NCIT*net 2 General Information

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Benjamin Dominic Kelly
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1 NCIT*net 2 General Information NCIT*net 2 An Introduction A component of NCCT research team activities is the development of a next generation network to promote the interaction of architecture, technologies, and applications needed for the definition, creation and activation of next generation services. The network was deployed since 1999, in the Ottawa Metropolitan area and was undergoing an upgrade on the technology and functionality side since February 2003 up to now. It is right now supporting production traffic and experimental researches. NCIT*net is also used as a test-bed for new industry standards, protocols and technologies. The network is a 64-channel DWDM system, and a 6-lambda over a four point meshed network, with a data-rate-per-wavelength ranging from 10/100 Mbps to 2.5 Gb/s. The network is an MPLS optical in that the transmission of data within the network does not undergo any optical-electrical conversions, although the connections or light paths may be controlled by electronics. The network primarily uses fast tunable laser transmitters and receivers with array technology also being developed. The architecture is hierarchical and includes passive broadcast local area networks (LANs), passive wavelength-routed metropolitan area networks (MANs), and configurable wavelength-routed wide area networks (WANs). Ten wavelengths are partitioned for use in the LAN, and the remaining ten are shared between the MAN and WAN. Wavelength partitioning enables scalability via wavelength reuse. Two all-optical services, A- and B- Service, share the twenty channels provided in the network. An additional service, the C-Service, is used for network management, scheduling of wavelengths and time-slots, and clock distribution. We make a distinction between the architecture and the testbed. The testbed effort is key to refining the architecture as well as being existence proof of its fundamental feasibility. Under the project Next Generation Architecture for NCIT*net, Control and Management fostered by National Capital Institute of Telecommunications the NCCT Research Laboratory s ( team has undertaken the task of redesigning the NCIT network for transforming it into a research/production network. In this way NCIT is setting up its first experimental research network outside the confinement of University of Ottawa, NRC ( Carleton University, and CRC ( Campuses firewalled networks. The NCCT research team has designed and implemented an Ethernet over MPLS, over DWDM network which meshes the four campuses and gives them connectivity through the ORION ( network, while the old infrastructure which was designed to provide Ethernet over SONET over DWDM was still kept in place. Version 1.0: October 13,

2 NCIT*net 2 The Architecture The second version of the NCIT*net, the NCIT*net 2 was designed with two goals in mind: - first to mesh the four institutions on an Optical Network - give connected labs connectivity over this network by assigning specific ports in the above labs an IP address such that the network becomes transparent from a connectivity point of view to the research teams using the network The last goal required to connect the network to a Layer 3 network. This network is the Ontario Research and Innovation Optical Network (ORION). NCIT*net (1) For comparison, the initial NCIT*net (the first version, installed in 1999 and inaugurated in March 2000) is given in the Figure 1 below. As it can be seen the network was designed and implemented as an Ethernet, over SONET, over DWDM network. The DWDM Optera Metro 5200 boxes were equipped with cards for two lambdas. As such, research laboratories were to be connected as LANs interconnected through broadcast domains, created over the IPT-100 rings of the SONET network. There were (and still are) available 64 of such broadcast domains, i.e. 64 different VLANs were possible to be configured. Each VLAN is able to connect participating research labs together. In the initial configuration of the NCIT*net (1), the IPT-100 rings were set over the STS-3c cross connect, over the OC-12 transport, over DWDM. One IPT-100 ring can carry up to 155 Mbps (OC3), while the Optera Metro 3400 box (the Nortel SONET technology solution) is able to connect four Fast Ethernet ports over STS-3c. However, only two Fast Ethernet ports were connected to the IPT-100 rings. The research labs were connected, by the unit IT/networking groups, through Nortel BayStack T Ethernet switches to the Fast Ethernet interfaces of the Optera Metro In other words, any NCIT*net lab was connected to the DWDM ring with connections limited to Fast Ethernet speed (100 Mbps). In order to make the connection possible between two different NCIT research labs the following solution was considered: - use a router for creating an IP address space for NCIT*net (initially the router was the CRC router) - connect all research labs in one single broadcast domain - assigning IP addresses through the above broadcast domain to any of the research labs One inconvenient of the above solution is that any user of the above network would have been able to take any still available IP address from the NCIT*net pool without permissions. This created a series of security issues due to the specific of the CRC network. Version 1.0: October 13,

3 Figure 1. The initial architecture of the NCIT*net (version 1) The physical/logical Ethernet over SONET, over DWDM solution is depicted in the Figure 2 below where the IPT-100 ring is shown in red, and the physical connections over DWDM are shown in black, while the blue ones show the connections to the Bay Stack switches. Version 1.0: October 13,

4 Figure 2. The physical and logical topology of the NCIT*net (1) NCIT*net 2 In the summer of 2003, after a series of iterations, it was decided to upgrade the network such that tunnels between the research institutions can be selected automatically by the network infrastructure, function of the connectivity required by different research projects. The envisaged solution is to give connectivity to labs through either an Ethernet over SONET over DWDM, or through a VPLS over DWDM network. As a consequence the optical part of the network was upgraded to eight lambdas which was the minimum necessary to mesh the four institutions and to keep in place the existing Ethernet over SONET infrastructure. Again, the Ethernet over SONET over DWDM connection is limited to a final 100 Mbps bandwidth, while the VPLS over DWDM connection can have up to 1 Gbps of bandwidth. Here, it has to be clear that the maximum available speed on one lambda is limited by the OCLD cards of the Optera Metro 5200 boxes, which is 1.25 Gbps. As some research projects might require a higher traffic speed it is left to the project leaders to assure the necessary funds for acquiring proper Optera cards and corresponding network equipment material for reaching higher speed limits. Version 1.0: October 13,

5 Figure 3. The NCIT*net 2 architecture In the new network architecture the SONET network was still kept in use, while the new part of the NCIT*net2 architecture provides meshing capabilities over 6 lambdas. The meshing is implemented by an MPLS network which connects on the customer side with switching equipment and on the NCIT*net side with the DWDM equipment. In Figure 3 above, the Nortel Optera Metro 5200, the Optera Metro 3400, the Juniper M7, and the Alcatel 7750 SR boxes represent the P equipment, while the Foundry FES and Nortel BayStack T are the PE equipment according to the ITU-T and NMF conventions. The CPE is represented by the local switches which shall be used in each of the interconnected research lab of the four institutions. From a logical point of view, the network meshes the four research institutions according to the Figure 4, below. From the connectivity point of view, some of the research labs will have to ask their campus IT/network units to install fiber between the interested lab and the NCIT local POP, while other labs were already connected as to NCIT*net 1 or when their building was raised (e.g., SITE). Version 1.0: October 13,

6 Figure 4. The logical topology of NCIT*net 2 NCIT*net 2 connectivity to the world In order to make proper usage of the network facilities and its potential use for research, the NCIT*net 2 was connected to ORION. The network interconnection center is the NCCT Research Lab where the NCIT*net 2 NOC and one of the POPs are located. The network interconnection center (NIC) of NCCT interconnects the NCIT*net 2 with ORION and Ca*net 4. The Figure 5 below depicts the network cross connection point of ORION, Ca*net 4, NCIT*net 2, and the UofO*net implemented at the NCCT site. Through ORION and Ca*net 4 the research labs are connected to the major research networks of the world such as Internet 2 (Abilene), GEANT ( the European research network linking the majority of the European countries to very high speed links), and to other continental research network such as the Australian and the Asia Pacific research networks. Version 1.0: October 13,

7 Figure 5. The interconnectivity of NCIT through NCCT with various other research networks Internal NCIT*net 2 connectivity The following labs were initially connected to the NCIT* net (1) as shown in Figures 1 and 2: NRC: - there is only one connection to a dedicated research lab which presently is at the discretion of the NCIT research group on how to use it. University of Ottawa: - the following labs are connected to the network: - CBY B the Network Control and Computing Technologies Research Laboratory - CBY B the Internet Architectures, Protocols and Performance Research Laboratory - CBY B the Broadband Wireless and Internetworking Research Laboratory - CBY B the Vision, Imaging, Video, and Audio Research Laboratory - CBY B the Microwave Photonics Research Laboratory - CBY B the Optical Network Research Centre - SITE BARLO - SITE DISCOVER - SITE DISCOVER - SITE DISCOVER - SITE BARLO Version 1.0: October 13,

8 Carleton University: - the following labs are connected to the network: - MC Wireless Mobile Computing Laboratory (WMCLab) - AA Alcatel Laboratory CRC/NCIT: - CRC campus is connected to the NCIT*net 2 through BADLAB ( Version 1.0: October 13,

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