Matt,
I think you are misinterpretting my comments. Don't read more in to them
than are there.
I am in no way attacking the validity of your experience or comments. I'm
simply asking for more detail, so that I can learn from your experience.
You seem to be suggesting that I simply haven't looked for information
No I am not. I am asking you to tell me what you know, so I don't have to
waste time replicating your research.
Thats the purpose of this list, to exchange knowledge and data. Not just
making claims, but disclosing why.
I am not making arguments based upon information I read somewhere.
I never suggest that. And Neither am I.
But no, I do not own a city wide MESH network. I decided against MESH, which
is why my opinion is biased against MESH.
I can count the total ISPs on one hand that have completed that task as of
today.
Maybe two Muni's that had been legally allowed to proceed doing a large
public network.
So my experience level does not lessen my point of view.
We do a vast amount of research before doing field trials.
Of course you do. Just like most WISPs do. I can't count how many single
unit Mesh system we had sent to evaluate. Its likely you did the same.
As a router operating system manufacturer with protocol level coding
experience, (but never went to market), we also have a great deal of talent
on staff, to investigate the trade offs of various technologies. But you
have to understand, that sooner or later a WISP needs to put the science
projects aside, and start making sales, and they don't always have time to
keep up to date on every latest and greatest daily enhancements to a
technology, when they've decided on a different path to follow. I really
don't have time to evaluate every manufacturers' Mesh product on a weekly
basis to prove right or wrong their latest theories in their field.
It doesn't appear you have done nearly the research we have
and it doesn't appear you have any significant mesh deployments.
This is where your comments are starting to cross the line, and in my
opinion not acceptable. What basis do you have to pass judgement on what
experience my company has, and what research we have done? You've never
taken one step into our research lab, nor ever spoken to one of our
engineers. To the best of my knowledge, I have not disclosed to you, any
thing about my client baseand projects. I advise you to stick to passing
judgement on your experience, which is what you are knowedgable on.
This is NOT a competition to prove who is the smarter technician and network
designer. I do not claim to be Grand Master MESH. But I am more than
qualified to carry on intelligent debate on the pros and cons of various
routing and wireless technologies.
I suggest you field trial the technology in a meaningful way before
dismissing it.
I am not dismissing MESH technology. I just have personally chosen against
it, for the majority of my projects, for technical reason appropriate for
the needs of those deployments. That does not mean that I do not recognize
that the MESH technologies have merit. And I recognize that huge
advancements have been made since the first generation gear days of
WaveWireless and Motorola 6 years ago (Yes, went to manufacturer training
for both). What we need to be concentrating on in this discussion, is more
detail on how and why current MESH software had been used to solve your
problems, and what were the trade offs, and why did you still chose that
technology knowing those trade offs. ALL technologies have trade-offs. That
is what helps everyone decide when which topology is best for them to deploy
for specific applications.
Cisco defines a mesh network as a communications network having two or
more paths to any node. I would agree with that definition. How would you
define mesh?
I don't disagree with that definition. And technically in the dictionary, if
it had to be defined, that could be it. But I feel MESH is more of a
mindset than a definition. In practicality and real world, that MESH
definition is two broad to cover all the many ways of implementing MESH.
That definition does not define why someone would benefit from usingthe
technology. I look at MESH as a concept of how to better gain coverage to a
large number of people and/or geographical area, when Line-of-sight to a
central or common sources are frequently obstructed, which typically
requires more radios, installed closer togeather, and a method to manage
their relationships, apposed to defining the way nodes communicate.
I don't think I will agree that a human is better suited to the job
though.
Some people believed in John Henry, some believed in the Steam engine. I
agree that the ultimately a computer (or technology) has more potential to
be better equipped to make those decissions. However, today is not that day
yet, and I have more confidence in the engineer (human). Not because the
computer isn't capable, but because the engineer has not yet been proven
capable to program the computer to be more capable.
Discuss muni issues in a non-technical thread.
Wether you recognize it or not, technology has no value if not applied to a
business case to solve. Technology's applications are well relivent to
technolgy discussions. I'd argue that one of the big mistakes of technical
people is they get trapped inside the technology, and design without
adequately understanding the applications and ultimate goal of using the
technology.
For example, the task is not to reduce packet loss, its to be able to serve
consumers more reliably. There is a big difference between the two. One
approach is narrow and one is broad. What often happens, is technical people
make these beautiful products from a technical point of view, but they are
worthless because they don't solve the problems that need to be solved for
its applications, which were the reasons for originally developing the
technology. Just my 2 cents.
Tom DeReggi
RapidDSL & Wireless, Inc
IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband
----- Original Message -----
From: "Matt Liotta" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "WISPA General List" <wireless@wispa.org>
Sent: Friday, February 24, 2006 9:30 AM
Subject: Re: [WISPA] Mesh Equipment
Tom DeReggi wrote:
Trie I did not offer any backup data. But use your immagination. Its all
in one place, easy to check, easy to document, easy to configure, easy to
backup, etc.
What does mesh offer for better complete central management?
You seem to be suggesting that I simply haven't looked for information to
back up your argument. Not sure why that makes sense to you. Anyway, I am
not making arguments based upon information I read somewhere. My company
operates a very large network that makes use of mesh, star, and ring
network architectures. Some of it is fiber-based, while other parts are
wireless. We are a highly technical, but practical company. In other
words, we do a vast amount of research before doing field trials. After we
are satisfied that the technical works in the field the way we expect and
ultimately want, only then do we deploy it. I can make intelligent
statements in regard to mesh because of this. It doesn't appear you have
done nearly the research we have and it doesn't appear you have any
significant mesh deployments. I suggest you field trial the technology in
a meaningful way before dismissing it.
In regard to your actual question, I would request that you be more
specific. We manage all of our network devices centrally using SNMP
regardless if they are mesh or not.
> I think you may be mixing too many arguments.
I may be mixing up typical deployment models using MESH with MESH
Technology.
It also depends on your definition of MESH.
Cisco defines a mesh network as a communications network having two or
more paths to any node. I would agree with that definition. How would you
define mesh?
I admit, I made a generalization of a typical way MESH would be deployed,
in my arguements.
Deployed at street level, so many short hops were required to get
coverage and get around NLOS obstacles, in a dense city environment.
That may be true if the mesh didn't have any dedicated backhauls. We using
P2MP systems to backhaul our mesh, which allows us to limit the number of
hops of any one particular path.
A network that made its own intelligent routing decissions, that may not
always be the most intelligent compared to the human mind's decissions.
Meshs don't have to make their own routing decisions. You can statically
route a mesh if you want to. I don't think I will agree that a human is
better suited to the job though.
But is that really MESH? Technically you could call any multi-path routed
network, MESH. I call my network a routed network using triangulation.
But I would not call it MESH. But it very well could be considered
similar to MESH.
Our industry peers use the term mesh in this context, so it appears quite
appropriate.
What criteria does your network OS sue to deterine routing changes?
Measure highest packet loss? measure most amount of available bandwdith?
Measure least amount of average bandwidth? Measure shortest path? Lowest
latency? Lowest cost ($) transit or transport provider path? And how many
can they consider togeather to make the best overall decission?
I'd be interested in hearing more about what you are doing with MPLS in
your design.
MPLS traffic engineering allows you to use any number of combinations of
criteria. In fact, Cisco sells whole books on this very subject.
Also understand this is a Wireless list, not a fiber list. The design
flaws of MESH over fiber (fast packet-loss less links) is a completely
different animal with different challenges than MESH in Wireless.
I disagree. While there are certainly important differences between fiber
and wireless, network architecture wish the communication medium is
generally less important.
I recognize that MESH is at a new stage of being more than just the
implementation of RIP2. (Allthough early MESH was not much more than
RIP).
Tropos's implementation certainly doesn't fit that description and they
have been around from the early days of wireless mesh.
Thats a very bold statement, that is not true. However, that does not
mean I do not recognize the benefits of the advanced design of MPLS
networks.
What do you mean it isn't true. Of course it is! Name one tier 1 ISP that
doesn't have an MPLS network or is working on having one.
How do you figure? I sure hope the network design that was getting
proposed, was something they would take the time to evaluate, in making
their decissions.
Anyone would look at there assets to locate gear, and consider that into
their design. Thats step 1 of any wireless network design.
We consider mesh for its technical merits and this thread started in that
regard. We have nothing to do with munis and yet we do a good deal of
mesh. It seems very simple that mesh as a technology and one market
segment are two separate issues. Discuss muni issues in a non-technical
thread.
-Matt
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