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TNS Services

Real Time Measurement Service

Telecommunications and Network Services (TNS) provides information about real time Integrated Backbkone (IB) network performance. TNS has installed and maintains equipment to measure parameters that indicate real time IB performances. The network performance data is available to contacts on http://boron.rtm.tns.its.psu.edu.

At every campus/wiring hub TNS has installed and maintains equipment used to measure parameters that characterize the performance of the IB. Equipment has also been installed on and measures the performance of the Internet1 and Internet2 connections at the Pittsburgh Supercomputer Center (PSC). Campus/wiring hub locations are the 23 campus locations and the wiring hubs at University Park.

Currently the parameters being measured are round trip time, multicast delay, multicast loss, multicast jitter and multicast out-of-order packets. Round trip time is measured between the central server http://boron.rtm.tns.its.psu.edu and the measurement equipment located at each of the campus/wiring hub locations. Round trip time is the time needed for data to travel from boron to the location and return to boron.

Multicast is a transport method that provides for the delivery of data from one sender to multiple receivers. Multicast delay is the time required for data to travel from the sender to the receiver. Multicast loss is the percentage of packets lost en route from a sender to a receiver. Multicast jitter is the variation in the amount of time it takes for data to travel from a sender to a receiver. Multicast out-of-order packets shows if packets are being delivered out of sequence. Multicast measurements are only made where multicast routing is enabled; multicast routing is an optional service of the IB and may not be enabled everywhere.

The charts showing the measurement data are available on http://boron.rtm.tns.its.psu.edu. Access to the network performance data on boron is password protected and is only available to the IB contacts. Contacts need their Access Account user-id and password to view the data on boron.

Two open source tools are currently used to gather and present the real time network performance data. Smokeping shows the round trip latency between http://boron.rtm.tns.its.psu.edu and all the other platform campus/wiring hub locations. Multicast Beacon shows the multicast delay, loss and jitter between every two of the campus/wiring hub locations. Please note that multicast routing must be active at a location for the multicast measurements to be made.

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