. The analsyis also will point out gaps in
the existing protocol suites, i.e., applications for which one
or more security services cannot be provided effectively. We
hope to be able to generalize from this analysis to make
security facility recommendations for large classes of Internet
applications.
At the PEM WG portion of the meeting there was considerable
progress on resolving issues related to the form of a
certification hierarchy for the Internet, initially for use with
PEM but useable by other applications as well, e.g., X.500 and
X.400. The attendees agreed upon a structure in which a root,
operated by the Internet Society, would certify various Policy
Certification Authorities (PCAs). Each PCA would promulgate
policies for certification authorities (CAs) registered under
the auspices of that PCA. The policies and procedures for a PCA
would be published as informational RFC.
All certificates issued by CAs will have the property that the
subject's X.500 distinguished name is subordinate to the
issuer's distinguished name, thus causing an isomorphism between
the naming and certification hierarchies below the PCA level.
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Internet Monthly Report October 1991
This architecture supports a variety of policies with regard to
organization and user certification. It also preserves the
ability of any user to determine, unambiguously, the policy
under which any certificate was issued.
It is anticipated that PCAs will be established to accommodate
users wanting high assurance policies (as per the RSADSI model
of certification), less stringent policies (as per MIT's model
for student registration), pseudononymous certification (as
previously accommodated by PERSONA certificates), and
residential user certification (as previously managed via NOTARY
certificates).
On the last day of the meetings, the PSRG discussed the newly
announced DRAFT FIPS Digital Signature Standard algorithm. As a
result of this discussion, the PSRG issued a memo on the
possible implications of this algorithm, especially with regard
to use with PEM, to the IAB. The PSRG did not recommend
adoption of this algorithm, at this time, for several reaosns:
- the DSS is quite new, i.e., it does not have a "track
record"
- the DSS is a DRAFT FIPS and thus has not yet made it
through the review and comment cycle mandated for FIPS
- the DSS satisfies the signature requirement of PEM, but
does not address the problem of symmetric key distribution
- the performance of the DSS, in the PEM, context, is
appreciably worse than the RSA algorithm
- use of the DSS does not ameliorate export control problems
- adding new algorithms to the list for use with PEM,
without grouping the algorithms into "suites" could result
in lack of widespread interoperability due to the range of
algorithms employed by PEM (encryption, message hash,
certificate hash, message signature, certificate signature,
and key encryption).
Note that this recommendation is not a condemnation of the DRAFT
DSS, but rather a suggestion to "wait and see" before making any
decisions with regard to its adoption in the Internet.
Steve Kent (kent@BBN.COM)
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INTERNET ENGINEERING REPORTS
----------------------------
IETF PROGRESS REPORT (October, 1991)
1. Let me remind everyone that the next IETF meeting will take
place from November 18th through the 22nd in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
The Sunday night reception will be held at the El Dorado hotel
begining at 6 PM on November 17th. Complete registration and
logistics information has already been mailed to the IETF mailing
list. A preliminary schedule for working group meetings have also
been mailed to the IETF list. For copies of this information (or
for any other question about the upcoming meeting), please mail
your request to ietf-rsvp@nri.reston.va.us.
It should be noted that the duration of the meeting has been
extended two hours to accommodate an additional WG meeting slot
during the week. Friday morning will be devoted to technical
presentations. The Area Director reports will be presented from
1:30 to 3:30 PM Friday afternoon, which will conclude the week's
schedule.
2. There has been a great deal of standards activity during the
month. The Border Gateway Protocol Version 3 (RFC1267), its MIB and
supporting documentation were published in a five RFC set. With
this publication, BGP was elevated to Draft Standard. In addition
to the WG actions, the Internet Activities Board submitted RFC
1262, Guidelines for Internet Measurement Activities, The Internet
Routing Protocol Standardization Criteria was released as RFC1264,
and SNMP Communications Services was released as RFC1270.
A number of other IESG protocol recommendations were approved by
the IAB during the month, and these will be listed in the November
monthly report.
3. As a result of discussions held during the Atlanta IETF
Meeting, the minutes of IESG meetings are now available via FTP.
These minutes are located in a distributed directory on the same
hosts as the ietf and internet-drafts directories. Filenames are in
the form "iesg.minutes.date" where date is the date of meeting
(such as 91-08-15 for the August 15, 1991 minutes).
To retrieve these minutes, FTP into one of the available machines
with the username "anonymous" and password "guest". After logging
in, type
"cd iesg".
"get iesg.minutes.91-10-03"
Cooper [Page 8]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
4. 1 New Working Group was formed: Internet School Networking
(cosn)
5. 20 Internet Draft Actions between October 1, and October 31,
1991:
(Revised draft (o), New Draft (+) )
WG I-D Title <Filename>
------ -----------------------------------------------------
(osids) o An Interim Approach to use of Network Addresses
<draft-ucl-kille-networkaddresses-05.txt, or .ps>
(rreq) o Requirements for Internet IP Routers
<draft-ietf-rreq-iprouters-03.txt>
(ahwgipso) o U.S. Department of Defense Security Options for
the Internet Protocol
<draft-ietf-ahwgipso-ipso-01.txt>
(spwg) o Guidelines for the Secure Operation of the Internet
<draft-ietf-spwg-secureop-02.txt, .ps>
(bgp) o Border Gateway Protocol NEXT-HOP-SNPA Attribute
<draft-ietf-bgp-nexthop-01.txt>
(acct) o Internet Accounting: Background
<draft-ietf-acct-background-01.txt>
(822ext) o Mechanisms for Specifying and Describing the Format
of Internet Message Bodies
<draft-ietf-822ext-messagebodies-01.txt, .ps>
(none) o A User Agent Configuration Mechanism For Multimedia
Mail Format Information
<draft-ietf-borenstein-configmech-01.txt, .ps>
(none) o Mid-Level Networks: Potential Technical Services
<draft-aggarwal-services-03.txt, .ps>
(none) o International character support in SMTP
<draft-prime-ullmann-smtp-01.txt>
(rreq) o IP Forwarding Table MIB
<draft-ietf-rreq-forwarding-01.txt>
(none) o RIP Version 2 Addition of Subnet Masks
<draft-ietf-malkin-rip-01.txt>
(bgp) o Application of the Border Gateway Protocol in
the Internet
<draft-ietf-bgp-usage-01.txt>
(x25mib) + SNMP MIB extension for HDLC
<draft-ietf-x25mib-hdlcmib-00.txt>
(x25mib) + SNMP MIB extension for IP over X.25
<draft-ietf-x25mib-ipox25mib-00.txt>
(x25mib) + SNMP MIB extension for the X.25 Packet Layer
<draft-ietf-x25mib-x25packet-00.txt>
(netfax) + File Format for the Transmission of Images in
the Internet
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<draft-ietf-netfax-netimage-00.txt>
(iab) + The Internet Standards Process
<draft-iab-standardsprocess-00.txt>
(bgp) + BGP OSPF Interaction
<draft-ietf-bgp-ospfinteract-00.txt>
(appleip) + Tunnelling AppleTalk through IP
<draft-ietf-appleip-aurp-00.txt, .ps>
6) 7 RFC's Produced between October 1 and October 31, 1991
(Standard (S), Proposed Standard (PS), Draft Standard (DS),
Experimental (E), Informational (I) )
RFC Status WG Title
------- -- -------- --------------------------------------------
RFC1264 I (iesg) Internet Routing Protocol Standardization
Criteria
RFC1265 I (bgp) BGP Protocol Analysis
RFC1266 I (bgp) Experience with the BGP Protocol
RFC1267 DS (bgp) A Border Gateway Protocol 3 (BGP-3)
RFC1268 PS (bgp) Application of the Border Gateway Protocol
in the Internet
RFC1269 I (bgp) Definitions of Managed Objects for the
Border Gateway Protocol (Version 3)
RFC1270 I (snmpdir) SNMP Communications Services
Phill Gross (pgross@NRI.RESTON.VA.US)
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Internet Monthly Report October 1991
INTERNET PROJECTS
-----------------
ANSNET/NSFNET Backbone Engineering Report
-----------------------------------------
Summary
The reliability of the recently expanded T3 backbone has improved
dramatically over the last month with the resolution to several
outstanding problems. In recent weeks, congestion has begun to set
in on the T1 backbone. An interim solution to address the T1
backbone congestion has been deployed while final reliability
enhancements are being applied to the T3 backbone. New software
has been installed on the T1/T3 interconnect gateways to improve
reliability and performance, while a 3rd interconnect gateway has
been installed in Houston. Following the remaining changes to the
T3 backbone in the coming weeks, we expect to transition more
networks off of the T1 backbone to the T3 backbone.
T1 Backbone Update
The T1 backbone network has recently begun to experience
congestion. The point of congestion is at the ethernet interface
on the E-PSPs. We have implemented a change at the College Park
NSS and the Ithaca NSS which uses a spare RT machine on the NSS to
be used as a second E-PSP. Both of these E-PSP machines are
attached to the single shared ethernet which also interconnects to
regional routers. The load can be split across the two E-PSP
systems since different networks can be designated by the
RCP_ROUTED routing software to use the two different ethernet
interfaces. This has been running successfully for a few days at
College Park and Ithaca. We plan to replicate this "dual E-PSP"
configuration at a few additional T1 backbone sites that have
experienced congestion over the next couple of weeks. Also, an
additional T1 connection will be installed between Boston and
Pittsburgh.
T3 Backbone Update
We are pleased to report that the T3 network reliability has
improved dramatically over the last month. Most of the major
problems which followed the installation of the phase-II network
deployment have been resolved. These include the observed packet
loss, the DSU synchronization problems, and most recently, the T3
interface adapter "black link" problem which has been significantly
minimized with recent software fixes and hardware configuration
changes in the routers. We have turned off ICMP network
Cooper [Page 11]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
unreachable messages which are generated from within the core CNSS
interfaces which were causing end users to see TCP session
disconnects. The ENSS routers continue to generate ICMP network
unreachable messages on external interfaces. We hope that this
"feature" will make internal topology changes less annoying to
users, at worst causing momentary pauses in data transfers as link
states change and routing algorithms converge.
There are a few remaining minor problems involving the routing
software which involve the periodic loss of internal BGP
connections between routers. The fixes to these problems are being
tested and will shortly be deployed on the production backbone.
Once these and other changes have been deployed, we will begin to
transition the remaining networks advertised over the T1 backbone
to use the T3 backbone.
The last remaining T3 link installation for the Phase-II plan for
the T3 backbone upgrade has been completed, from Denver to St.
Louis. All CNSS sites are now multiply connected. The T3 ENSS
installation at Lincoln, NB has been delayed
Safety Net Plan
The plan to deploy 12 new T1 links on the T3 backbone to
redundantly interconnect the existing T3 CNSS nodes together is in
progress. Routing metrics will be established on the T3 backbone
so that the T1 links would be used only in the event that multiple
T3 paths become unreachable between CNSS routers, and no other
alternate T3 paths are available. The links and hardware have been
installed on the production nodes, but have yet not been software
configured. This is pending completion of testing. The
installation is scheduled for completion by mid-November.
T1/T3 Interconnect Gateways
A new version of the "rcp_routed" software was deployed on the Ann
Arbor and San Diego T1/T3 interconnect gateways. This software
allows the interconnect gateways to run as "hot standbys" for each
other, so that if one fails the other will take over. It is still
the case that the switchover will take 6 minutes during a full
route transition. We are preparing to split the routes between
Cooper [Page 12]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
multiple interconnect gateways which will improve load balancing
across the interconnects, and reduce the transition time during an
automatic cutover. A 3rd interconnect gateway has recently been
installed at Houston. Our current plan is to use the Ann Arbor and
Houston gateways as hot standbys for each other, with San Diego as
a manual backup site in case of dual interconnect failure.
Jordan Becker (becker@NISC.JVNC.NET), Advanced Network & Services Inc.
Mark Knopper (mak@merit.edu), Merit Network, Inc.
BARRNET
-------
The U.S. Forest Service Pacific Southwest Research Station became
BARRNet's 100th connected member in October, joining with a 56kbps
connection. Two additional sites were connected at 56kbps, bringing
the total BARRNet connectedmembership to 102. BARRNet also provided
the Internet connectivity for the Interop 91 trade show in San Jose
October 7-11. Interop is the largest trade show for users and
providers of internetworking equipment.
BARRNet announced in October a new Port-only service, under which a
member may provide their own BARRNet-approved equipment at their
site to connect to a port at a BARRNet hub running PPP. Previously
all equipment had to be BARRNet provided. BARRNet also announced a
plan to deploy routers manufactured by Network Application
Technology to member sites, to further lower the cost of connecting
with BARRNet-provided equipment.
by Paul Baer <pbaer@carcoar.Stanford.EDU>
BOLT BERANEK AND NEWMAN INC.
----------------------------
ST Conferencing
There were a total of 21 video conferences and demonstrations as
well as one four-day SIMNET exercise during September. Two
conferences included four sites, three included three, and the
remaining 16 were point to point. The DWS project sponsored about
one-third of the conferences, making good use of the second
conferencing site at BBN. Conferences were held for discussions in
the following areas: DWS, AWSSIMS, PSRG, and the Fatpipe OMG. The
expected reconnection of Ft. Leavenworth as a TWB conferencing
site did not occur in October, because the T1 tail circuit to the
TWB was not yet available.
Jil Westcott <westcott@BBN.COM>
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Internet Monthly Report October 1991
CICNET
------
This report covers CICNet activities for both Sept. and Oct. 1991.
During the month of September CICNet began the process of a bid
solicitation to reengineerits backbone and develop new NOC
services. A key component of this process wasa Technical Board
meeting held in Reaston, Virginia on Sept. 12 & 13. This meeting
included an indepth review of current CICNet operations, associated
costs, and analysis and recommendations by Technical Board. The
meeting also included a presentation by MCI and a visit to their
East Coast Network Operations Center. During Sept. CICNet staff
members met with the CIC Telcom Directors and the CIC Library
Automation Directors to discuss issues of mutual interest.
During October the bid solicitation process continued with
presentations by four bidders to a Technical Board committee
charged with making bid recommendations to the CICNet Board of
Directors. CICNet also held the second meeting of the Network
Information Resources Committee (NIRCOMM). This committee is
charged with building an environment within CICNet which provides
for effective and efficient access to the many information
resources located at CICNet member sites and elsewhere. The
Committee is composed of individuals from CICNet member sites
working is a variety of areas, including library automation and
acquisition, user support, campus wide information system
development and support, and network development. At the October
NIRCOMM meeting Ameritech and NOTIS Systems, Inc. gave
presentations on current activities and strategic directions.
by John Hankins <hankins@cic.net>
COMMERCIAL INTERNET EXCHANGE (CIX)
----------------------------------
The following report outlines CIX-WEST usage for the
month of October, 1991.
CIX In Out
Member Octets Packets Errors Octets Packets Errors
--------- ----------------------------- ------------------------------
AlterNet 35597608609 96300940 399 13042811490 72440584 0
CERFnet 19454796525 81325425 211 26492024413 83300747 0
PSINet 19413907185 89331631 1127 34998709405 111714642 0
Starting: Sep 30 1991 at 23:53
Ending: Oct 31 1991 at 23:45
SNMP Polling Intervals: 2840
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Internet Monthly Report October 1991
SNMP Polling Frequency: 15 minutes
In - traffic entering the CIX from the CIX member network
Out - traffic exiting the CIX into the CIX member network
At the present time, approximately 400 networks within AlterNet,
CERFNet, and PSINet are using the CIX-WEST.
A complete list of networks accessible via the CIX is available via
anonymous FTP from cix.org in the file cix.nets. The current
revision of this list is: 29-OCT-1991.
Send mail to info@cix.org for information regarding the CIX.
Mark Fedor (fedor@psi.com)
CONCERT
-------
We had one new 56kbps connection added during the past month,
bringing the total number of connected institutions to 34. A
proposal was submitted to the NSF for funding to connect eight
additional North Carolina universities and colleges.
We have recently started on a project to provide CONCERT's first
production T3 link. The T3 circuit will link the FDDI backbone at
the North Carolina State University with the FDDI network
connecting the CONCERT NOC and the North Carolina Supercomputing
Center. The transmission is via private microwave, with DSUs
converting between the DS3 signal and the high-speed serial
interface provided by Cisco AGS+ routers. Testing is currently
underway, and the link should be operational within the next couple
of months.
A Spectracom Netclock/2 WWVB receiver clock was brought on-line so
that CONCERT could provide a stratum 1 NTP timeserver within our
mid-level network.
Alan Clegg helped staff the OSI Connectivity demonstration at
Interop. The CONCERT network provided end systems for the
demonstration. X.400, X.500, vt and ftam were provided by two
systems at CONCERT. Connectivity was excellent, limited only by
the intermittent failure of the shownet.
The Communications Research group is activily studying applications
of a local area HiPPI network at the North Carolina Supercomputing
Center (NCSC). The HiPPI network interconnects a Cray Y-MP 8/464,
Convex C220, IBM 3090, Maximum Strategies Disk Array, an Ultranet
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Internet Monthly Report October 1991
1000 Hub, and several SUN4/470 workstations.
To study the performance of this network, a HiPPI Link Data
Analysis System (HILDA) has been developed. This system consists
of a single board that plugs into the VME bus of a SUN4
workstation. The HILDA hardware and software provide an array of
functions for measuring and testing this network including:
* Real time analysis of network traffic
* Real time error insertion
* Statistical analysis of upper layer protocol functions
* HiPPI network interface for a SUN4
* Network stress testing analysis
At this point, all of the hardware and software design has been
completed. We are starting to measure live traffic over the
network. We are also using the HILDA system as an high speed
network interface to the CRAY-YMP. When used in such applications
as FTP, we have acheived data rates as fast as 160Mbps from the
Cray to the SUN4 workstation. We have acheived FTP data rates as
fast as 16Mbps from the workstation to the Cray.
by Tom Sandoski <tom@concert.net>
CREN, CORPORATION FOR RESEARCH AND EDUCATIONAL NETWORKING
---------------------------------------------------------
BITNET Node and Gateway Requirements Specified
Acting on the recommendations of its Technical Advisory Committee
(previously BITNET Working Group), the CREN Board has established
minimum requirements for BITNET nodes and for the official INTERBIT
gateways between BITNET and the Internet that belong to members of
CREN. This action was taken in response to increasing concerns
about mail problems on the Internet caused by inconsistencies in
addressing and error handling of mail gatewayed between the two
networks.
* All BITNET nodes must support the POSTMASTER and POSTMAST mail
ID's for local delivery of messages to a human who will follow
up to correct error conditions. This formalizes what has long
been an unofficial requirement for BITNET participants. Support
of the shorter POSTMASTER ID is necessary for those systems
which are limited to eight-character user-names and mail ID's.
* BITNET nodes which communicate with the Internet via the
official INTERBIT gateways must use a BSMTP-compliant mailer,
in order to correctly handle incoming as well as outgoing mail
Cooper [Page 16]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
with domain-style addresses and proper headers (see below for
examples). This action was a compromise, allowing BITNET nodes
which need only to communicate with other BITNET nodes to
operate without a null mailer, in order not to unduly burden
institutions needing such limited services, while simultaneously
addressing the requirements for effective communications
between networks.
* INTERBIT gateways must forward mail only to and from BITNET
nodes with BSMTP-compliant mailers, as soon as the software
can be readied to make that possible. They will use the node's
"servers" tag in BITEARN NODES and its derivative files to
determine if the node has proper mailer software.
* The re-writing of addresses by INTERBIT gateways must comply
with the standards specified by the CREN Board (see below),
as soon as modified software is available to allow that.
Address rewriting is currently not done strictly according to
Internet rules by most of the gateways. The definition of
acceptable rules of address conversion should standardize this
in a way which will also help to reduce looping and other errors.
* The Board encourages unofficial gateways also to comply with
the above requirements.
The full text of the new standards adopted by the CREN Board is
as follows:
A. All BITNET nodes are required to support both POSTMASTER and
POSTMAST mail ID's (case insensitive), for receipt of error
messages and their local delivery to a human capable of taking
whatever action may be necessary. (POSTMASTER will be truncated to
POSTMAST upon receipt by nodes without mailers and must be properly
delivered upon receipt by that account.)
B. Every INTERBIT gateway between BITNET and the Internet operated
by a CREN member or affiliate shall satisfy the following
requirements, which other gateways are also strongly encouraged to
meet: 1. The gateway shall not pass mail to or from BITNET nodes
that do not use a BSMTP-compliant mailer. Mail from the Internet
addressed to a BITNET node without such a mailer shall be returned
with an error message; any file from a BITNET node without a
compliant mailer, and any file without proper Internet mail
headers, even if sent from a node with a compliant mailer, shall be
returned with error message. For reference, the following are
known to be BSMTP compliant: for VM/CMS systems, the combination of
VM Network Mailer, Release 2, and Rice Mail; for MVS systems,
UCLA/Mail; for VAX/VMS systems, Jnet plus PMDF; for Unix, UREP. 2.
Cooper [Page 17]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
The conversion of addresses in the mail headers shall: a. not
modify apparent Fully Qualified Domain Name (FQDN) addresses in
gatewaying mail from BITNET to the Internet or from the Internet to
BITNET; b. convert BITNET addresses of the form user@FOO or user
@FOO.BITNET into Internet addresses of the form
user%FOO.BITNET@gateway.domain, when sending mail from BITNET onto
the Internet; c. convert Internet addresses of the form
user%FOO.BITNET@gateway.domain into BITNET addresses of the form
user@FOO.BITNET, when sending mail from the Internet onto BITNET;
d. not convert or pass into the Internet any mail with BITNET
addresses containing exclamation marks in the "user" field,
as these are ill-defined upon conversion.
The significance of the word "apparent" in B.2.a is that gateways
are not expected to verify the actual address, but only its form.
CREN, the Corporation for Research and Educational Networking, is
the parent corporate structure for BITNET, the United States part
of the global network consisting of BITNET and its Cooperating
Networks.
by Jim Conklin <conklin@bitnic.educom.edu>
CSUNET (The California State University Network)
-----------------------------------------------
We upgraded CSU San Bernardino to T-1 and installed a StrataCom IPX
multiplexer for instructional video and data.
Two-way instructional video is now productional between CSU
Sacramento, CSU Fresno, and CSU Bakersfield. This week CSU San
Bernardino begins live video production.
The Los Angeles Community College District has been added to
CSUnet. LACCD will use CSUnet to gain access to the CSU campuses
educational resources and to the Internet.
Mike Marcinkevicz (mdm@CSU.net)
FARNET
------
CSUnet (the California State University Network) and CONCERT
(Communications for NC Education, Research and Technology) are the
newest members of FARNET. FARNET now has 30 members, including:
Cooper [Page 18]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
State networks 14
Regional (multi-state) networks 7
National nets 3
Supercomputer nets 3
Canadian provincial nets 1
University campuses 1
Local networks 1
FARNET delivered its recommendations regarding inter-regional
connectivity in the next generation of the NSFNET to NSF on
November 1. Copies of the text are publicly available for FTP from
host nic.cerf.net, directory farnet, subdirectory farnet_docs,
filename nsf-backbone-rec.
The next meeting of FARNET will be held in Santa Fe, NM, on Nov.
18-19. The topic is "Improving End-to-End Reliability in the
Internet: Hardening the Network." The winter meeting is tentatively
scheduled for Feb. 11-12 in Orlando, FL. Topic: Commercialization
of the Internet.
Laura Breeden (breeden@NIC.NEAR.NET
ISI
---
GIGABIT NETWORKING
INFRASTRUCTURE
Presentation: "User Services Planning in the Internet". RARE WG3
(Association of European Research Networks) Meetings Directory
Services and User Services. September 28th - October 3rd, 1991 -
Zurich, Switzerland. Provided demonstrations on BBN's "Tour of the
Internet" and UCDavis' "Mining the Internet".
Session Leader: "Internet User Services Session" (10/9/91)
Session Leader: "Internet User Services Birds of a
Feather" (10/10/91)
Interop '91, October 7th - 11th 1991 - San Jose, California.
Presentation on: "Internet School Networking". California Internet
Federation Meeting. October 21st, 1991. San Ramon, California.
Joyce Reynolds (jkrey@ISI.EDU)
Cooper [Page 19]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
Eight RFCs were published this month.
RFC 1262: Vinton G. Cerf, "Guidelines for Internet Measurement
Activities", CNRI, October 1991.
RFC 1263: O'Malley, S., and L. Peterson, "TCP Extensions
Considered Harmful", University of Arizona,
October 1991.
RFC 1264: Hinden, R., "Internet Engineering Task Force
Internet Routing Protocol Standardization Criteria",
BBN, October 1991.
RFC 1265: Y. Rekhter, (IBM) Hinden, R., (BBN), "BGP
Protocol Analysis", October 1, 1991.
RFC 1266: Y, Rekhter, "Experience with the BGP Protocol",
(IBM), October 1, 1991.
RFC 1267: Lougheed, K., (CISCO), Y. Rekhter (IBM), "A Border
Gateway Protocol 3 (BGP-3)", October 1991.
RFC 1268: Rekhter, Y., (IBM), P. Gross, (ANS), "Application
of the Border Gateway Protocol in the Internet",
October 1991.
RFC 1269: Willis, S., and J. Burruss, "Definitions of
Managed Objects for the Border Gateway Protocol
(Version 3)", October 1991.
Ann Westine Cooper (COOPER@ISI.EDU)
MULTIMEDIA CONFERENCING
We have enhanced the SPARCstation implementation of our real-time
Packet Video Program (PVP) from the older ST protocol to ST-II (RFC
1190), and tested it by transmitting packet video across DARTnet
between ISI and BBN. PVP uses the socket API provided by BBN's
kernel implementation of ST-II. Upcoming will be performance tests
of the ST kernel under a mixed load of packet audio and video plus
IP.
ISI has received from SunLabs two prototype S-bus boards that
perform frame buffer, video image capture, video window, and video
codec functions. These boards, called "DIME", will be used for
experiments with "personal conferencing" between workstations.
The TWBnet conferencing system was employed for the first time to
Cooper [Page 20]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
teach a graduate computer science class between USC/ISI and UCL.
As an aid for this lecture, the Multimedia Conference Control
program was extended to allow the lecturer to select display of the
local image on the video monitor instead of the remote image. This
is useful for sharing overhead slides on a copystand camera with
students participating both locally and remotely.
Eve Schooler, Steve Casner
(schooler@ISI.EDU, casner@ISI.EDU)
JVNCNET, NORTH EAST RESEARCH REGIONAL NETWORK
---------------------------------------------
I. General information
A. How to reach us:
*1-800-35-TIGER (from anywhere in the United States)
*by e-mail:
NOC: noc@jvnc.net
Service desk: service@jvnc.net
*by mail: U.S. mail address:
Princeton University
B6 von Neumann Hall
Princeton, NJ 08544
(Director: Sergio Heker)
B. Hours
*NOC: 24 hours/day, seven days a week
Service desk: 9:00 to 5:00 pm, M - F (except holidays)
C. Other info available on-line from NICOL
Telnet to nicol.jvnc.net.
Login ID is nicol and no password.
II. New Information
A. RFCs on-line
To obtain RFCs from the official JvNCnet repository (two methods)
*ftp nicol.jvnc.net; username: nicol; password: <your email
address> *RFC automailer. Send email to sendrfc@jvnc.net.
Subject line is RFCxxxx. xxxx represents the RFC number. RFCs
with three digits only need three digits in the request.
Cooper [Page 21]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
B. Operational Information
JvNCnet availability for September is 99.92%.
JvNCnet traffic (input and output packets combined)
Aug. 1991 : 1,592,886,470
Sept. 1991: 1,982,000,376
September's figure represents an increase of 24%.
C. New On-line Members
Fairleigh Dickinson University, Madison, NJ
Thomas Edison State College, Trenton, NJ
Glassboro State College, Glassboro, NJ
Rider College, Lawrenceville, NJ
D. JvNCnet Symposium Series
An opportunity for novice and Internet-experienced users to
learn more about Internet-reachable applications may be
just what you are looking for. The JvNCnet Symposium,
NETWORK APPLICATIONS, will place Friday, January 24, 1992
at Princeton University.
Program speakers will describe useful and interesting
applications and resources accessible over the Internet.
Send inquiries to nisc@jvnc.net.
E. K-12 Program
JvNCnet recently initiated a K-12 educational program using
dial-up connectivity in the State of New Jersey. The program
was developed because students and teachers in pre-college stand
to receive numerous direct benefits including: electronic
communication with other students, educators, other educational
professionals, academicians and corporate scientists worldwide,
improvement and enrichment of cognitive skills, ability to perform
independent research and knowledge acquisition, and building
computer/technical literacy. We are interested in hearing your
views and comments about the K-12 network matrix. Send email to
K-12-interest@jvnc.net.
by Rochelle Hammer (hammer@jvnc.net)
Cooper [Page 22]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
LOS NETTOS
----------
A technical committee meeting was held on the 30th. This meeting
was used to discuss technical issues only. Routing upgrades,
software upgrades, and hardware upgrades were discussed. Technical
policies and procedures were also discussed. The meeting proved to
be quite valuable because many new technical representatives
supporting Los Nettos have joined the network.
GTE has given us an OK to test, use of a FAX to report T1 outages.
They are willing to try this method after the beginning of the
year. We hope to automate sending of the T1 outaged FAX's with our
network monitoring system and our e-mail FAX server.
OSPF routing tests continue.
Walt Prue (Prue@ISI.EDU)
MITRE Corporation
-----------------
Walt Lazear and John McGuthry participated in the OSI
Infrastructure booth at Interop '91. We had X.500 and FTAM
available on the Internet for access from the booth. The
interoperability testing and routing problems before the show were
exciting. The OSI networking at the show, however, is better left
for war story time. In addition to Walt and John, Rick Wilder, Ron
Bennis, Dave Wood, Forrest Palmer, and Chris O'Donnell attended
Interop.
Bill Barns, Walt, Forrest, Susan Symington, and Kit Leuder
presented a briefing and demonstration of managing an internetwork
to Defense Information Systems Agency managers. The emphasis was
on cooperation among operations centers to identify and resolve
internetwork problems.
Walt and Mike Fidler are heavily occupied with planning,
coordinating, and executing a move of 700 people in December to a
new building. New lab layouts, operating strategies, and comm
issues make life interesting these days.
Walt Lazear (lazear@gateway.mitre.org)
Cooper [Page 23]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
NEW ENGLAND ACADEMIC AND RESEARCH NETWORK
-----------------------------------------
NEARnet has grown to 99 members.
The OSI CLNS routing over the NEARnet backbone during INTEROP was
successful.
NEARnet continues deployment of DECNET for ESNET.
The fifth NEARnet Technical and User Seminar will be held on
December 12, 1991 at the Brandeis University Events Center in
Waltham, Massachusetts.
The fall issue of the NEARnet Newsletter has been published and
distributed.
The ninth issue of the electronic bulletin "NEARnet This Month" has
been distributed. Past issues of the bulletin are available via
anonymous FTP at nic.near.net, in the directory
/newsletters/nearnet_this_month.
by John Rugo <jrugo@nic.near.net>
NNSC, UCAR/BOLT BERANEK and NEWMAN, INC.
----------------------------------------
Change in NNSC.NSF.NET IP Address
Please note that the Internet Protocol (IP) addresses for the
NNSC.NSF.NET system have been changed. In the past, there were two
addresses:
192.31.103.6
128.89.1.178
The 192.31.103.6 address is no longer valid. Please remove it from
any configuration files as appropriate. The NNSC.NSF.NET system
provides provides ftp access to ietf documents, internet-drafts,
and a variety of related information for NSFNET users.
DDN NIC Root Server Files available at NNSC.NSF.NET
Due to connectivity problems experienced between Internet sites and
the new DDNNIC, we have made copies of the updated DDN NIC root
server files available viaanonymous FTP at nnsc.nsf.net.
INTEROP '91
Cooper [Page 24]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
John Curran of the NNSC Staff participated in the Internet User
Services Session at INTEROP 91. The NNSC "Tour of the Internet"
HyperCard2 Stack was demonstrated at a related BOF session.
Internet Resource Guide
The NNSC Staff distributed additions to Chapters 1, 3, and 5 of the
Internet Resource Guide.
The Internet: A World of Connections
The NNSC has published a short introduction and overview of the
Internet, called "The Internet: A World of Connections". This
document is available via anonymous FTP from nnsc.nsf.net, in the
directory nsfnet. The document may also be retrieved through
electronic mail via the NNSC Info-Server. To receive the file send
a mail message to: info-server@nnsc.nsf.net, in the body of the
message type, request: nsfnet, topic: internet-overview.
Update on NNSC "Tour of the Internet" Distribution
The NNSC "Tour of the Internet" HyperCard2 stack has been accepted
into to the Hypermedia and Instructional Software Clearinghouse
catalogue published at the University of Colorado. The next issue
of the catalogue is due to be released next month.
Updating NSF Network Newsletter Map Site List
The NNSC Staff began collecting site list information for the
upcoming issue ofthe NSF Network Newsletter map. Network managers
should send their updated list of sites to Alanna MacDonald at
macdonal@nnsc.nsf.net.
Corinne Carroll <ccarroll@nnsc.nsf.net>
NSF BACKBONE (Merit)
-------------------
Total traffic on the NSFNET T1 and T3 infrastructures measured
11,267,961,959 inbound packets, representing all inbound traffic
during October 1991 and a 19% increase over September's volume.
NSFNET T1 infrastructure inbound traffic totaled 10,394,213,694
packets during October. This total includes packet traffic
entering the T1 network from the T3 network. As of the end of
October, 3556 networks are announced to the T1 NSFNET, with 1214 of
this total foreign networks.
Cooper [Page 25]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
T3 infrastructure inbound traffic totaled 1,447,985,015 packets
during October, including packet traffic entering the T3 network
from the T1 network. Networks with announcement to the T3
infrastructure now number 869.
Merit Network, Inc., Advanced Network & Services (ANS) and some 30
networking technology vendors worked in collaboration to provide
ISO Open Systems Interconnection infrastructure demonstrations at
InterOp to some 30 networks including five European sites. The
Merit/NSFNET partnership, which includes the Merit Network, Inc.,
Advanced Network & Services (ANS), IBM, and MCI, gave the first
public demonstration of a prototype implementation of the OSI
Inter-Domain Routing Protocol (IDRP). The prototype exchanged OSI
routing information between three Routing Domains located at the
InterOp show floor, Merit in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and ANS in
Elmsford, New York. IDRP is the final protocol needed to complete
the OSI Network Layer. It is currently undergoing Committee Draft
ballot review in the International Standards Organization. Susan
Hares and Dave Katz, both of Merit Internet Engineering, worked to
define the IDRP protocol and participated in the cooperative effort
which resulted in OSI demonstrations at InterOp
The OSI Demonstration Booth also featured X.500 infrastructure and
interoperability demonstrations. The Field Operational X.500 (FOX)
project is a joint endeavor of Merit, ISI, SRI and PSI. Mark
Knopper, manager of Merit Internet Engineering, described Merit's
efforts in the Field Operational X.500 Directory Services session
and Chris Weider, also of Merit, exhibited Merit's FOX activity on
the demonstration floor.
Several other Merit staff attended InterOp in various roles: Glee
Harrah Cady offered insights from the NSFNET experience in the
Internet User Services conference session; Cady and Susan Calcari
participated in the Internet User Services BOF; Bill Norton, John
Vollbrecht, Brian Cashman, as well as Cady, Calcari and Weider,
provided discussion at the IBM booth for a new network management
tool.
EDUCOM '91 in San Diego was another forum for NSFNET project
endeavors. In the "Live Exploration of NSFNET Resources" pre-
conference session, Susan Calcari of Merit/NSFNET Information
Services demonstrated online resources of the NSFNET and gave an
overview of the project and possibilities to twice the expected
audience. Calcari also participated in the concurrent session
"Enhancing Education with NSFNET." "From NSFNET to the NREN:
Computer Networking Today and Tomorrow" was the concurrent session
topic for Steve Wolff, Director of the National Science
Foundation's Division of Networking and Communications Research
Cooper [Page 26]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
Infrastructure, and Ellen Hoffman, manager of Merit/NSFNET
Information Services. Jane Caviness, NSF, Mike Roberts, EDUCOM,
and Doug Van Houweling, Vice-Provost for Information Technology at
the University of Michigan, were the featured panelists for a SIG
review of "Merit's National Activities." Laura Kelleher and Ken
Horning of Merit/NSFNET Information Services attended the
proceedings.
Information services and network resources were topics for
discussion in other conferences: Kelleher spoke at the University
of Maine about the NSFNET and its resources, and Horning traveled
to Pasco, Washington for the NorthWestNet Annual Meeting to present
an overview of the NSFNET and Internet Tour. The November 11-12
Merit Networking Seminar hosted by SURAnet at the University of
Maryland University Center and sponsored by Merit Network, Inc. has
been filled to capacity. Speakers will include Jim Knighton, NASA;
Donna Cox, NCSA; Ron Larsen, University of Maryland; Jim Fulton,
UNC; Jonathan Wilkenfeld, University of Maryland; Tom Grundner,
NPTN/Cleveland Freenet; and John Clement, EDUCOM. Stephen Wolff,
NSF, will give the keynote address, and Mike Nelson, US Senate
Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, will close the
session. Information on the next Merit Networking Seminar,
scheduled for April 13-14, 1992 in Las Vegas, Nevada, is available
from 1-800-66-MERIT or seminar@merit.edu.
Jo Ann Ward (jward@merit.edu)
PITTSBURGH SUPERCOMPUTER CENTER
-------------------------------
Interop '91, held in San Jose California earlier this month, was
attended by Gene Hastings, Ken Goodwin and Stephen Cunningham of
our networking staff. Ken and Gene participated in a customer
presentation where both spoke about our experiences with the
implementation of FDDI.
Members of our group are also currently working on the network
design and implementation that will be part of Supercomputing '91,
to be held in Albuquerque, New Mexico, November 18 - 22.
New network connections to the PSC and the Internet for the month
of October include: The Society for Industrial and Applied
Mathematics, Franklin and Marshall College, Munin Systems,
Allegheny College, twelve temporary networks to be used at
Supercomputing '91, and six PREPnet service networks.
by Stephen Cunningham <cunningham@b.psc.edu>
Cooper [Page 27]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
SAIC
----
SAIC Activities for October
An experiment was attempted with with MITRE and UDEL to participate
in DARTNET audio conferences using IDPR. Unfortunately
configuration problems with SAIC's nameserver prevented us from
getting started. The problem has since been fixed and we will try
again as soon as possible.
A new parser for reading address to AD mapping files is nearly
finished. This is significant because it uses the BSD4.3 reno
routing code. This was seen as a simple way of learning about the
radix based routing softwre and seeing if it can be easily
integrated with the IDPR kernel code. It also makes the mapping
files more flexible.
Work continues on modifying the IDPR kernel for the addition of 4.3
reno routing.
Planned activies:
Completion of the IDPR configuration parser and first cut at radix
based searches in the kernel code.
Woody Woodburn (woody@sparta.com)
SAN DIEGO SUPERCOMPUTER CENTER
------------------------------
The NSC HIPPI crossbar switch was delivered to the Center last
month. Additional interface cards, plus the requisite cables are
still awaited.
As mentioned last month, we linked the UCSD campus FDDI ring to
SDSC with a CERFnet supplied FDDI "stub" and a Cisco double FDDI
router. This connected the rest of campus to the NSC supplied
FDDI/T3 routers via our production ring and thence to the EDUCOM
'91 conference the San Diego Convention Center (Oct 16-19.)
On 16 October, Hans-Werner Braun attended an EDUCOM NTTF meeting,
held during the conference. On October 17, Braun and Kim Claffy
attended a breakfast meeting to further discuss NREN objectives
with Bob Aiken, George Strawn and Steve Wolff of NSF and Peter Ford
of LANL.
Braun met with Steve Wolff on October 17 to further discuss general
networking issues, and met with George Strawn on October 18 on
Cooper [Page 28]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
matters related to the NSFNET.
During the month the Sequoia network researchers at UCSD conducted
studies of the Internet response time between various sites in
Calif. Gerard Newman & Tom Hutton of SDSC assisted them with
routing modifications, etc. as needed.
Braun particpated in two IAB conference calls on October 2 and
October 24, as well as attending the IAB meeting in San Jose on
October 10, during the Interop conference (October 7-10).
On October 9, also during InterOp, Braun and Claffy met with Bob
Aiken, NSF Programming Director for NREN, and Peter Ford (LANL), to
discuss NREN-related objectives.
On October 15, SDSC hosted a visit from Don Albares of the Naval
Ocean Systems Center to discuss the possibility of applying
Albares' gigabit research to projects that SDSC is involved in.
On October 21, UCSD and SDSC hosted a visit from Gurudatta Parulkar
of Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. Parulkar gave
presentations at both UCSD and SDSC on his research interests in
high performance networks.
Braun participated in a panel presentation at the Visualization '91
conference in San Diego, on October 24, focusing on Networking
Infrastructure, in particular as it applies to visualization
requirements.
Active involvement in the Casa Gigabit Testbed effort continues.
On October 21, Braun participated in a Casa Executive Committee
conference call. Dan Massey of SDSC continues to collaborate with
LANL on HIPPI network simulation efforts.
SDSC hosted a visit from Dan Stevenson of NCNC on October 25.
Gerard Newman, Hans-Werner Braun, and Dan Massey met with him,
focusing on issues related to the gigabit projects and other
networking efforts at SDSC.
SDSC is also maintaining active communication with the rest of the
UCSD campus community. On October 28, Braun gave a presentation on
the NSFNET in a meeting of a research group at the UCSD Computer
Science Department.
SDSC has also gained considerable momentum in its network
performance testing efforts. Working toward project goals of
network performance analysis has resulted in a set of initial data
to explore the traffic domain, and is now focusing on establishing
Cooper [Page 29]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
a systematic methodology for testing a variety of networking
environments composed of multiple link, intermediate router, and
end system architectures. An effort between Claffy and colleagues
in Japan is focusing on traffic characteristics between Japan and
the United States, as measured by Toshiya Asaba of Recruit, Inc. at
the WIDE network interface point to PACCOM in Japan.
Paul Love (loveep@sdsc.edu)
SURANET
-------
MCI/SURAnet Agreement
SURAnet and MCI completed an agreement which will deliver
significant benefits to all SURAnet members. SURAnet is beginning
immediately to convert the existing SURAnet network.
Access to T-3 Backbone
Two new external gateways were introduced, ENSS #138 at Georgia
Tech and ENSS #136 at College park, MD. These two nodes provide
SURAnet sites access to the new T-3 NSFnet backbone.
Archie
An Archie server is now installed and running at the SURAnet NIC.
This should provide much faster service to SURAnet members and
others on the Internet who want to access this very popular
service.
SURAnet Review
A high level Committee, formed for the purpose of assuring that
SURAnet is and remains a program of excellence and of merit in
meeting the communications needs of the higher education and
research community, held its first visit on November 11th. It is
anticipated that the Committee will visit SURAnet on an annual
basis.
Cooper [Page 30]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
SURAnet Technical Meeting
Plans are being finalized for the SURAnet 2nd Annual Technical
Meeting to be held at the University of Maryland from 12th - 15th
November. The Meeting will cover a variety of topics including
OSPF/Routing; Internetworking with OSI; SMDS; T1 Date Circuits and
others.
by Peter Liebscher <plieb@sura.net>
UCL
----
We have been conducting packet voice and video experiments across
the 2Mbps IP service on JANET, paralleling the DARTNET activities.
Using UDP for voice, we are now able to run mini-conferences with
perfectly adequate audio quality, and using DPCM, about 50% of the
64kbps required for sparc audio. Using X over TCP, or UDP based
simple transport to carry XImages, we get 6-7 frames per second of
mono 128 pixel video London-Cambridge, which is usable for video
telephony. We still await delivery of H.261 CODECs from a certain
telecom company.
We are investigating the use of the Eschkol-Wachmann movement
notation for automatic gesture recognition in stored digital video
conference logs. If we can make this quick enough, it may be used
to automate some aspects of floor control (e.g. switching camera
sources), but it can certainly be effectively employed to compare
the non-verbal communication that is able to be used in different
bandwith conferences. At the moment, a prototype is in use for
studying mammal behaviour at 5 frames per second. This work is in
conjunction with our neurophysiology department.
John Crowcroft (j.crowcroft@CS.UCL.AC.UK)
UNIVERSITY OF DELAWARE
----------------------
1. Thanks to Lars Mathieson of the University of Copenhagen, we
now have a Unix version of the NTP Version 3 time-
synchronization protocol up and running. It was derived from
Dennis Fergusson's xntpd distribution now in use at lots of
places. In addition, Erik Perkins of our lab fixed the kernel
and radio interface code to work with SunOS streams, so we now
have a functional stratum-1 primary server online. A fair
amount of work remains to certify the protocol machinery and
Cooper [Page 31]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
local-clock algorithms.
2. Ken Monington has been carefully monitoring precision time
differences (low nanoseconds) between our burgeoning crop of
radio and atomic time references and finding some of them not
as truly well disciplined as previously supposed. Glitches
several times the claimed specification have been observed in
all the radios, although the incidence of these is infrequent.
This reinforces the conventional wisdom that no single clock
can be trusted all the time.
Dave Mills (Mills@UDEL.EDU)
Cooper [Page 32]
Internet Monthly Report October 1991
DIRECTORY SERVICES
------------------
This section of the Internet Monthly is devoted to efforts working to
develop directory services that are for, or effect, the Internet. We
would like to encourage any organization with news about directory
service activities to use this forum for publishing brief monthly news
items. The current reporters list includes:
o IETF OSIDS Working Group
o IETF DISI Working Group
o Field Operational X.500 Project
- ISI
- Merit
- PSI
- SRI
o National Institute of Standards and Technology [X]
o North American Directory Forum
o OSI Implementor's Workshop [X]
o PARADISE Project [X]
o PSI DARPA/NNT X.500 Project
o PSI WHITE PAGES PILOT
o Registration Authority Committee (ANSI USA RAC) [X]
o U.S. Department of State, Study Group D, [X]
MHS Management Domain subcommittee (SG-D MHS-MD)
[X] indicates no report this month
Tom Tignor (tpt2@isi.edu)
DS Report Coordinator
IETF OSIDS WORKING GROUP
------------------------
The OSI-DS Group met at Interop on 8th October. Full details will
be available in the soon to be published minutes. The meeting was
well attended, with representatives from Australia and France.
The following I-Ds of the group have been recommended for progress
to RFC by the IESG:
- An Interim Approach to use of Network Addresses (OSI-DS 5)
- A String encoding of Presentation Address (OSI-DS 6)
- Domains and X.500 (OSI-DS 7)
- Using the OSI Directory to achieve User Friendly Naming
(OSI-DS 8)
- Replication Requirement to provide an Internet Directory using
X.500 (OSI-DS 9)
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- The COSINE and Internet X.500 Schema (OSI-DS 10)
- Replication and Distributed Operations extensions
to provide an Internet Directory using X.500 (OSI-DS 11)
The document "Naming Guidelines for Directory Pilots (OSI-DS 12)"
was discussed briefly, and pending minor edits is ready to be
submitted as an RFC. The document "DSA Naming (OSI-DS 13)" was
discussed. It is intended to attempt to progress this document
prior to the next meeting, as it is important for the next stage of
expansion. Pilot experiments on "Handling QOS (Quality of service)
in the Directory (OSI-DS 15)" are ongoing, and recommendatios on
this I-D will be deferred until we have some practical experience.
The document "An Access Control approach for Searching and Listing
(OSI-DS 21)" was presented. It was agreed that this should be
submitted privately by the authors as an informational RFC. The
area was of interest, and this function should be considered later
for Internet standardization. If done, this should probably be
based on the 92 access control.
It was agreed that following successful experiments (Russ Wright,
Tim Howes et al) that pictures in the directory should migrate for
G3Fax to JPEG. Definitions would be added to the schema to allow
for this.
A draft document "A Strategic Plan for deploying an Internet
Directory Service" was discussed. The next version of this
document will be an I-D. This WG will take on active review of the
document. There were many comments, but broad concensus on the
direction proposed.
A lengthy discussion on postal addresses was avoided by scheduling
this item at 18:00.
Steve Hardcastle-Kille (s.kille@cs.ucl.ac.uk)
IETF DISI WORKING GROUP
-----------------------
The DISI group is currently reviewing their draft, "An Executive
Introduction to Directory Services Using the X.500 Protocol." As
stated in the draft abstract, this document is an overview of the
X.500 standard for people not familiar with the technology. It
compares and contrasts Directory Services based on X.500 with
several of the other Directory services currently in use in the
Internet. The paper also describes the status of the standard and
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provides references for further information on X.500
implementations and technical information.
Chris Weider (clw@merit.edu)
FOX -- FIELD OPERATIONAL X.500 PROJECT
--------------------------------------
The FOX project is a DARPA and NSF sponsored effort to provide a
basis for operational X.500 deployment in the NREN/Internet. This
work is being carried out at Merit, NSYERNet/PSI, SRI and ISI. ISI
is the main contractor and responsible for project oversight.
ISI
---
ISI recently compiled and submitted the U.S./Internet component
of the PARADISE report. The submission included updates on the
activities of X.500-oriented organizations over the past half
year. Directory Services activities were emphasized, and much of
the submission consists of the most central elements of previous
DSARs. Look for this information when the PARADISE report is
released.
Tom Tignor (tpt2@ISI.EDU)
MERIT
-----
Merit's FOX activities for the month of October consisted mainly
of presentations:
1: Merit presented an overview of the FOX project to the
RARE Working Group 3 meeting in Zurich, Switzerland in
early October.
2: Merit participated in the Fielding Operational X.500
seminar at Interop in San Jose, CA in mid October.
Chris Weider (clw@merit.edu)
PSI
---
A first draft of a document describing the schema supporting the
x5ftp application was prepared and distributed to FOX
participants. It will be submitted for review by the IETF OSI-DS
group in the near future.
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A script to generate EDB files in accordance to the schema
described above was written, and a new DIT subtree
{ o=Internet, ou=FTP Archives }
was brought online.
Discussions were begun with other interested parties on the
specification of a lightweight alternative to the X.500 DAP. The
form of the mechanism, as well as the functionality to be
provided are both currently under discussion.
PSI attended the FOX meeting at Interop '91.
Wengyik Yeong (yeongw@psi.com)
SRI
----
Ruth Lang participated in the "Field Operational X.500 Directory
Services" panel session at Interop 91. Her talk gave an
overview of the DISI Working Group, the creation of the DISI
Internet-Draft entitled "A Catalog of Available X.500
Implementations," and work performed to make WHOIS information
available through X.500.
Jose Garcia-Luna and Ruth Lang attended a FOX project meeting
that occurred on Friday, October 11 at 7:30a at Interop 91.
A prototype of X5WHOIS was demonstrated on Friday, October 11 at
Interop 91 in the SRI booth. The intent of X5WHOIS is to
provide a facility as similar as possible to the existing NIC
WHOIS service, using X.500 instead of the NIC database software.
In order to provide reasonable response time, a total of 12
indices are used to access the WHOIS information being offered
by the QUIPU DSA "Northern Swift Fox." The additional memory
required to support these indices has required that we
temporarily reduce the data set available; specifically, only a
token set of individual entries are available. System
reconfiguration work will be performed in the near future to
remedy the problem. You can experiment with X5WHOIS now; we
will keep a current copy accessible while development continues.
There are two methods, remote-WHOIS and TELNET:
[1] Remote-WHOIS: Assuming your site runs the BSD
"whois" program:
% whois -h inic.nisc.sri.com <argument-string>
[2a] Telnet to inic.nisc.sri.com, port 43.
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Internet Monthly Report October 1991
Type a one-line argument.
[2b] Telnet normally to inic.nisc.sri.com.
Login as "x5whois", which
needs no password. Type one-line arguments.
Ruth Lang met with Bob McCollum and Mark Kosters of Network
Solutions on October 18. They discussed technical options of
how GSI/Network Solutions could make a copy of the WHOIS
information available to FOX for keeping the X.500 information
up to date. A description of viable technical options was
submitted to Network Solutions for their review.
Input for the PARADISE report highlighting SRI's activities over
the last 8 months was submitted to the DSAR Editor.
An effort to obtain updated implementation descriptions and new
submissions for the DISI Internet-Draft, "A Catalog of Available
X.500 Implementations," occurred. Directed email describing
additions and clarifications was sent to authors of existing
catalog entries. A "last chance to submit" message was sent to
the IETF OSI-oriented mailing lists. Russ Wright (LBL) and Ruth
Lang (SRI) are in the process of compiling the updates to create
a revised version of Internet-Draft document.
We received and responded to 9 queries regarding the
availability of "A Catalog of Available X.500 Implementations"
(Internet-Draft document draft-ietf-disi-catalog-00.txt); 5 of
these resulted from contacts made at Interop 91.
Ruth Lang (rlang@nisc.sri.com)
NORTH AMERICAN DIRECTORY FORUM
-------------------------------
At the last meeting of the NADF in Bethesda, the NADF began
examining security and privacy issues related to the offering of
directory services, with a new subgroup being formed that will
focus on such issues.
NADF-175, the revised version of NADF-123, has been released as an
informational RFC (RFC 1255.)
Wengyik Yeong (yeongw@psi.com)
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PSI DARPA/NNT X.500 Project
---------------------------
A script was written to remotely poll DSAs. This script will be
used to check the reliability of DSAs under PSI control, including
the master and official slaves for c=US.
Some bugs in the quipu 7.0 code affecting the use of the Directory
Assistance Service were fixed and fed back to the maintainers of
the ISODE distribution.
PSI speakers participated in the Interop '91 panels on "X.500
Directory Services" and "Fielding Operational X.500".
Wengyik Yeong (yeongw@psi.com)
PSI WHITE PAGES PILOT PROJECT
-----------------------------
The transition of the PSI White Pages Pilot Project to the naming
scheme proposed by the NADF was begun.
New organizations added to the pilot this past month are:
Control Data
Washington University
Stanford University
Digital Equipment Corporation
Wengyik Yeong (yeongw@psi.com)
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CALENDAR OF EVENTS
------------------
Readers are requested to send in dates of events that are
appropriate for this calendar section.
1991 CALENDAR
Sep 29-Oct 4 5TH SDL (CCITT FDT) FORUM,
Rick Reed, GPT Coventry, UK
rick_reed@eurokom.ie
Oct 7-11 INTEROP91, San Jose, Ca
Oct 7-15 6TH WORLD TELECOM'91 SYMPOSIUM, Geneva
Oct 8-11 IFIP WORKSHOP ON OPEN DISTRIBUTED
PROCESSING -- Contact
jdm@fokus.berlin.gmd.dbp.de or
heymer@iir-adlershof.adw.dp.dd
Oct 15-17 4TH INTL. WORKSHOP ON PROTOCOL TEST SYSTEM
Leidschendam, Jan Kroon (J_Kroon@pttrnl.nl)
Nov 4 T1S1: Call Control and Signaling (ISDN,
Frame Relay, Broadband ATM), Dallas, TX
MCI/DSD
Nov 10 T1E1, Physical Layer Interfaces (ISDN, T1,
Broadband, etc.), Florida, Siemens
Nov 17 T1M1, Management and Maintenance (ISDN,
Broadband, Frame Relay, etc.) Nashville, TN,
Northern Telecom
Nov 18-22 IETF, Santa Fe, MN
Megan Davies (mdavies@NRI.RESTON.VA.US
Nov 19-22 FORTE'91, University of Queensland
Ken Parker, Telecom Austrl (k.parker@trl.oz.au)
Dec 2-5 4TH INT. WORKSHOP ON PETRI NETS AND
PERFORMANCE MODELS, Melbourne, Australia
Jonathan Billington, Telecom Austrl.
(j.billington @ trl.oz.au)
Dec 2-5 GLOBECOM'91, See IEEE Publications. Phoenic
Dec 9-13 OIW, NIST, Gaithersburg, MD
1992 CALENDAR
Jan 13-21 ANSI X3T5
Jan 19 T1S1, Call Control and Signaling (ISDN,
Frame Relay, Broadband ATM)
Jan 20-22 RIPE, Amsterdam
Jan 28-30 ANSI X3S3.3, Tucson, AZ
Feb 9 T1E1, Physical Layer Interfaces (ISDN, T1,
Broadband, etc.) Fish Camp, CA Verilink
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Feb 19-20 RARE WG1, Location unknown
Feb 20-21 RARE Manager Mtg, Location unknown
Mar 2 T1S1, Call Control and Signaling (ISDN, Frame
Relay, Broadband ATM)
Mar 2-6 ANSI X3T5
Mar 2-6 CAIA '92 8th IEEE Conference on AI Application
Mar 3-5 ACM CSC, Kansas City, MO
Mar 9-13 IEEE802 Plenary, Irvine, CA
Mar 9-13 OIW, NIST, Gaithersburg, MD
Mar 16-19 Info Netwrk&DataComm, Espoo, FI
Espoo, Helsinki, Finland; Contact: IFIP-TC6
Mar 18-20 Computers, Freedom & Privacy II,
Grand Hyatt Hotel, Washington, DC
Mar 23 T1M1, Management and Maintenance (ISDN,
Broadband, Frame Relay, etc.), Raleigh, NC,
Fujitsu
Mar 25-27 National Net 92, Washington DC
Elizabeth Barnhart (barnhart@educom.edu)
Apr 6-16 CCITT SG VII Geneva, Switzerland
Apr 21-23 ANSI X3S3.3, Mountaon View, Ca.
<Spring> IETF, San Diego, CA
Megan Davies (mdavies@nri.reston.va.us)
May 4-6 ANSI X3T5
May 4-8 DECUS '92, Atlanta, GA
May 4-8 IEEE INFOCOM'92, See IEEE Pub., Florence
May 11 T1E1, Physical Layer Interfaces (ISDN, T1,
Broadband, etc.)
Williamsburg, VA, Bell Atlantic
May 12-14 Joint Network Conference 3, Innsbruck, Austria
(this is the RARE Networkshop - renamed)
May 13-15 IFIP International Workshop on Protocols for
High Speed Networks, Stockholm, Sweden
Contact: <PfHSN92@sics.se>
May 18-25 INTEROP92, Washington, D.C.
Dan Lynch (dlynch@interop.com)
May 19-29 ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 21, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
May 27-29 IFIP WG 6.5 Int'l Conference, Vancouver, Canada
May ??-?? Third IFIP International Workshop on
Protocols for High-Speed Networks, Stockholm
Per Gunningberg, per@sics.se
Bjorn Pehrson, bjorn@sics.se
Stephen Pink, steve@sics.se
Jun 8 T1M1, Management and Maintenance (ISDN,
Broadband, Frame Relay, etc.)
Minneapolis, MN, ADC TElecom
Jun 8-12 OIW, NIST, Gaithersburg, MD
Jun 10-11 RARE WG1, tentative-Location unknown
Jun 11-12 RARE COSINE MHS MGR, tentative-Location unknown
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Jun 14-17 ICC-SUPERCOMM'92, Chicago, IL
Jun 15-19 INET92, Kobe, Japan
Jun Murai (jun@wide.ad.jp), KEIO University
Elizabeth Barnhart (barnhart@educom.edu)
"North America Contact"
Jun 16-18 ANSI X3S3.3, Minneapolos, MN
Jun 22-25 PSTV-XII, Orlando
Umit Uyar (umit@honet5.att.com)
Jerry Linn or Holmdel, NIST
linnrj@ECF.NCSL.NIST.GOV
Jun 14-17 ICC-SUPERCOMM'92, Chicago, See IEEE Publ..
Jul 6-10 IEEE802 Plenary, Bloomington, MN
Jul 13-17 ANSI X3T5
Jul 13-24 ISO/IEC JTC1/SC6, San Diego, CA
Aug 2 T1S1, Call Control and Signaling (ISDN,
Frame Relay, Broadband ATM)
Aug 16 T1S1, Call Control and Signaling (ISDN,
Frame Relay, Broadband ATM)
Aug 17-20 SIGCOMM, Baltimore, MD
Deepinder Sidhu, UMBC
Sep 7-11 IFIP World Congress
Madrid, Spain; Contact: IFIP
Sep 14-18 ANSI X3T5
Sep 21-25 OIW, NIST, Gaithersburg, MD
Sep 22-24 ANSI X3S3.3, Boston, MA
Oct 5-8 FORTE'92, Lannion
Roland Groz (groz@lannion.cnet.fr)
Michel Diaz (diaz@droopy.laas.fr)
Oct 26-30 INTEROP92, San Francisco
Dan Lynch (dlynch@interop.com)
Nov 9-13 ANSI X3T5
Dec ANSI X3S3.3, Boulder, CO
Dec 7-11 DECUS '92, Las Vegas, NV
Dec 14-18 OIW, NIST, Gaithersburg, MD
1993 CALENDAR
Mar 8-12 INTEROP93, Wasington, D.C.
Dan Lynch (dlynch@interop.com)
Mar 8-12 OIW, NIST, Gaithersburg, MD
May 23-26 ICC'92, Geneva, Switzerland
May-Jun PSTV-XIII, University of Liege.
Contact: Andre Danthine,
May 23-26 ICC'93, Geneva, See IEEE Publications.
Jun 7-11 OIW, NIST, Gaithersburg, MD
Aug INET93, San Francisco Bay Area
Aug SIGCOMM, San Francisco
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Sep 13-17 OIW, NIST, Gaithersburg, MD
Sep 20-31 ISO/IEC JTC1/SC6, Seoul, Korea.
Oct 12-14 Conference on Network Information Processing,
Sofia, Bulgaria; Contact: IFIP-TC6
Oct 25-29 INTEROP93, San Francisco
Dan Lynch (dlynch@interop.com)
Nov 9-13 IEEE802 Plenary, LaJolla, CA
Dec 6-10 OIW, NIST, Gaithersburg, MD
1994 CALENDAR
Apr 18-22 INTEROP94, Washington, D.C.
Dan Lynch (dlynch@interop.com)
Aug 29-Sep 2 IFIP World Congress
Hamburg, Germany; Contact: IFIP
Sep 12-16 INTEROP94, San Francisco
Dan Lynch (dlynch@interop.com)
1995 EVENTS
Sep 18-22 INTEROP95, San Francisco, CA
Dan Lynch (dlynch@interop.com)
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