Definition of a burstable circuit
Without getting into a religious debate, I need some consensus for a problem that I am having regarding the definition of a burstable circuit. In my view of the world, a burstable circuit is defined as one where the customer can send us as much data as they would like (for example, an entire DS3's worth on a consistent basis), and we would bill them for usage above the contracted amount via some method (we use 90th percentile reporting) In someone else's view inside the company, the customer should be prohibited from sending above the contracted rate for any extended period of time by policing at the ATM layer. Both views are viable, but I believe (nearly religously) that the former view is correct. Any input would be appreciated. PS. These views are my own and do not represent those of the company, even though I'm sending from my work email :)
On Wed, 22 Aug 2001, Stanley, Jon wrote:
Without getting into a religious debate, I need some consensus for a problem that I am having regarding the definition of a burstable circuit.
In my view of the world, a burstable circuit is defined as one where the customer can send us as much data as they would like (for example, an entire DS3's worth on a consistent basis), and we would bill them for usage above the contracted amount via some method (we use 90th percentile reporting)
In someone else's view inside the company, the customer should be prohibited from sending above the contracted rate for any extended period of time by policing at the ATM layer. Both views are viable, but I believe (nearly religously) that the former view is correct.
Any input would be appreciated.
To me, what you view as "burstable" means "metered". IMHO, "burstable" means you are gauranteed X bandwidth, and you can burst up to Y, but only if network conditions allow. Andy xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Andy Dills 301-682-9972 Xecunet, LLC www.xecu.net xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Dialup * Webhosting * E-Commerce * High-Speed Access
On Wed, 22 Aug 2001, Stanley, Jon wrote:
Without getting into a religious debate, I need some consensus for a problem that I am having regarding the definition of a burstable circuit.
In my view of the world, a burstable circuit is defined as one where the customer can send us as much data as they would like (for example, an entire DS3's worth on a consistent basis), and we would bill them for usage above the contracted amount via some method (we use 90th percentile reporting)
In someone else's view inside the company, the customer should be prohibited from sending above the contracted rate for any extended period of time by policing at the ATM layer. Both views are viable, but I believe (nearly religously) that the former view is correct.
Any input would be appreciated.
i think your definition is correct, ie customer can burst to some max. billing based one some base, with free bursting, or billing for the 90th percentile are common options. i think what the other view is what i would call an "expandable" link, in that the customer buys blocks of raw throughput, without any throttling taking place (other than to limit them to their contracted amount. this would be useful for a customer that doesn't want the excess billing that a burstable connection could cause, or the potential of the bandwidth not being there (if more than one customer shares the bursting bandwidth). a customer could call up and say "hey, bump me up 5 megs" or "drop me down 5 megs" and the implementation could be done swiftly, as no physical changes are required. -- [ Jim Mercer jim@reptiles.org +1 416 410-5633 ] [ Now with more and longer words for your reading enjoyment. ]
On Wed, 22 Aug 2001, Stanley, Jon wrote:
Without getting into a religious debate, I need some consensus for a problem that I am having regarding the definition of a burstable circuit.
In my view of the world, a burstable circuit is defined as one where the customer can send us as much data as they would like (for example, an entire DS3's worth on a consistent basis), and we would bill them for usage above the contracted amount via some method (we use 90th percentile reporting)
In someone else's view inside the company, the customer should be prohibited from sending above the contracted rate for any extended period of time by policing at the ATM layer. Both views are viable, but I believe (nearly religously) that the former view is correct.
Any input would be appreciated.
The holder of the latter view is confused. (does that count as religious?) Seriously, what all the providers I have experience with have done is let you burst to whatever the link capacity is and charge a premium on the overage above the normal committed per Mb rate, or bump you to the next committment level once you have sustained an overage for a period of time. While it can make traffic engineering a little more difficult, both of these represents a revenue opportunity. If you take the first approach and charge a premium it has the advantage of generally being self-corrective when you explain to the customer they are paying more by not making a larger bandwidth committment. Taking the second approach is easier for you, generates additional revenue, but could be more of a billing/customer service hassle.
Without getting into a religious debate, I need some consensus for a problem that I am having regarding the definition of a burstable circuit.
In my view of the world, a burstable circuit is defined as one where the customer can send us as much data as they would like (for example, an entire DS3's worth on a consistent basis), and we would bill them for usage above the contracted amount via some method (we use 90th percentile reporting)
In someone else's view inside the company, the customer should be prohibited from sending above the contracted rate for any extended period of time by policing at the ATM layer. Both views are viable, but I believe (nearly religously) that the former view is correct.
The holder of the latter view has the benefit of history on his side. Remember Frame Relay and terms like Bc (committed burst)? What you are talking about is a varient of volume based billing or metered service. The fact that you can 'burst' (for up to 5% of samples without being billed extra (actually just 'use' as you could do it all in one lump in one day of the month, which is hardly a burst), led some marketroids to call this a bursting service a long while ago, has (sadly) caught on, to the point where now there are two definitions in equal use, and a lot of confusion. The confusion is then added to by sales people who just say 'yes' to the question 'does the bursting work like [x]', for all values of x. Then the unhappy customer is annoyed when they either receive a bill for more than they expected, or find that after 3 seconds, their initially extremely zippy ftp session slows down to their committed rate. Cue support call from right. Exit sales person, pursued by a bear market. -- Alex Bligh Personal Capacity
I forgot one thing: A small part of the reason why people invented 95th % billing etc (which was quite difficult in the days when measuring things reliably was hard), was that implementing proper bursting and shaping in an IP compatible way was harder. It still is. Just look at the brain damage the 'burst' facility that 'forward or drop' technologies like Cisco's CEF/CAR do to a TCP/IP session, and you'll see why. [shall we shape the traffic by queuing the packets we'd have otherwise binned, and take them off the queue at a reasonable rate? noo noo process switching noo bus bandwidth horrors etc.] -- Alex Bligh Personal Capacity
My view matches yours but certainly I know that this would not be shared amoung my own work mates. Its the Telco World Vs IP Junkies story all over again. Maybe you should play with there heads and ask them how they manage ABR ;-). Regards, Kevin
Without getting into a religious debate, I need some consensus for a problem that I am having regarding the definition of a burstable circuit.
In my view of the world, a burstable circuit is defined as one where the customer can send us as much data as they would like (for example, an entire DS3's worth on a consistent basis), and we would bill them for usage above the contracted amount via some method (we use 90th percentile reporting)
In someone else's view inside the company, the customer should be prohibited from sending above the contracted rate for any extended period of time by policing at the ATM layer. Both views are viable, but I believe (nearly religously) that the former view is correct.
Any input would be appreciated.
PS. These views are my own and do not represent those of the company, even though I'm sending from my work email :)
participants (6)
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Alex Bligh -
Andy Dills -
Jim Mercer -
Kevin Gannon -
Patrick Greenwell -
Stanley, Jon