| I suspect that they will be going completely switched and have very few | total points on the whole network (depending on what configuration they | go to). A network of OC12s or OC48s in a redundant star will have | significant performance benefits because 1) no routing, or very symmetric | routing. 2) very low latency <8ms coast to coast I'd suspect. 3) priority | queues, quality of service, reserved bandwidth, etc. #0: well, nobody's physical topology is shaped like a redundant star. at very fast rates, for (2) above in particular, having the network topology follow rights-of-way is a good plan #1: *something* somewhere has to do routing, and has to know the full details of what the topology looks like and make decisions based on that information and any constraints. Problem A in the current Internet is that boxes that have to know everything are feeling the crunch of complex topology and instability; I don't see how Internet-II can get around this, and moreover, I do see how easily additional parallel infrastructure can worsen Problem A for everyone (and in particular for the Internet-II connectees). Also, have you noticed Vern Paxson and Van Jacobson saying that path symmetry really doesn't seem to matter with respect to TCP throughput, or that path asymmetries even on point-to-point circuits has existed for some time in the real world? I dunno, maybe very symmetric routing might help, but aren't you building some bad failure modes by trying to force this by building a star? #2: Are you planning on building photon accelerators? BTW, what kind of delay do you get between Stanford and UCSD if you have a star topology? You can assume that your physical topology is built out of the four principal right-of-way carriers' fabric, whether leased or otherwise. #3: What type of per-packet and per-flow time budgets do you think you have at OC12 and OC48? If you can make all this happen with existing technology (or can make new technology), then there are at least four companies that will want your resume ASAP, particularly if you can do this and accomplish your #2 (assuming you accidentally missed a digit) simultaneously. Sean.