definition of infrastructure

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Brian Randell <Brian.Randell () ncl ac uk>
Date: April 15, 2009 12:55:51 PM EDT
To: dave () farber net, "ip" <ip () v2 listbox com>
Subject: [IP] Re:    cost of 1 gig GOOD POINT

Hi:

At 10:42 -0400 15/4/09, David Farber wrote:
> Begin forwarded message:
>
> From: "Savage, Christopher" <ChrisSavage () dwt com>
> Date: April 15, 2009 8:58:52 AM EDT
> To: <dave () farber net>
> Subject: RE: [IP] Re:   cost of 1 gig GOOD POINT
> ...Richard's assertion masks what is, in the broadband and other  
> arenas,
> probably the critical question: What do we actually MEAN by
> "infrastructure"?
>
> I'd throw out, as a first approximation, infrastructure is something
> that: (a) is capital intensive; (b) is long-lived; (c) is a necessary,
> or at least a key, input to a wide variety of unrelated productive and
> leisure activity; (d) is technologically relatively stable; and (e)
> exhibits strong positive externalities....

FWIW, here's my attempt at a rather general definition of the term  
infrastructure:

The term infrastructure in general refers to an underlying set of
general purpose facilities. It is a matter of viewpoint whether these  
facilities
are regarded as a system or an infrastructure, since one  
organization's system
often becomes another organization's infrastructure.
An infrastructure has connotations of being reusable by different
individuals/organizations for different purposes on different occasions.
Typically, not all of these uses are known to, or even the concern of,  
the
designer(s) of the infrastructure, who therefore must create something  
that
will respond to and support types of use that have not yet been  
conceived.
Moreover, infrastructures typically need to be capacity engineered -  
so that
the amount of resource can be changed to meet current and expected  
demand.
(Over-deployment endangers the supplier, under-deployment frustrates the
user.)

This comes from something I wrote a few years ago:

Dependability, Structure and Infrastructure
In Cyberspace Security and Defense: Research Issues,
Kowalik, J.S., Gorski, J. and Sachenko, A. (eds), pp 143-160
NATO Science Series II, 196
Springer, 2005, ISBN 1-4020-3380-X
http://www.cs.ncl.ac.uk/publications/books/papers/282.pdf

Cheers

Brian Randell

--
School of Computing Science, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne,
NE1 7RU, UK
EMAIL = Brian.Randell () ncl ac uk   PHONE = +44 191 222 7923
FAX = +44 191 222 8232  URL = http://www.cs.ncl.ac.uk/people/brian.randell




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