Jay, Darlene, Thread,
"Can you comment on the ability of @Home technology to deploy web processes closer to the user? Can @Home generically deliver distributed server capacity?"
You ask if ATHM can accommodate web apps, with a focus on their caching and other deep architectural server elements. Perhaps, but I see some splintering needed in the MSOs clustering schemes where their data model is concerned, where individual server devices would need to be placed at the outermost points, closest to the user, if the present system could accommodate it at all. This would sit in contrast to regional servers next to existing caching, where multiple head ends share a common set of resources. The impact of this would be considerable from a support and logistics standpoint, given current HFC designs, and there is more to consider before we get this far.
Before we look into the core, I'd have to examine the edge and their (the MSOs) access platforms, and here's where I see the first signs of architectural unfriendliness if we are discussing going beyond the status quo of what is, and what is not, achievable, given popular assumptions and recent utilization trends.
If the web apps you are referring to (i.e., those which substitute for the executables which normally reside on the desktop) were the only challenge then there would be no problem. But this is not the case.
When evaluating this possibility one must also take into account the other things going on in the local distribution plant, namely the normal traffic levels (see next para) and the amount of traffic that is pent up but currently discouraged, and then assess the aggregate picture.
ATHM's residential service offerings already preclude sustained commercial (read so-ho) use, requiring that end users refrain from extended file transfers and other applications demanding of prolonged bandwidth utilization, such as those which will be inevitable in the near future. Streaming video and audio from content providers comes to mind here. This constraint may have been lifted momentarily (I don't know what the last waffle state on this issue is, it goes back and forth based on public tolerance and outcry), but its need is clear when you look at the traffic utilization trajectories which point to the horizon.
Cable has enormous capacity potential, enormous, if it is fashioned properly. That is, if its network architecture takes into account the new realities of a photonic universe and designs to the parameters of these new realities, as opposed to merely pyrrhically fulfilling yesterday's dreams.
But the constraints imposed by current DOCSIS implementations, if not upgraded, are going to put a serious crimp in this potential for a long time to come, unless the tail sections in the loop and the CMTSs (cable modem termination systems at the head ends) are re-groomed, as in the way T's Salt Lake City fiber pilot suggests they should be.
Also, and assuming that the decision is reached to follow through with this form of re-grooming --which would reduce the shared user domain from over 500 homes passed in many cases (sometimes thousands) down to something under 80 homes-- then one must also take into account the costs and the amount of time that would be required to effect said changes which are needed to even make a difference when considering the installed base, and the existing growth projections.
Many systems are not even half way complete under the old model. So, how long would it take the MSOs to change their plans midstream and adapt to a new model? A very long time.
This time frame would be measured in terms of up to another 5 years (to redo what it's taken a comparable period to only partially complete in the old model) in order to make a noticeable dent.
Unfortunately, the MSOs are split, in favor of legacy, on the need for such improvements as was amply demonstrated by a joint interview with the CTOs of T, Cox, Adelphia and TWX the other day. Some of these guys are looking to DOCSIS 1.1 as a form of final beatitude which transcends suffering, in fact.
Even where promise is voiced by those in favor of upgrading, it's a long way off. So, in my view the capacity that currently exists will suffice for the status quo, with some edging-in by some streaming apps, but I don't see any chance for "at work" kinds of utilization or full streaming apps anytime soon. If the foregoing apps (so-ho and streaming content, to name just two) are precluded or discouraged (even if only tacitly by not building out more capacity), then I must also wonder how the web apps' contention for capacity will unfold. I can only surmise that the powers that be will say, 'not now.'
Or, they might roll the dice if competitive pressures mount (or if they are blinded by their own denial), and go forward with it. Who knows.
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With this backdrop of application tensions vying for capacity already, what does downloading executables and ordinary services -such as printing and backing up - across the shared loop, portend? I am left to wonder. I also see this as an opportunity for new players to indulge in some serious encroachment with new fiber-to-the-home or curb architectures, who don't share the same anachronistic dreams and memes as many of today's MSOs.
Regards, Frank Coluccio
ps - I've also posted this on the Frank Coluccio Technology Forum, in case anyone wants to follow up on discussion there.
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