On 13-02-06 17:12, Scott Helms wrote:
Correct, there are few things that cost nothing, but the point is here that PPPoE has been successful for open access to a far greater degree than any other technology I'm aware of
By default, Telus in western Canada has deployed ethernet based DSL for wholesale, although PPPoE is available. Its own customers are ethernet based wth DHCP service. Some of the ISPs have chosen PPPoE since it makes it easier to do usage accounting at the router (since packets are already asscoated with the PPPoE session account). The difference is that Telus had purchased/developed software that made it easy to change the PVC to point a user to one ISP or the other, so changing ISPs is relatively painless. Bell Canada decided to abandon etyernet based DSL and go PPPoE because it didn't want to develop that software. Bell is deploying PPPoE for its FTTH (which is not *yet) available to wholesalers, something I am hoping to help change in the coming months) However, the australian NBN model is far superior because it enables far more flexibility such as multicasting etc. PPPoE is useless overhead if you have the right management tools to point a customer to his ISP. (and it also means that the wholesale infrastructure can be switch based intead of router based).