Quality-of-service intranets and extranets are now within reach of all SA businesses which have a connection to the Internet.
This follows the implementation of the country`s first Internet Protocol (IP) network based on the revolutionary Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS) protocol by IS (The Internet Solution), Dimension Data`s e-business infrastructure provider subsidiary.
IS joint-MD Derek Wilcocks, says the new protocol is a clear indication that IP has come of age. Indeed, it has enormous implications for SA business by enabling users to exploit their Internet connectivity to the full.
The MPLS network - initially built and tested by IS and Cisco technicians in Cisco`s US-based laboratories and now deployed by IS in South Africa - enables IS` customers who connect to their remote branches or business partners via the Internet, to make use of MPLS features to improve the quality, robustness, reliability and security of those connections.
"This new protocol means Quality-of-Service is now possible for all business-to-business (B2B) interactions via a company`s existing leased line Internet connection," he explains.
Small and medium-sized companies which until now have been reluctant to implement an intranet connecting all their branches because of the costs associated with setting up a dedicated wide area network (WAN), as well as the performance uncertainties of standard Internet connectivity, can now safely use the Internet as a backbone on which to build inter-office connectivity by outsourcing their intranet infrastructure requirements to IS.
Similarly, secure, high-performance corporate extranets can now include even a company`s smallest business partner provided that partner has access to the Internet via the IS backbone.
Application Service Providers, portals, and other electronic business providers hosted with IS can use this technology to connect with full quality of service and security to their customers.
"The availability of this service will significantly enhance the viability of conducting business over the Internet in South Africa," Wilcocks adds.
MPLS is a high-performance method for forwarding packets (frames) through a network. It enables routers at the edge of a network to apply simple labels to packets (frames). Packets are assigned short, fixed length labels. Switching entities perform table lookups based on these simple labels to determine where data should be forwarded and the precedence it should take over other packets on the network.
"Network traffic is classified and labeled at the edge of the network before traffic is aggregated according to policies defined by subscribers in association with IS, and transported across the network. Traffic at the edge and core of the network is then be differentiated into different classes by drop probability or delay," Wilcocks concludes.
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