Gary, you should know better than to take a short synopsis type of headline article and try to draw conclusions.
NT is NOT just going to go after device market although that is a huge and potentially the mother-of-all market (which is why Gates is spending billions trying to "buy" his way into Windows CE being the standard development software platform for the device market and why companies like Phone.com are valued like crazy).
Why for example is Qualcomm and every stock associated with digital cellular technology going up the roof as much as optical network stocks? Because there is huge potential for turning the digial cellphones into an intelligent two way IP device with all the associated applications (banking, stock investment, paging, internet browsing, email, maybe even watch live concerts !). So if you take a mass-market device like a cellphone and embedd it with IP applications using NT OIE, what are the potential for this market?
The following info clearly identifies where NT is headed with this Open IP approach. The fact that Microsoft and Intel has signed on should give off an obvious clue that the PC platform will likely be the first mass market platform that will incorporate some of the basic routing functionality........after all what is a Cisco box other than a specialized computer with packet control application built in along with few other utilities!
Once you provide the hardware/software system vendors with the OIE source and API, the potential areas where routing functions will be imbedded is almost unimaginable.
Remember the premise of Internet: Open, Everywhere, and Ubiquitous. Remember that last word Ubiquitous especially.....there are lot of analysts who are predicting that the future of Internet is not actually even the PC but in every day 'devices' like Sony Playstation, Sony TV, VCR's, Calculators, Nokia handphones, Palm Pilots, Seiko wrist watches, Pagers, ...... where the IP and Internet capabilities are built RIGHT into these devices and thereby truely taking Internet to the masses -- even those who can't afford PC's or hate turning computers on but are fine with operating TV, VCR, Cellphones......get the idea?
If NT actually pulls this off, it will truly revolutionize the world and the Internet and you can kiss Cisco good-bye. Sure it ain't going to happen tomorrow but once the pandora's box is opened, there is no turning back.
This incredibly bold and exciting initiative could be precursor to the science fiction stories of years gone by where machines all of a sudden are everywhere, networked to everything and literally provide almost perfect level of communication/information to every single human being on this earth.
Sounds crazy but then I am sure computers and electricity also sounded crazy not too long ago.
I am not saying NT will succeed because this initiative is breathtakingly big in scope and challenge but i think you are dangerously mis-understanding all the RAMIFICATIONS of this strategic move by NT.
By embedding IP applications into everyday devices (or PC's which is almost "everyday device"), Internet will truely become the mass market medium through which almost all human endeavours will be conducted through. Kind of fluffy but potentially true.
Read the following and you might get a better idea of where NT is going with this;
Telecomguy
What value does the Open IP Environment have for our customers?
The Open IP Environment addresses the two critical, customer issues: driving down cost of ownership and generating new service revenue. It will do so by accelerating the commoditization of routers and facilitating the deployment of new and more cost-effective networks. This will not only reduce capital costs, but ongoing operating costs driven by the labor-intensive planning, support, trouble-shooting and provisioning nature of legacy, router-centric networks.
By opening up the Internet to the global development community, the Open IP Environment will stimulate the rapid introduction of innovative services, applications and devices. This outburst of creativity will lead to a huge open market for a richer choice of value-added service offerings for our customers. The resulting competition will drive a new, profitable economic model for service deployment.
How will Open IP Environment transform today's router-centric networks?
Open IP Environment is a scalable, modular and high-performance IP software infrastructure that works on any hardware and operating system. It provides an open, modular framework for incorporating routing and IP functionality, as well as interfaces to applications developed by Nortel Networks and other companies, including IP accounting, policy, and network management.
With IP Open Environment, we will enable thousands of companies to embed routing and other IP functionality into their products and services. We are shifting the industry from a model largely based on "IP in routers" to one based on delivering IP functionality - including routing - on a variety of platforms. This highly scalable and flexible software solution (less than 100 kilobytes in its fundamental form) can Internet-enable everything from personal appliances to high-performance carrier switches deep within the Optical Internet - the use determines the IP functionality to be incorporated.
The high-performance Internet envisaged by Nortel Networks requires a new network architecture that eliminates today's router-centric performance constraints and the high cost of ownership due to networks based on legacy, multiprotocol routers. In addition to a high-performance physical infrastructure that exploits the convergence of optical and packet technologies, the high-performance Internet also requires a new IP software infrastructure. Open IP Environment is Nortel Networks' response.
What applications can exploit the Open IP Environment?
A major rationale for developing the Open IP Environment was to enable a new economic model for the cost-effective development and rapid deployment of IP services into the marketplace. The open architecture of our IP software solution enables the global Internet development community to access a powerful new software infrastructure to facilitate this goal. Nortel Networks believes that the Open IP Environment will enable a vast number of applications to emerge, as varied as networked personal digital assistants (PDAs), online banking and finance solutions, Internet gaming, e-commerce, and telephony and video services - to list just some examples.
Viewed from a general, technical perspective, how are we defining the Open IP Environment?
The Open IP Environment is a software solution from Nortel Networks providing an IP communications building block that sits between the operating system and the applications/services layer of any Internet-enabled device. The Open IP Environment consists of four cornerstones, or frameworks, each containing a set of components with well-defined interfaces.
The system services cornerstone provides interfaces to a wide range of operating systems and delivers high-performance computing services for demanding, real-time environments. Services include thread, fault and memory management, as well as interprocess communication capable of terabit rates. The forwarding cornerstone provides interfaces to multiple packet forwarding mechanisms, including hardware, software and hybrid platforms.
The Control plane cornerstone provides plug-and-play access for all IP modules, such as our high-performance implementation of the OSPF routing protocol, tunneling protocols such as L2TP, call management functions such as RSVP and H.323, etc.
The Management plane provides open standard interfaces for policy-based management (COPS), command line interface (CLI), network management based on the Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP), IP accounting, etc.
How does Open IP Environment enable the high-performance implementation of IETF protocols?
Next-generation IP networks will need to handle traffic volumes thousands of times greater than today's networks, driven by more bandwidth-intensive applications, a rapidly growing subscriber base, and a growing number of mission-critical applications and services, such as e-commerce and telephony services. Key thrusts in implementing IETF protocols therefore include scalability, reliability and performance. Whether it's protocols related to routing, tunneling, framing, control, signaling or others, Nortel Networks' strategy is to deliver industry-leading implementations of these protocols. In this regard, the crucial activities are reducing complexity of the software to increase its robustness, improving the implementation of algorithms to increase performance, and designing modules to be highly scalable.
How is the Open IP Environment different from today's technology?
In several ways. First, the Open IP Environment architecture is highly modular and scalable in its design, in contrast to traditional monolithic architectures found on many router products today. The Open IP Environment can therefore be deployed as a cost-effective, highly efficient fundamental building block in a wide variety of Internet-enabled devices, spanning everything from home network controllers and consumers electronics, to terabit networking devices and optical servers. Today's monolithic software is tied to specific router platforms, operating systems and hardware. Porting this environment to other Internet-enabled devices and platforms, if technically feasible, requires huge R&D investment and considerably lengthens time to market.
Secondly, the Open IP Environment was designed to enable the entire Internet development community to design and build value-added application modules that can leverage a much lower-cost hardware and software Internet infrastructure.
Thirdly, the Open IP Environment is completely independent of the underlying computing environment, including the operating system and processor. This enables designers and developers to select the most appropriate computing infrastructure for their products and markets.
Is the Open IP Environment proprietary?
Absolutely not. Open IP Environment runs on a variety of computing platforms (such as UNIX, Linux, Windows, VxWorks, Chorus, Solaris) and chipsets (Intel, Motorola, National Semiconductor, etc.). Modules within the Open IP Environment are fully compliant with the applicable Internet standards, as defined by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) RFCs. Finally, interfaces to applications and services are also compliant to the applicable IETF RFCs, e.g., Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) for management, RADIUS for authentication, COPS for policy, etc.
How is the "openness" of the Open IP Environment realized?
It is realized in several ways. First, the system services cornerstone allows the Open IP Environment to run on a wide variety of computing platforms. Secondly, the various cornerstones and modules are interconnected with high-performance, open application programming interfaces (APIs). Thirdly, open standard interfaces are employed for access to applications and services.
Is Open IP Environment "open source" software like Linux?
No, not exactly. It is more similar to the Java model. The Linux open source model encourages the global development community to modify and improve the entire base of Linux source code. Modifications and additions to the source code are loosely managed and controlled to provide some measure of product stability. Several companies have emerged to take advantage of the subsequent requirement for professional packaging, support and maintenance. Java, on the other hand, is owned by Sun Microsystems but is available for the global development community to implement as required. It is recognized as an industry standard.
Similarly, Nortel Networks will be the sole owner of Nortel Networks Open IP modules and frameworks. However, our customers are free to modify the source code for their own purposes, and to add any applications and functions they want. Nortel Networks does not foresee the need to integrate these customer-created modifications into the base product stream, just as Sun Microsystems does not implement all of the applications and functions customers develop using Java. Using this approach, Nortel Networks will ensure the quality, reliability, performance and scalability of OIPE as it evolves.
Nortel Networks actively encourages the global development community to create application modules for OIPE and is engaging third parties to develop modules for OIPE, such as system management, link layer protocols (e.g., frame relay, ATM, etc.), and non-IP protocols (e.g., SNA, AppleTalk, Novell IPX, etc.).
Can OIPE interwork with IOS?
Yes. There are two ways OIPE can interwork with IOS-based products and technologies. The first involves data plane interaction - the data transfer level where packets are received, transmitted and processed. OIPE implements standard IP functions as defined by IETF RFCs. As a result of implementing these standards, OIPE is completely interoperable at the data plane level with IOS-based products and technologies.
The second area involves interaction with "back office" systems responsible, for example, for accounting, network management, policy, and customer care. OIPE implements open standard interfaces for these functions, as well as the command line interface - the de facto industry standard for provisioning and managing routers using text-based command strings, similar in appearance to DOS 1.1 and UNIX commands. |
