A new perspective

The dynamic, change-a-second world of the Internet and the staid, straightforward-to-the-point-of-boredom world of telecommunications testing might seem like something of an odd couple. One is perceived as the cutting edge, the other as the tool to clean up things after that edge has dulled.

But the latest generation of testing products is making ever-greater use of the Internet, and as in any good marriage, the two technologies complement each other. This makes testing a viable tool for marketing, and it makes the Internet a platform that network technicians can use in their jobs every day. The key to this partnership is the ability of the Internet - and especially the World Wide Web - to broadcast the results of network monitoring and testing in near real time to an infinite number of locations, whether those locations are corporate or carrier.

The central cause From a monitoring standpoint, the benefits are obvious. With a broad spectrum of information readily available at the touch of a browser, the centralized monitoring of a distributed network finally can become a reality.

"You can centralize your human expertise resources, but before the Internet, who knew where those resources should be centralized?" asks Dave Camp, marketing manager for Hewlett-Packard's communications measurement division, located in Colorado Springs, Colo. "The advent of the Internet and its integration into testing products is a huge boon because it serves as a tool to eliminate time and distance as factors in the equation. That results in a savings in support costs, and that by itself is a powerful argument in favor of the use of the Internet.

Systems from HP and other test and measurement vendors already incorporate technology to provide remote access to test equipment in the field, often in conjunction with a network management platform.

Some systems for field service personnel such as HP's Broadband analyzer now allow technicians to transmit "snapshots" of what's going on in the field back to centrally located network gurus for analysis through the Internet. Just last year, the technician had to go to the site, collect information and bring it back to the carrier's office for analysis.

Other systems "broadcast" data from testing and monitoring operations in real time, painting a portrait of network health at that moment in an easy-to-access format. That's an important consideration as networks become more complex.

"Why would you want to have to look at 10 monitors to get the results of testing or monitoring when you can get the same results looking at a single monitor?" asks Eileen Healy, president of Fremont, Calif.-based consultancy Healy & Co. "It's a productivity issue, of course, but it's also a much more orderly way of correlating the results of testing and understanding what those results mean.

The Internet also allows carriers to minimize the training needed to use their monitoring equipment. Instead of confronting new managers with a flurry of different interfaces, "the browser is just about as universal an interface as you can get," says Camp. "For most people, the browser's already second nature. It's going to allow people who aren't necessarily fully literate in the ins and outs of testing and monitoring to get a good idea of what's going on by looking at a single panel.

That's the key to the Internet's second major strength in the test and measurement world: its ability to get data to corporate customers who are becoming increasingly concerned about their networks' performance.

"Once you're on the Web, it's no problem to dial up the Web site of an element under test to look at information on that test on the fly," says Byron Anderson, vice president and general manager of HP's microwave and communications group. "That goes for all concerned, including customers.

"In the old days, a test like that would result in the generation of a lot of paper and require a lot of analysis, and customers certainly don't want to be faced with that. The Web lets you access standard documents without paperwork or delay," he says.

The Internet also can provide quick access to testing procedures for new managers, Anderson says. "Instead of putting the information on a testing process in a manual, put it on a Web site," he says. "By arranging the links in a sensible manner, you can walk managers through tests and allow them to do things right the first time they try them. That's going to be more important as managers become less sophisticated and the number of protocols we use increases." On again, off again While techniques for attacking common problems are becoming almost a prerequisite in the current generation of test equipment, some smaller companies are using Internet technology to tackle problems that might otherwise be impossible to solve without expending a lot of money and staff resources.

"Soft" or intermittent errors are an example of such problems. Often occurring at the edges of public and private networks, where incorrect diagnoses can cause disputes and damage customer relationships, these errors can be time-consuming for the technicians dispatched to deal with them.

Ellipsys Technologies, a small testing company based in Soquel, Calif., used a different approach to the problem. The company's E4A and E2D analyzers can capture and transmit large volumes of data via the Internet, eliminating a trip by a technician who must wait for the problem to recur.

"It's sort of comparable to using a cage trap to catch a pest instead of standing around with a shotgun waiting for him to show up again," says Kenneth Tingley, president and chief executive officer of Ellipsys. "The deciding factor in the telecommunications marketplace is going to be speed and responsiveness, and sending a technician out to wait for problems like these to crop up again is not conducive to improving the speed and responsiveness of your field force.

The solution, which is based on a technology called Call Problem Analysis, uses a behavioral model instead of a physical model to analyze problems in switched networks. The analyzers capture large amounts of data - as well as a recurrence of the intermittent error - without the need for on-site troubleshooting.

This captured data is then subjected to the vendor's analysis tool, which isolates the likely sources, identifies the nature of the problem and then presents detailed event information and analysis or an automatic diagnostic routine to resolve the trouble.

Another Web-based monitoring tool, Wandel and Golterman's NetForce Ranger, uses a browser to present problems from the end user's point of view. This is a much more effective means of attacking and solving problems, says Jog Mahal, senior product manager. The NetForce Ranger is an interactive probe that works with a browser-based management system to predict system problems. The probes periodically signal between each other across the network, allowing them to accurately pinpoint potential failure points. Only when a problem is detected do the devices transmit a warning signal.

"Instead of feeding data continuously back to the network operation center, NetForce Ranger only reacts when it senses a problem," says Mahal. The Java-based system, which is common object request broker architecture-compliant, is also compatible with management tools from HP and Sun, enabling carriers to introduce the intelligent probes without abandoning dependable management tools.

By positioning the probes within the network, carriers can test network availability from the end user's perspective. If a problem is detected, a list of probable causes is displayed through the browser.

"The use of the browser with the probes gives you centralized management over a distributed network monitoring system," says Mahal. "You can be virtually anywhere and still see network problems as if you were at the end user's premises. Obviously, this is useful in solving problems, but it's also helpful in dealing with your customers, since you will be seeing the problem through [their] eyes.

Going native Of course, these Internet-based tools are naturals when it comes to analyzing their native environments. HP and Ipsilon Networks use the Internet to conduct flow-analysis of Internet protocol (IP) switching using HP's Internet Advisor family of integrated test tools. The tools are designed for installing and maintaining local area networks, wide area networks and high-speed networks, including switched Ethernet, full-duplex fast Ethernet, asynchronous transfer mode and fiber distributed data interface (Figure 1).

"Internet Advisor was created with ease of use in mind, and the Internet has a lot to do with that," says HP's Camp. "If there's an alarm in the middle of the night, the on-call manager can go to his PC instead of driving to the network operations center. He plugs in the URL, and once he's on the Web site, he's looking at the essentials. It's like the heads-up display in an airplane - all the data he needs is right there.

The newest software component is designed to help network managers perform strategic network planning. It makes it easy to identify and measure the network improvements that can be gained by migrating to IP switching technology from routing and legacy technologies, and it helps engineers test and optimize different IP switch configurations before deploying them.

The software uses flow-analysis algorithms certified by Ipsilon. "Users experience the network through their application flows, so real-world flow-analysis is a cornerstone of IP switching," says Larry Lang, vice president of product management for Ipsilon Networks. "Using Ipsilon-certified algorithms, the HP Internet Advisor converts measurements of existing network traffic into objective analysis of the acceleration that IP switching would provide." HP Internet Advisor IP switching flow-analysis software allows network managers to predict the effectiveness of IP switching on a given network, based on actual traffic usage patterns, to gain maximum returns on investment in IP switches.

Predictions can be made for switching efficiency, latency and packet flow. The software produces a definitive report showing the advantage of IP switching as a replacement for routing and legacy technologies.

The report is laid out in a multilevel format so the user can see the high-level traffic classifications and then drill down to see the detail necessary for optimizing network performance. Information contained in on-screen and printed reports may include a high-level traffic overview, switched IP traffic breakdown, forwarded IP traffic breakdown, non-IP traffic breakdown, bytes and packets per flow, and flow duration.

"Not only can you see where improvements can be made, but you can see where problems are already occurring," says Camp.

As involved as some of these solutions may seem, the integration of Internet technology with testing and monitoring techniques is only beginning. Camp says that, as multimedia features become more capable and managers grow used to using the Internet as "just another tool," the technology could transform testing into a much more dynamic process.

"Right now, we're only laying the foundation," says Camp. "Soon, testing will link directly into vendor support through links built directly into client software." Managers whose browser-based interfaces have revealed problems will be able to click on links and initiate contact with the vendors whose equipment is giving them problems. "That will start a callback process through which a customer service representative from the vendor will respond through an on-screen pop-up window," says Camp. "It won't be just a measurement device - it will serve as a way to tap directly into the vendor's support system." Camp also envisions an Internet-based method of remotely monitoring central offices and other facilities visually, giving managers the ability to see real-world problems that might be difficult to divine from abstract data.

"It would be very easy to add a video camera option to Internet Advisor, for instance, and allow managers to get a look at the physical configuration of hubs and switches," Camp says. "It would take the idea of being able to troubleshoot remotely to a whole new level. It may very well be that at this time next year we aren't talking about the Internet and test as the wave of the future, but test and multimedia."