i2i

• Donation a major boost to ATM Interoperability
• McIVER wins National Award
• CTIE offers a commercial encoding service
• Someone has noticed
• Website gets a dusting!
• 1996 in Review

• ATM Interoperability Testbed
• ISDN Gateway product - A success
• New Laboratory almost complete

i2i - 1997

The ANSPAG ATM Interoperability Service has been greatly enhanced by the donation of a sophisticated Protocol Analyser, by Hewlett Packard.

Hewlett Packard's global Protocol Analyser business is located in Melbourne not far from Monash University. Impressed by ANSPAG's work in ATM interoperability testing and analysis, Hewlett Packard chose to make a major donation of their Broadband Series Test System.

"We have been monitoring the progress of ANSPAG in this area and recognise their expertise in ATM. We are keen to support the development of the ATM industry in Australia, and saw support of the ATM Interoperability Service as a direct input into this", said Bill Wood, General Manager, Hewlett Packard.

The ATM Interoperability Service provides Australian industry with direct access to the ANSPAG Network Testbed for Testing, Training and Troubleshooting. ANSPAG staff are also available to offer expert support and advice.

ANSPAG will also be using the analysis equipment for their research into the traffic characteristics of video traffic over ATM and other networks.

(Further information relating to the Interoperability Service and other functions of CTIE are available on request.) anspag@eng.monash.edu.au

McIVER wins a National Award

The Networld & Interop Exhibition, Australia's most important networking event, was held at Darling Harbour, Sydney in november. Each year a number of awards are presented for outstanding efforts in the network community. This year the "Best Communications Application" was awarded to ANSPAG for the McIVER video-on-demand system. The other finalists in this category included JTEC, Madge and 3Com.

Kevin Dillon, Manager of Network Engineering, accepted the award in front of 200 network professionals in the Interop auditorium, along with Mira Bashi, ATM Product Manager for Telstra.

McIVER offers true video-on-demand to students in each of the three main libraries of Monash University, from a single video server located in the ANSPAG laboratories. The system uses an ATM network incorporating fibre optic cable, microwave and Telstra's ATM network for distribution. Initially users are all from the Department of Visual Arts, although other users are currently arranging for their own teaching material to be made available as well.

McIVER was demonstrated at Interop in Sydney on the Telstra stand with two client PCs streaming live video from the ANSPAG video server in Melbourne. A high quality video conferencing link, requiring around 14mbit/s was also established over the same link, offering better than VHS quality picture on a large screen TV and with no perceptible delay. In contrast to the high quality video conferencing, there was also a Picturetel system operating at 128kbit/s again over the same ATM network, offering more conventional quality.

The high quality video conferencing system attracted considerable interest from the other exhibitors, and some valuable contacts were made.

ANSPAG will be demonstrating these applications again at ATUG in Sydney in May.

CTIE offers a commercial encoding service

A high volume commercial MPEG encoding facility has been established at Monash University. MPEG is a digital video encoding standard which has been globally accepted and is widely used in the television, advertising and pay-TV industries.

The Video Coding Group has had a long a nd fruitful research relationship with Siemens with whom they developed a very high quality MPEG1 and 2 encoding system, which is marketed by Siemens as the Eikona system. This product stems from the expertise in video coding built up by the group over the last decade.

The Centre is now offering an additional commercial MPEG coding service using real-time encoding systems, suitable for encoding large collections, as well as smaller pieces for CD and video server distribution. The Eikona service remains available for very high quality and specialist MPEG encoding.

There are two standards available, MPEG1 and MPEG2 which are suitable for different applications. The Centre for Telecommunications and Information Engineering at Monash has established this facility in response to demand from within the University and related organisations.

The Video Coding group has very significant internationally recognised expertise in the field of digital encoding and is a member of the MPEG standards board.

Enquiries about the Encoding Service should be directed to 03 9905 5382.

Someone has noticed

The national industry and generalist press has developed quite an interest in the work undertaken by ANSPAG over the last twelve months. Thirteen(??) articles have been spotted, with five(??) of these being in the national press.

The majority have related to the McIVER video-on-demand system being trialled at Monash University, and the award presented at Interop in Sydney. For copies of the articles simply telephone or email a request to us.

Website gets a dusting

The ANSPAG website has had a (long overdue) overhaul, so please feel free to visit us at: http://www.anspag.monash.edu.au

Apologies to those of you who have visited recently and seen out of date information and "under construction:" notices.

1996 - A year in review

The McIVER video-on-demand trial which was under investigation for most of 1995 was implemented in the middle of 1996. The system went "live" during the second semester, and is now available to students in the main libraries of Monash University.

CTIE partnered with the State Film Centre of Victoria in June, on a wide area video-on-demand pilot trial known as the Digital Media Library. This trial is progressing well and details will be available later in 1997.

A major high quality Video-Conferencing trial has begun, focussing on distance education applications.

The Video Coding group continued their important work as integral members of the MPEG standards bodies.

The Centre exhibited very successfully with Telstra at Interact 96 in Melbourne and Interop 96 in Sydney. ANSPAG won the "Best Communications Application" award at Interop 96, beating off JTEC, Madge and 3Com to take the honour.

A number of succesful commercial contracts were completed. These included: Development of software for use in an ISDN gateway card for Tennyson Technologies Pty Ltd, a local manufacturer of telecommunications products; Product evaluations for Siemens, Newbridge, First Virtual Corporation, FORE systems, KNET, Hewlett Packard and Interlink; Network Design consulting work for Victorian Local Government, Waste Management Council and Cinemedia; Conducted seminars for Newbridge Networks in the Philippines, Korea and Thailand;

Short courses for industry were all very well attended, with the number of attendees more than doubled from the previous year. Courses offered included: Introduction to ATM; ISDN - Hands On; Video Communications; Telecommunications & Corporate Management ; and Packet Switching.

Centre staff were invited to report to the Federal Govt on the applications and future of ATM. Centre staff were also invited guests at CeBit 96 in Germany, University of California, Berkley.

The Centre now has 11 full time postgraduate researchers in addition to the permanent staff. Five new full time postgraduate researchers joined the Centre. Three postgraduate research degrees were conferred on CTIE postgraduates. Prof Greg Egan was welcomed as the Director of ANSPAG following the retirement of Prof Fred Symons.

Mr Tony Newstead, Chairman of ANSPAG, was honoured with a Fellowship of the Telecommunications Society of Australia for his important lifetime contributions to the Australian telecommunications industry.

This only scratches the surface of what we achieved in 1996, and still more is scheduled for 1997. We hope that you will be a part of it.

i2i - 1996

The ANSPAG group has recently launched a new service for the Australian ATM industry. As Asynchronous Transfer Mode emerges as a leading network technology, interoperability issues are becoming increasingly important for the market acceptance of ATM.

Users of ATM networking technology are expecting that any new equipment is installed on their premises quickly and efficiently. Discovering interoperability problems "on site" is all too often an ATM installation experience.

ANSPAG has invested almost two million dollars in its ATM Network testbed for research into advanced networking technology. The facility has been used as an informal ATM Interoperability Testbed for several years, with users typically being vendors or research partners. Over the last six months demand for this type of facility has increased to the level where access to the Testbed has been extended to encompass all industry participants.

The ANSPAG ATM Interoperability Testbed is designed to offer two main services to industry. Firstly, it is an interoperability testing facility, enabling vendors and manufacturers to test their own equipment along with others, so as to preempt and solve problems of interoperability. Secondly, it is a training resource, to increase the level of knowledge and skill amongst the Australian technical workforce.

This type of hands-on experience in a "live" ATM environment, in "neutral" surroundings is doubtless of great value to the industry, as has been evidenced by the strong support and acceptance from major industry players.

The benefits to end users of ATM equipment will also be significant, since they will be able to ask if a technical solution has been tested in the interoperability lab. If equipment has been successfully trialled in the laboratory, the chances of a trouble free installation are much greater.

The ATM Network Testbed is a significant research and development resource, which has been built up over a number of years.

The equipment includes ATM edge switches with connections to carrier ATM networks (34Mbit/s E3, 2 Mbit/s E1, OC3 155 Mbit/s connections), ATM campus backbone switches (OC3 connection), ATM workgroup switches (25Mbit/s and 155 Mbit/s OC3), ATM network interface cards for UNIX workstations and PCs running Windows 3.1 and Windows 95. ANSPAG has also assembled Australia's most sophisticated suite of ATM test and analysis equipment.

In addition to the ATM Network, there are extensive ISDN and LAN facilities.

A range of "live" applications, including data, voice and video traffic, such as video-on-demand, provide a valuable testbed for use by the Australian ATM industry.

While the physical equipment is important for Testbed activities, the real value of the Network Testbed Facility lies in the Network Engineers who have built up very considerable interoperability expertise. They are available to support companies which come and use the Testbed for Interoperability testing.

For full Details contact anspag@eng.monash.edu.au

ISDN Gateway product - A success

In the fast moving world of Telecommunications, it is becoming clear that global hardware markets will be dominated by the giant equipment manufacturers. If Australia is to have any influence at all, then it will be through the innovation and resourcefulness of Small-Medium sized Enterprises (SMEs).

Tennyson Technologies Pty Ltd is one such company. Tennyson is based close to Monash University in Melbourne and manufactures ISDN network solutions. A recent product is the MicroAccess PCTA card, offering PC/LAN connectivity using ISDN.

Tennyson contracted ANSPAG to develop software drivers for the MicroAccess card, under the ANSPAG Technical Services commercial arm. Following six months of rigourous development and testing the product has been delivered to Tennyson and accepted by them.

The MicroAccess card is a cost effective solution for extending head office information and computing systems to branch offices and other remote locations. MicroAccess and Telstra's Microlink ISDN service together provide greatly enhanced operability, enabling applications such as EFTPOS, database inquiry, telecommuting and video-conferencing. The system can also be used to combine telephone and data traffic, giving substantial potential for cost reduction.

The modules ANSPAG delivered included:

• Netware loadable module (NLM) providing a CAPI presentation to the Netware CAPI Manager and interfacing to the Tennyson MicroAccess ISDN PCTA.
• A DOS Terminate and Stay Resident (TSR) program interfacing to the Tennyson MicroAccess ISDN PCTA with CAPI presentation to the Netware environment.
• User, installation and release documentation.

To contact Tennyson Technologies Pty Ltd , telephone 03 9558 9964

New laboratory - almost complete

Monash University has almost completed the new laboratory in the Centre For Telecommunications and Information Engineering (CTIE). ANSPAG works in partnership with CTIE, whose other members include the well known Video Communications group, a leading video encoding research group.

The new laboratory will provide a showcase for some of Australia's finest research activities in all aspects of video communications.

The new facility has been welcomed by industry, who regularly visit the facility to call upon the services of the researchers, or simply to have new technologies demonstrated.