Category Archives: NOMA

A while back, I wrote a guest blog for APNIC on the topic of the first results from the NOMA pilot work with RIPE NCC’s Atlas framework.

I concluded: “Nevertheless, while these results are pretty preliminary, they do highlight the value of the in-network perspective on IPv4 and IPv6 performance, and motivate further study. For instance, it seems the performance of IPv6 is better when measuring to a “near” target. One hypothesis is that performance improvement is because transit networks are not as friendly to IPv6 traffic as access networks. Other hypotheses are also possible, and only testing will tell.”

In a world where IPv6 and IPv4 network connectivity and routing are very clearly not symmetric, that testing could be really valuable, if for no other reasons than to show progress with IPv6 deployment, salute the networks that have made the progress, and help identify issues remaining.

This  is the persistent reference page for the NOMA Measurements Template document.  Please use this page’s URL to refer to the document:  http://www.techark.org/noma-measurements-template/

Current version of the document:    http://www.techark.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/20161208-NOMA-Measurements-Template.pdf

This  is the persistent reference page for the Internet Measurements Landscape (2016) paper.  Please use this page’s URL to refer to the paper (http://www.techark.org/internet-measurements-landscape-2016-systems-approaches-and-a-comparative-framework).

Current version of the document:  http://www.techark.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/20161213-NOMA-SurveyPaper.pdf

This is the persistent reference page for the 2016 NOMA Vision Paper.  Please use this page’s URL to refer to the paper:  http://www.techark.org/2016-noma-vision-paper/ ‎

Current version of the document:  http://www.techark.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/20161209-NOMA-Vision-Paper-RefUpdate.pdf (Updated URL for reference to Internet Measurements Survey paper)

Older versions of the document:

• http://www.techark.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/20161209-NOMA-Vision-Paper.pdf

The TechArk NOMA (Network Operator Measurement Activity) is focused on  developing operator-driven network health measurements through the definition and promotion of self-instrumentation and information sharing.)  This is all with a goal of ensuring a better, shared understanding of what “good” Internet looks like.

An important question is whether there is anything left to measure in operator networks?  At an invitational workshop in June of this year, the answer seemed to be “why, yes, there is”.

Various measurements are made of and across networks today, but they are often done without the specific involvement of the operators of those networks, and therefore have to make guesses or generalizations about them.  On the flipside, there’s a lot that goes into the customer’s experience of the Internet that can be adjusted and improved if network operators have a comprehensive instrumentation of their own networks.

The report from that workshop is now available here:  http://www.techark.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/20160831-WorkshopReport-Final.pdf .  Have a read through to see more about the experiences of one network operator that has implemented such instrumentation and possible paths forward to achieve the NOMA goal.

There are distinguishable roles in establishing, running and extracting results from any set of data about networks.   In some cases, one entity will handle more than one role. In all cases, the access and expertise of the entity impacts how they carry out the role.   That is, the operator of a network is in a better position to understand the network being measured (access), although they may not have as much experiment and analysis expertise as a non-affiliated researcher.   The 3 key roles are:

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An unexpected benefit of World IPv6 Launch in 2012 has been an ongoing look into the state of IPv6 deployment in access networks around the globe, as measured by participating websites. One of the guiding principles was that those making a public commitment to IPv6 deployment had to deliver, and it had to be publicly verified. We established a dashboard that indicated whether or not the website was delivering IPv6 on its homepage. Those websites in turn measured the extent to which the access networks were delivering IPv6.

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