Subject: [ericas] Examples of Internet protocols not working well in emergent regions

From: Arturo Servin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2013 22:19:04 -0300

Some ideas of possible challenges for the IP suite in emergent regions:

	- Long delay networks
	- Low bandwidth networks
	- Satellite networks (which are low BW and have long delays)
	- Mesh wireless networks
	- Networks not connected all the time
	- Not reliable/slow backup networks (i.e. in many countries there is
just one ISP, how can we provide multi-home for critical services using
a not very reliable backup link, for example a satellite link, a 3/4G,
dial-up, etc.)
	
	These are the problems that for instance, I suffer or I know people
that do. Nevertheless I imagine there should be many more of these.

	I imagine that a first step would be to document a set of problems on
which we could try to solve.

Regards,
as

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From: Melinda Shore <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2013 17:49:25 -0800

> a not very reliable backup link, for example a satellite link, a 3/4G,

If I can split hairs for a second, these problems are not peculiar
to emergent regions but to remote places without a lot of local
infrastructure.  We have these same problems in Alaska (particularly
in villages off the road system) and my understanding is that they're
not uncommon in northern Canada and portions of some of the nordic
countries.

Melinda

-- 
Melinda Shore
No Mountain Software
[email-masked]

"Software longa, hardware brevis."

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From: Arturo Servin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2013 22:52:15 -0300

These are problems of emergent regions and remote places.

/as

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From: Stephen Farrell <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 29 Apr 2013 03:00:28 +0100

> not uncommon in northern Canada and portions of some of the nordic

True, at least based my experience off-road Northern Sweden. However,
in our case where we did DTN work, that was only true for about two
hundred people for a few weeks of the year (summer in the mountains
for the reindeer herders basically). If those conditions applied for
many more people all year 'round then that would be an entirely
different scenario.

So I for one am very interested in the nitty-gritty details as they
appear in different places.

S.

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From: Melinda Shore <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2013 18:24:37 -0800

> appear in different places.

Frankly the most pressing problems in the villages seem to be
around remote device management, less of a protocol problem
than a product problem.  As far as delay it seems like people
have found a way to negotiate that, but packet loss (particularly
during weather events) can have considerable impact.

Melinda

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From: Alejandro Acosta <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2013 22:01:52 -0430

Hi All,
   Do you know of any study/research which might say things like:

a) Some kind of ratio of Km of fiber per population?
b) Some kind of ratio of Km of fiber per size of the country?

  Of course there any many measures of speed, rtt, high speed access
penetration and cost per Mbp.. Emerging region sare at the end of this
list.

Alejandro,

-- 
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^A.......o$

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From: S Moonesamy <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2013 23:11:55 -0700

Hi Alejandro,
>penetration and cost per Mbp.. Emerging region sare at the end of this

Sorry, I do not have a good answer to your questions.  There was a 
report which looked into the impact of the Web ( 
http://thewebindex.org/2012/10/2012-Web-Index-Key-Findings.pdf 
).  The questions (see above) are about infrastructure.  There is 
very little open data from emerging regions.  As a starting point 
people from emerging regions could collect data as part of a research 
project.  I leave it to Arturo to comment about how to get funding if 
this is part of a regional project.

Regards,
S. Moonesamy

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From: Arturo Servin <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 29 Apr 2013 10:23:48 -0300

On 4/29/13 3:11 AM, S Moonesamy wrote:
> http://thewebindex.org/2012/10/2012-Web-Index-Key-Findings.pdf ).  The
> questions (see above) are about infrastructure.  There is very little
> open data from emerging regions.  As a starting point people from
> emerging regions could collect data as part of a research project.  I
> leave it to Arturo to comment about how to get funding if this is part
> of a regional project.
> 
> Regards,
> S. Moonesamy

	There are some RIPE Atlas probes in Latin America, possibly some others
in Africa and Asia where we could get some data to compare with North
America and Europe.

	This data is not 100% public AFAIK, however it may be possible get some
results involving research people at RIPE NCC. Anyone here?

	Also, we collect some data using our project (lacnic labs) SIMON but we
haven't too much spare time to mining it. If someone wants to use the
dataset or to host a probe please let me know.

http://simon.labs.lacnic.net/simon
http://simon.labs.lacnic.net/simon/reports/

Example of one of our reports:
http://simon.labs.lacnic.net/simon/throughputresults/MX/4/2012/12/JavaScript/1

Regards,
as

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From: Alejandro Acosta <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 29 Apr 2013 09:26:38 -0430

Hi SM, Arturo,
  Thanks both. However, if was thinking in comparing infrastructure,
not exactly rtt, bandwidth, and this kind of thing (I'm not saying
they are less important)
  For example things like how many kilometers/miles of fiber are
person/per square feet of the country.
  I know the examples given by Arturo are worldwide issues, but I
think in emerging region are more common. Talking about the country I
live (Venezuela) it's not common to find fiber link to many cities.
It's also difficult to find fibre to many parts of the city in fact.
  Recently I was involved in the following situation:  in a mid-size
city a customer quit a Frame Relay link thinking they could replace it
by a G3 connection -this order came from headquater in Germany-.
Surprise: the G3 connection was pathetic, more than 1 second RTT and a
lot of packet loss. Solution: The customer had to use a satellite
link.

  Another issue (to be confirm) that I find worse in developing
countries are installation times. I've participated in some project in
other countries and links can be installed in few weeks. For LATAM it
might take months. What about Africa?.

Best regards,

Alejandro,

-- 
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^A.......o$

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From: S Moonesamy <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 30 Apr 2013 11:10:35 -0700

Hi Arturo,
>in Africa and Asia where we could get some data to compare with North

There are some RIPE Atlas probes in Africa.

Alejandro has mentioned some of the challenges.  It would be helpful 
if more people from emerging regions commented by posting a message 
to this mailing list.

Regards,
S. Moonesamy