APCCIRN-044
APCCIRN-044
1994.5.24
Kilnam Chon
Internetworking in Asia by Kilnam Chon, Korea Advanced Institute
of Scient and Technology
Brief History
Computer networking in Asia became popular with readily available
network software packages such as TCP/IP, UUCP and USENET in early
1980s.[Chon] Later, other networks such as Bitnet and Fidonet were
introduced in 1980s. Nationwide network implementation based on these
network software packages were carried out among various countries in
Asia throughout 1980s. The implementation naturally led to the
international links, mostly to USA and some within Asia. By early
1990s, most countries in Asia have domestic networks with
international links. See Table 1 and Figure 1 for further
information.
Coordination
Coordinated Committee of Intercontinental Research Networking(CCIRN)
and its regional committees in North America and Europe were formed in
1987 to coordinate networking for global research and education
communities.[Neggers] The Asia-Pacific Coordinated Committee of
Intercontinental Research Networking (APCCIRN) was formed in early
1990s and joined CCIRN. APCCIN and its engineering planning group,
Asia-Pacific Engineering Planning Group(APEPG) meets twice a year; one
during INET Conference, and the other in the Asia-Pacific region.
APCCIRN started the pilot project on Asia-Pacific Network Information
Center (APNIC), which coordinates global network information center
activities with InterNIC in USA and RIP in Europe. See the article on
APNIC in this issue for further information on APNIC.
APCCIRN set up several working groups to work with the following
issues;
(1) Commercial Services
(2) Developing Countries
(3) Local Language Support
(4) Link Coordination.
Commercial Services
Commercial service is increasingly important in the Internet, and it
is expected to be dominant service provision in USA soon and other
countries later. In Asia, as a late comer to the Internet, the
commercial services started almost at the same time as the non-profit
operation unlike the North America and Europe.
There are two types of services in addition to the traditional
non-profit operations for research and education communities. They
are commercial services, and general services. The former is
for-profit operation. The latter is not necessarily for-profit
operation, but it is rather for cost sharing. Many countries started
the commercial and/or general services. Table 2 shows the current
status compiled at APCCIRN Secretariat.
The ap-commercial Working Group was formed at the APCCIRN/APEPG
Meeting last December, and it was headed by B. Coggershall of Supernet
in Hong Kong.
Developing Countries
Asia is a unique continent where GNP per capita spreads from $150 to
$30,000. Developed and developing countries coexist. The developed
countries have fairly good domestic networking infrastructure with T1
or FT1 international links. In some developing countries, networking
activities are negligible or email is not available yet. The
networking is available over 130 countries, i.e., over eighty percent
of the world.[Landweber] Many of the non-networked countries are in
the Asia-Pacific region and the Arab-Africa region. We need to work
on these countries in addition to improve the networking capability of
weakly-networked countries.
We need to train people, and support to set up networks and
development of applications. APCCIRN set up the working group,
ap-develop last year, and is headed by Dr. D. Narayan of Science
University of Tokyo in Japan. UNESCO has been working in this area
through its Information Infrastructure Program.[UNESCO] Regional
Informatics Network Projects have been implemented as a part of the
program. RINSEAP and RINSCA were established for Southeast Asia and
Pacific, and South and Central Asia, respectively. Other
organizations of the United Nations such as WHO, and UNDP as well as
World Bank are working on to set up the network infrastructure
globally.
We need to come up with regional solutions to work on the
non-networked and the weakly networked countries systematically.
These countries may be better supported regionally by the center of
excellence proposed by UNESCO. Some of regional institutions could
play the instrumental role. Or, we may set up a new institution to
work on this issue and others.
Local Language Support
Many Asian countries use quite different languages from English such
as large character sets. This and other differences force us to
modify the existing network software substantially. Sometimes, we are
forced to develop software from scratch due to substantial difference
from the English version. Since the local language support is a
rather unique issue to Asia, we need to pay particular attention.
Otherwise, the networking is good only in English, which limits usage,
and we may end up with user-unfriendly systems.
APCCIRN has the working group, ap-i18n to work on this issue. The
group is headed by Dr. M. Ohta of Tokyo Institute of Technology in
Japan. Internationally, various organizations are working on the
local language support, which is called internationalization and
localization. The former provides the framework on which all local
languages are supported, and the latter is on actual implementation of
the local language support. To have a unified view on the
localization, the localization profile for each country or region is
necessary. International Standards Organization is working on the
internationalization through its technical committee JTC1, and
subcommittees. Uniforum and X/Open are working together on the
subject. Other organizations such as IEEE and OSF are also working on
various issues through their working groups.
Among the Asian countries, Japan and Republic of Korea have fairly
well developed local language support in their network environments.
Chinese language support is being developed by various countries and
regions, and their effort need to be harmonized. Many other languages
are supported in the Internet and other networks, and their usages
vary among countries.
We need to work out in two levels; one at global and regional levels
on internationalization, and the other at an individual country or a
language region on localization. We need to come up with the
internationalized network software. The localized network software
may be handled through local clearinghouses.
Universal code systems such as Unicode and ISO 10640 may have major
impact to the internationalization and localization.[ISO] Since the
systems offer the generic framework which makes localization to
specific language environment much easier and consistent. On the
other hand, the harmonized development of such a code system is not
easy at all.
Link Coordination
Most of the international leased lines in the Asia-Pacific region is
to the USA. The leased lines to Europe and within the Asia-Pacific
region are not popular. There are several reasons to the phenomenon.
(1) Intercontinental leased lines cost marginally more than
intracontinental leased lines.
(2) All countries primarily communicate with USA.
(3) One fat pipe makes more sense than multiple thin pipes.
By connecting to the same place in USA or in the region with a fat
pipe to USA, we can solve the problem of intracontinental exchanges
among the Asia-Pacific countries.[Chon] Global Internet Exchange(GIX)
is the model proposed.[Almes] The European group implemented GIX in
the east coast of USA, and is working on its extension to allow
distributed GIX by supporting multiple GIXs. For the Asia-Pacific
community, it is natural if the Asia-Pacific GIX is located in the
west coast of USA or in the Pacific. For the distributed GIX, the
problem is who to support the link between GIXs as we need fat pipes
for the link. The cost for the Atlantic link is shared between USA
and Europe, and a similar scheme may work for the Pacific. For future
link coordination, the emerging commercial operations should be taken
into account as they may play the major role.
CAREN is one of the regional networks which provide Intra-continental
links. It links Japan, Korea and Taiwan with addition of China soon.
Networked Information
Networked information is an emerging major issue to the Asia-Pacific
community. As networking becomes more common, information access
becomes more important. In addition to general issues of the global
networking community, we need to address an additional issue on the
local language support. Most of the information materials in the
region are in local languages, i.e., non-English. This causes
problems on information tools, translation, and other issues on
natural languages.
Pacific Neighborhood Consortium headed by Prof. C. Hardyck of the
University of California is addressing the issue of sharing
information among the Pacific Rim countries.[Hardyck] The consortium
was established in early 1990s, and it meets annually.
Concluding Remarks
The Asia-Pacifc networking community may be able to contribute to
globalization of the Internet by addressing some of the above issues
and others. The globalization of the Internet is very important for
development of good global information infrastructure. As part of the
global information infrastructure, Asian Information Infrastructure
based on the Asian Information Highway would be the issue our
community should address in the coming years.
Reference
G. Almes, et al, Global Internet Exchange(GIX), Working Paper, IEPG,
1992.
APCCIRN, gopher apccirn@krnic.net.
K. Chon, et al(ed.), Proc. of Pacific Computer Communications
Symposium, 1985.
K. Neggers, "CCIRN," Proc. of INET, 1992.
ISO, Multi-Octet Code System, IS 10646, 1993.
L.H. Landweber, International Connectivity, Version 10, Feb. 1994.
C. Hardyck, Pacific Neighborhood Consortium, 1993.
UNESCO, Academic and Research Networks in the Asia and Pacific Region,
1992.
Kilnam Chon holds Ph.D from the University of California, Los Angeles.
He worked at Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Rockwell International in
USA on networking related projects before he went to Korea in 1979.
He is a professor at Korea Advanced Institute of Science and
Technology, and his research interests include networking and
distributed processing. He chairs Asia-Pacific Coordinating Committee
on International Research Networking(APCCIRN), and co-chairs CCIRN.
He can be reached as chon@cosmos.kaist.ac.kr.
Table 1
Country/Region with Country/Region with
International Leased Line International Dialup
----------------------------------- --------------------
Australia China Hong Kong French Polynesia
Fiji India Japan Sri Lanka Vietnam
Korea Malaysia New Zealand Indonesia Iran
Philippines Singapore Taiwan Pakistan
Thailand
Table 2
Country Commercial Service Provider General Service Provider
------- --------------------------- ------------------------
Hong Kong Supernet
India Softnet
Japan ATT-JENS, IIJ, PSI Japan
Korea (Korea Telecom), (Dacom)
Malaysia (MIMOS)
Singapore Technet
Taiwan HiNet Seednet