Your View on DPI

[thomas.s.martinson-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org (Tom Martinson)]

I will answer the question, but everything I say is only me.  I speak 
for no one other than myself, and how I feel.

I know this Allot Communications.  At one time I had them in the Cable 
System I was running in Michigan, until I was able to remove them.

I don't believe that is really an issue anymore in the US.  The guide 
lines set forth by the FCC pretty much states a few things, but 
basically you are not allowed to discriminate.  You are allowed to 
manage your network but you need to stay above board.

My personal feelings about DPI comes from two points of view.  The first 
is as someone who has been the Sr. Geek for a cable network.  The second 
comes from that of a Internet User.

1.  As a user, I find them reprehensible.  In no way should anyone be 
able to see my data traffic, and decide for me that my Hulu download 
should have a lower priority than my email traffic, or vice versa.  Also 
it is not right for someone to have the ability and the need to 
"inspect" my packets and do with them as they wish, (I think that 
everyone remembers all those ACK resets to fight P2P traffic).  DPI was 
also used by NebUadd to identify advertisements and then substitute in 
what they want to put in.  This screams in the face of privacy issues.   
My feelings are that if the USPS is not allowed to read and decided if 
you should get a package/letter or at what rate you should get it, other 
than the postage on it, then how can someone look at our internet traffic.

2.  a.  From a technical point of view I was always able to show the 
cost of a DPI system over a 3 year period vs. just upgrading equipment 
and buying lager connections (OC12 to Gig or Gig to 10Gig) was the same 
price then why would we put an extra device into the network (Something 
else in the data path to fail).
     b. DPI was also installed in the Core or the AGG part of the 
network.  This is not the portion of the network that seems to have 
congestion.  It is the access portion of the network that is 
congested.   So why would I try to adjust traffic in the core.  It just 
did not fit well with what was trying to be done.

Now I do believe that network management is something that needs to be 
done.  It should be used to make sure everyone has a fair shake at 
getting good service, but I feel that it needs to be done at the access 
layer, and in a way that does not cause privacy concerns.  And if 
anything is done it should be done by something that is really only 
looking at bits and bytes on the access layer of the network, not 
something that is in  the flow of data.

Tom



On 01/26/2011 06:41 PM, Paul Courchene wrote:
> Tom Martinson said:
>> Some of us, like myself have strong
>> feelings about DPI ...
> I am curious about your "comment" and feelings about "DPI"
>
> For example, I was doing some research on an Israeli S/W firm that is into DPI
> and experiencing some growth... The firm has Stock Ticker: ALLT or Allot Communication, and their business summary says:
> "The company offers traffic management systems, including Service Gateway platform for broadband service control and optimization based on DPI;"
> While they are not very big (Cap: $288 M), they are growing like crazy.
>
> What would you share with us, on the potential of DPI?
>
> paulc
>
> Quoting Tom Martinson<thomas.s.martinson-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org>:
>> Basically the software is a resource management software specifically
>> for Cable companies.  It is used to gather information about a number of
>> different things, and then present a number of things.  The software is
>> based on IPDR so there is no DPI (Some of us, like myself have strong
>> feelings about DPI)  PCMM is used to control and adjustments (up or
>> down) that needs to happen in the network.
>>
>> Some of the Key areas are
>>
>> PCMM
>> IPDR
>> DOCSIS
>> Postgres
>> RHEL/CentOS 5.x
>> Buis
>>
>>
>> Does this help?
>>
>> Tom
>>
>>
>> On 01/26/2011 05:18 PM, theBlueSage wrote:
>>> Hi Tom,
>>>
>>> What kind of software? what language? what type of application? we have
>>> everything here from kernel hackers to hardware hackers to web
>>> hackers .. likely the only thing we all have in common is Linux, so you
>>> may need to be a tad more specific :)
>>>
>>> Richard
>>>
>>> On Wed, 2011-01-26 at 17:08 -0500, Tom Martinson wrote:
>>>> I am looking for suggestions as to where to go looking for a couple of
>>>> Software Engineers.  Specifically they have to be able to develop on the
>>>> Linux platform.  We (The company that I work for) have tried a number of
>>>> different areas to include recruiters, and even Craig's list.  Any
>>>> suggestions would be helpful.
>>>>
>>>> Thanks,
>>>>
>>>> Tom
>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
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>
>
>    --
>    paulc
>
>