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Academic Computing and Communications Center | |||||||||
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Network Computing at UIC -- Now and in the Future |
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The ADN, or Academic Data Network, is of growing importance to both the product and process of this university. Teaching, research, and service all have at their core the generation, dissemination and preservation of information. And with the increased flow of information these days, this can not be done efficiently or competitively without a reliable, high-speed computer network. The products of a university -- graduates that use information technology in their jobs, or research results analyzed by computer and disseminated by electronic mail -- will depend increasingly on computers and their interconnections. In addition, the actual processes that create these products will be drastically altered. New ways of collaboration between teachers and students and between researchers themselves will be made possible by instant access to remote data and computing facilities. |
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| The ADN Today | ||||
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Our campus network is functionally a single backbone used for interconnecting
other, more localized networks called LANs. A LAN, or Local Area Network,
connects to the backbone through specialized computers called "routers."
This structure provides basic addressing and routing information necessary
for connections between local networks and the outside world.
The details, of course, are much more complicated. A high capacity fiber-optic cable acts as a backbone; it reaches most buildings on campus. Each building, in turn, has hubs and concentrators that connect wires from offices onto the backbone cable. Different labs or LANs on campus use different networking protocols that may depend on either hardware or software. And somehow information must flow from any point A to any other point B quickly and without collisions. Fortunately, normal users and their desktop machines don't have to pay attention to the internal boundaries between the various subsystems. National networks and hosts on a local network perceive the entire campus as a single network. Indeed, we are well connected to the Internet and BITNET. The Internet itself is really an internetwork of many other networks of different sizes and shapes, each conceptually like our ADN. It reaches colleges, universities, research organizations and many corporations in the states and throughout the world. The upshot is that any computer, large or small, that is connected to the ADN (and ultimately to the Internet) can communicate with any other computer/host on any local or remote network without having to know how the information gets from one point to the next, or how the information is structured, or where it is stored. It is increasingly easy for a person to move files or connect to servers anywhere in the world without having to know much about the technical details of the connection. In the past, networking was not an integral part of a computer system or its services; it merely provided a narrow path for one computer to communicate with the people who used it. The boundary between systems was usually the local phone company. In today's computing environment boundaries are no longer so clearly delineated. Services are supported across multiple networks, by multiple hosts. The host is no longer the other half of the network, but one connection on a ring. As a result, a person may enter a command to retrieve data or to execute a program on one host, have it execute on a second machine, read from a file on a third, and store the output on a fourth, in some cases without having to know which computers are actually involved. Like computers in general, one can't just install a state-of-the-art network and let it sit for 10 years. As technology improves, the functions needed by the campus will necessarily increase. Luxuries will become necessities; fortunately they will also become cheaper. To fully exploit this dynamic computing environment, UIC requires a robust, fast, well connected and reliable network. The ADN-i must be retired and the ADN-ii must be upgraded with new routers, new connections, and new services. The complete installation and maintenance of the campus network will help optimize the capabilities of many thousands of computer systems across the campus for the benefit of the entire University community.
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| Current ADN Services | ||||
The real value of the network is the collection of services it makes available
and the kind of working environment it makes possible. Examples of such
services now available are:
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| ADN in the Next Decade | ||||
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Two aspects of networking will dominate discussions in the near future.
The first, of course, is new services. Existing services, like electronic
mail, need to be brought to more people on campus. This is, to some extent,
a political and economic question, because the hard part is paying for
PCs and network connections. The basic technical requirements can be met
with existing technologies, and the addition of more routers and wires
on the campus.
But widespread use of truly new services, like video teleconferencing, will demand a serious increase in network capacity. We must commit to upgrading the network on a continuous basis, as technology falls within our means, just to keep up with new ways of teaching and communicating. New services also means new servers, that is, new computers that function as central community resources. We'll need database servers, backup servers, compute servers, file servers, and simply machines for people who need a bit more capacity than they can reasonably afford on their desktops. The second important aspect of future networks is appropriate coordination between the connected computers and the people using them. More network services and access means more opportunity to interfere with your neighbor s operations, whether inadvertently or otherwise. Explicit security, the protection of files against corruption or eavesdropping, is only a part of this. In the long run, key parts of software run on campus need to be configured in a coordinated way. This will enable central services such as file servers to be accessed from anywhere on campus, and will also enable efficient accident recovery and general consulting. |
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| What's Coming Next? | ||||
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The ADN currently has about 3,000 connections, and is growing. We are close
to critical mass -- those who don't regularly use email are becoming the
exceptions, and those who do are learning to depend on other network services
as essential parts of their work environment. This means that it is essential
to complete the campus network in a systematic way. In particular, we need
to connect the remaining offices and labs, to maintain and increase bandwidth
by adding new routers, and to add new servers and services.
We are talking with other campus units about ways to coordinate the installation of network connections. We are also talking with the campus administration about finding new funds for routers and wiring without having to charge the end users. And we are looking for ways to coordinate our services with related campus units. As more people get connected, and as they increase their use of other people's machines over a network, the ADN will become a thoroughly modern appliance something you don't notice when it works, yet something you can't live without when it doesn't. Comments are appreciated; send them to |
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| The ADN Connection, May/June 1994 | Previous: ADN Microcomputer Services | Next: Discussions with the Networked World |
| 1999-9-1 connect@uic.edu |
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