Re: GMPLS support for Ethernet switching

["Adrian Farrel" <adrian@olddog.co.uk>]

Hi,

Thanks for raising these questions, and I hope Dimitri et al. will respond.

However, the discussion should take place on the GELS mailing list.

Thanks,
Adrian
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Fahad Dogar" <fahad.dogar@gmail.com>
To: <ccamp@ops.ietf.org>
Sent: Monday, April 24, 2006 3:36 PM
Subject: GMPLS support for Ethernet switching


Hi all,

I have few questions related to the draft on GMPLS support for
Ethernet switching by D.Papadimitriou et al.:

i) The draft discusses that connection oriented ethernet is suitable
for metro and core networks where ethernet is used for transport. I am
not too clear on the architecture in which ethernet LSPs would be
used. Are we considering point to point type ethernet connections
between switches/routers  i.e. where the bandwidth is not shared.
Example: Two peer routers connected through an ethernet interface, so
effectively complete bandwidth is available.

Or are we talking about multiple switches in a GMPLS enabled cloud
that are part of the SAME LAN and  bandwidth  is shared. I am not sure
how  bandwidth reservations would be done in this sceneario.


ii) Please correct me if I am wrong but it seems that the traffic
engineering benefits of GMPLS support for Ethernet are also available
in Ethernet over MPLS. (I am considering that connection oriented
Ethernet is used in metro/core networks only). However, by providing
GMPLS support for Ethernet we are able to do away with IP/MPLS layer
and thus we can have an all Ethernet network (with only ethernet
switches). Is this the primary reason for using GMPLS support for
Ethernet rather than Ethernet over MPLS? Can someone comment on this?

iii) The draft discusses various options for ethernet label, all of
which seem to require modification in the forwarding plane of
Ethernet? Is this something that can implemented easily i.e. change in
forwarding plane? Why can't we consider MAC address or VLAN tag as the
label?

Thanks in advance,
Fahad