The EduPop Project

Copyright Hubert Daugherty and Julie Cohn, The Center for Technology in Teaching and Learning at Rice University, February,

2002. This work is the intellectual property of the authors. Permission is granted for this material to be shared for non-commercial,

educational purposes, provided that this copyright statement appears on the reproduced materials and notice is given that the copying is

by permission of the author. To disseminate otherwise or to republish requires written permission from the author.

The EduPop Project

Growth of Multimedia Resources at Rice University fosters reflection on the structure of the Internet

Delivering Multimedia to Off-campus Community

Become ISP Not within University Mission Costly to University

Partner with ISP Preferential treatment Non-competitive service

Create peering point between ISP’s and education

Creating a new Peering point became the best choice

Existing Conditions - Texas GigaPOP Network

Links Texas Higher Education Institutions/Internet 2 backbone

Recent policy change to add K-12 institutions

Other efforts underway to fund K-12 links to GigaPOP

Benefits to Commercial ISPs

Access to large customer base

Marketing benefit of affiliation with Rice and others

Technical benefit of shifting local traffic directly to educational Institutions.

Edupop Picture

Challenges we faced

How to fund the peering site

How to bring the educational institutions together

How to bring commercial ISPs to the project

How to get the project built

Funding the peering site

TIF Board Discovery grant program – natural fit, had to find 10% local cost-share

Bringing Educational Partners Together

Rice UniversityTexas A & M UniversityUniversity of Texas Health Science Center HoustonUniversity of HoustonBaylor College of MedicineAldine Independent School DistrictHouston Independent School DistrictSpring Branch Independent School DistrictTexas Education Service Center Region IV

Bringing Commercial ISP’s to the project

Challenges: Market changes Identifying ISP’s with local aggregation point Conflicting internal policies within RBOC

Opportunities Flexible attitude towards peering The HAL-PC example

Success = marriage of technical benefit and marketing benefit

HalPC

RoadRunner Time/Warner

Internet America          

              

     

Building It –Technical and Legal Issues

Technical – developed and implemented new policy for networking peering point

Legal – very significant – caused delays in implementation Agreement in principal – enough for one provider Simple agreement in writing – enough for second

provider Lengthy contract requiring months of work by legal

counsel required for third provider

Building It – Logistical Issues

Local – coordination with campus facilities and networking departments

External – problems can be extensive changes in city policy city construction projects literal unknown roadblocks contractor and subcontractor challenges

Building It – Selecting Providers

Selected Provider – pros More service for the money New infrastructure for community

Selected Provider - cons Market conditions and physical

construction problems caused significant delays to project.

Outcomes

EduPop peering site is in place

Outcomes

EduPop peering site is in place2 of three providers are peering

Outcomes

EduPop peering site is in place2 of three providers are peeringOther peering groups (e.g. MAGIE) are peering as well

Outcomes

EduPop peering site is in place2 of three providers are peeringOther peering groups (e.g. MAGIE) are peering as wellVPN implemented at UTHSC and TAMU

Outcomes

EduPop peering site is in place2 of three providers are peeringOther peering groups (e.g. MAGIE) are peering as wellVPN implemented at UTHSC and TAMUTexas GigaPOP Network connections to K-12 Institutions in place

Outcomes

EduPop peering site is in place2 of three providers are peeringOther peering groups (e.g. MAGIE) are peering as wellVPN implemented at UTHSC and TAMUTexas GigaPOP Network connections to K-12 Institutions in placeEduPop will become Texas GigaPOP facility

Outcomes

EduPop peering site is in place2 of three providers are peeringOther peering groups (e.g. MAGIE) are peering as wellVPN implemented at UTHSC and TAMUTexas GigaPOP Network connections to K-12 Institutions in placeEduPop will become Texas GigaPOP facilityUnexpected benefit – EduPop has become a critical component of network disaster recovery plan (Tropical Storm)

www.EduPop.net

A fast Internet routing point between commercial Internet Service

Providers and the Educational Institutions in the region