[no subject]

Derek

-----Original Message-----
From: Andy Dills [mailto:andy () xecu net] 
Sent: Thursday, August 08, 2002 1:18 PM
To: Derek Samford
Cc: nanog () merit edu
Subject: RE: NANOG, its decline in s/n

On Thu, 8 Aug 2002, Derek Samford wrote:

> Personally, every time I post, it's from a Tier-2 perspective. This,
> honestly, changes absolutely nothing about how I build my network from
a
> logical perspective. There are some minor differences, I.E. I don't
own
> my own fiber, and I don't have many peering relationships. I use
> transit/transport the same as many other Tier-2's. But the best
> practices of a Tier-1 are the best practices of any other ISP
> regardless. Reinventing the wheel is, IMHO, a very bad thing. Over 90%
> of networking mistakes have already been made, and really, that's what
> NANOG is for. How many of you out there wish you had done some things
> different when you look back after rolling out a network? I think
people
> should keep in mind that one of the hardest parts of network design
> isn't making it work, but making it scale properly. And generally,
> that's the advice the newer people tend to ignore. Sure other ways
will
> *work*, but they generally won't scale. And the whole point of an ISP
is
> to grow, right?

The whole point of an ISP is to make money. Let's not forget that.
Growing has ruined many a fine network.

The best practices of a Tier-1 (such a useless term) are NOT
neccessarily
the best practices for all networks.

For instance, a few years ago, I had to bitch at UUnet for three weeks
to
get them to configure per-packet CEF facing me (3 DS1s). Their first
reaction was "No, we don't run proprietary protocols on our network."
When
I pointed out that I knew for a fact that they were already using CEF
switching, cisco-proprietary or not, they finally agreed to try it out
as a special circumstance, if it breaks, tough shit. Worked flawlessly
for us till we migrated to the DS3 level.

Now, it would seem like a reasonable thing for the UUnet's of the world
to
have such policy, to not run proprietary protocols on their network.
(That's why they always turn up circuits with encap frame instead of
HDLC.) When you have a network of that size, such sweeping policies are
neccessary to maintain sanity. Not so for small networks.

It wouldn't make sense for a small network to give up the very
flexibility
that differentiates it from the large networks.

Andy

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