Editor: Cathrin.Stover@dante.org.uk
Starting in December this year, DANTE, together with the national research networks of 16 European countries and with the support of the European Commission, will replace the current TEN-34 network with the new TEN-155 network. TEN-155 will have access capacities of 155 Mbps in 8 European countries and will be the largest operational pan-European network. For the first time, and as a direct result of the liberalisation of the European telecommunications market, pan-European bandwidth will equal bandwidth available within the national research networks.
TEN-155 will provide researchers across Europe with a core transmission network of 155 Mbps circuits and nodes in Austria, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden (as the connection point for the Nordic regional network service), Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Belgium, the Czech Republic, Greece, Hungary, Slovenia and Spain will be connected to the core at 34/45 Mbps. There will be 10 Mbps links to Luxembourg and Portugal and an extension of the service to Ireland is currently planned. The design of the TEN-155 network also provides for extension of the service to the United States and other Continents.
TEN-155 will use a combination of IP, ATM (Asynchronous Transfer Mode) and SDH (Synchronous Digital Hierachy) technologies. The network will be based on SDH circuits with an ATM overlay which allows for bandwidth management and the optimal loading of the SDH capacity. A conventional IP service will run on top of a full mesh of ATM virtual circuits. DANTE will also be able to offer both a Managed Bandwidth Service to specific user groups and the temporary setup of Virtual Paths with guaranteed bandwidth between national research networks.
As announced in an international press event on 17 September 1998, the main supplier of the TEN-155 network is Unisource Belgium who will provide connectivity in Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. The contract with Unisource Belgium has been signed for a period of 3 years, with the roll-out of the network starting in December 1998. It is anticipated in the Unisource contract that the network will be upgraded to 622 Mbps by the year 2001!
More information on the TEN-155 network, including a topology map, frequently asked Questions and Answers as well as web order forms for the TEN-155 brochure, poster and mousepads (as long as stock is available :-)) can be found on the TEN-155 homepage.
The working items of the Task Force have been defined during a meeting in September and will include among others RSVP, multicasting, differentiated services, IP version 6 and ATM signalling. Although much of the effort to carry out the QTP is expected to come from the national research networks and the Associated Partner Telebit Communications A/S, the participation in the QTP is open to any individual or organisation able to make a contribution in the form of manpower, equipment or services.
You can find more information on the QTP and the Task Force on the QTP pages.
![[TEN-34 logo]](/ten-34/ten-34-small.GIF)
September and October were very smooth months for the TEN-34 network. The network continues to prove the service ideal of providing an effective and reliable service in transferring large quantities of data between the European national research networks. The average access port availability in September remained above 99.7% for all but two national research networks. Of these two, only the Portuguese network experienced a particularly low availability due to a line problem in Lisbon in the beginning of September.
Packet loss on the US link again increased sharply during September, coinciding with the start of the academic year. Losses were then as high as before the line speed was increased from 34 Mbps to 45 Mbps earlier this year. However, the Czech national research network disconnected from the service on 2 October resulting in ample space for the remaining research networks.
Within the context of migration to the TEN-155 network, DANTE's US connectivity will also be upgraded to 155 Mbps. It is expected that this new link will be operational by mid- December 1998.
Consequently, DANTE reorganised the distribution of the European Mbone and provided a Mbone pilot service to the national research networks. This TEN-34 Mbone pilot service has been accepted with enthusiasm by the national research networks as for the first time the scalability, manageability and bandwidth usage problems were overcome on a European-wide scale.
Roberto Sabatino and Jan Novak have written a paper on the TEN-34 Mbone pilot which is available from DANTE in PRINT.
Most services currently provided by ULCC will be upheld. These include the Root DSA (Directory System Agent) management, the demonstrational LDAP (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol) server connection to the UK First Level DSA with statistics, the NameFLOW mailing list management, an FTP information server and a help desk. DANTE intends to discontinue the gopher information service by the end of 1998, due to very little usage.
DANTE will uphold the above mentioned services until the end of 1999, when we expect them to be replaced by new NameFLOW services based on new technologies. The development of these new services is currently in progress.