Paul, from an end user needs perspective, and from the perspective of receiving the delivered product, ATM is indeed the preferred protocol when it comes to delivering vvd over a shared network. But it's best if exercise a little care here when assigning TLAs to applications.
Are we speaking about end-point to end-point ATM? Who is set up for that? Hardly anyone.
Or, are we speaking about mapping IP-based video streams to ATM flows? This method is, in fact, how many existing audio and video streams are established today when we access video clips over the 'net, in the absence of a universally accepted TCP'IP suite alternative, namely multi-provider-based MPLS. We don't see the ATM ourselves, since the mapping takes place behind the curtains of the cloud.
Or, perhaps are we speaking about some combination of the previous two alternatives? Again, not hardly... since hardly anyone is set up to send or receive native ATM.
I should like to return to this in a couple of days, or maybe tomorrow, as I do not have the presence of mind or the time right now to do this subject justice. Suffice it to say that this is a widely debated, and nontrivial, area with a fair amount of religious overtone associated with it, and one in which generalities will only lead us into trouble - if short answers are applied to this seemingly innocuous question.
I will attempt to provide a better clarification of this topic as time permits over the next day or so. In the meantime, if anyone else cares to jump in and save me the bother (or give me more work, as it were), please feel free to do so.
Regards for now, Frank Coluccio |
