garyx, when discussing bandwidth-related services (transport delivery, distribution, routing, management of, or even basic I/O functions) I don't know how software can be removed from the formula that also includes silica, silicon and gallium arsenide, except for the most pedestrian forms of link products, today. A vendor either supports a dumb pipe between two points, such as the most simplistic and classic forms of passive metallic two-port networks, or they provide software at end points and network nodes which govern how traffic flows.
How "much" bandwidth and how it "knows where to go," after these other basic considerations are taken into account, becomes a matter of degree, and they are always under the direction of someone's (and not necessarily the box maker's own) software. The things that make up Cisco's Internetwork Operating System platform, or those attributes which differentiate Lucent's ATM architecture from anyone else's, or even those which make up a Ciena DWDM lambda services framework, are all defined in a software model first, and then executed under the direction of that software, or someone else's which is made to order. Oftentimes, the software vendor best suited for the task finds themselves being "acquired" by the larger box maker.
I therefore infer that you are referring to "pure plays," of which there are many... and who routinely license their software protocol "stacks" and application to the larger hardware platform vendors without ever producing a box themselves. Are these the 'software companies that specialize in bandwidth solutions' to which you are referring?
Upstream a bit I posted a message which someone sent to me via email seeking an opinion on his approach to network software. It speaks directly to the topic which you've brought up here. No one has replied to it yet, so I guess I'll need to get my research cap on and do a little digging into the state of the art of directory enabled networking, or DEN. In the meantime, if anyone else lurking here has something to contribute on these topics, I'd be interested in reading your views, whether it is in direct response to gayrx's, or to the earlier DEN post.
Regards, Frank |
