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ATM pilot will begin operating at the end of October

The National Research Network will run a pilot backbone in November utilizing 155 Mbps access at Points of Presence in São Paulo, Brasília and Belo Horizonte. The network is being built so as to enable evaluation of various service parameters based on ATM technology. The purpose is to find the most appropriate configuration for the new backbone project financed by both the Ministry of Science and Technology and by the Ministry of Education. The proposed ATM Service should comply with performance specifications and with the requirements of new educational and research applications in Brazil.

The ATM Pilot Project will remain in operation for a one-month period. During that time the technical staff at PoPs and at RNP will evaluate ATMNet services made available by Embratel in order to identify the best solution for the project. By means of these tests, it will be possible to determine how adequate the ATM public network is in relation to Internet production applications as well as determine the best alternative for integrating experimental traffic - which requires Quality of Service (QoS) - with production traffic. In addition, the test run will serve to test possible IP/ATM solutions to be used in the new backbone and try out a central management model for the new network.

The new RNP backbone has been designed with autonomous and flexible bandwidth configuration for production and experimental traffic in order to further the linkage between the major part of state networks and main educational and research institutions across the nation. According to RNP's Project Manager José Luiz Ribeiro Filho, "at the rate that network requirements become geared to the necessities of production applications and experimental applications, that there is guaranteed interoperability of different platforms and that there is control and management of services offered by the ATM public network, RNP and its Points of Presence will embark on a new development cycle for academic networking." Aside from assuring the modernization of the current RNP backbone, the RNP2 backbone will also enable the link up with High Performance Metropolitan Networks (ReMAVs).

The services of an ATM public network are not as simple as those based on conventional data communications technology. In this particular case, neither the specification process nor the service control areas bear any resemblance to those of chartered private lines. For this reason, during the pilot project, tools will be used that permit an evaluation of ATM public networking services. The following service categories will be available on ATMNet, defined according to the norms of the ATM Forum and of ITU-T: CBR, rt-VBR and nrt-VBT, for both VP and VC connections. In order to evaluate ATMNet networking services, tests will be conducted at point-to-point VP switches, and in order to test the ATM Pilot networking services, tests will be conducted in all logical topology of services.

The agreement between the Ministry of Science and Technology and MEC that was signed in the second half of October is comprised of a work plan effective until the year 2004 with joint investments totaling approximately R$200 million.

[RNP, 10.15.1999]