6 ms·

Has anyone any good resources for learning more about the "internet-level" infrastructure affected today and how global networks are connected?

marmshallow 6y ago
+1 Many of the comments here presume knowledge about this stuff, and I can’t follow.
albertTJames 6y ago
https://mobile.twitter.com/Level3 https://mobile.twitter.com/Level3 (not an internet level, just a company :)
- Vinnl 6y ago
  Were their tweets protected (i.e. only visible to approved followers) when you posted that link, or is that in response to this event?
  - iso947 6y ago
    Level3 was qquired/merged/changed to century link a year or so back, I think they closed their old twitter account then When someone says level3, read century link. L3 have been a major player for decades though (including providing the infamous 4.2.2.2 dns server), so people still refer to them as level3. The account to follow for them now is https://mobile.twitter.com/CenturyLink https://mobile.twitter.com/CenturyLink but it won’t tell you much.
    - Godel_unicode 6y ago
      Note that L3 is a separate company from Level 3 Communications, which was the ISP that was acquired by CenturyLink. L3 is an American aerospace and C4ISR contractor. CenturyLink's current CEO, Jeff Storey, was actually the pre-acquisition Level 3 CEO.
vesh 6y ago
This might help https://community.fs.com/blog/tcpip-vs-osi-whats-the-difference-between-the-two-models.html https://community.fs.com/blog/tcpip-vs-osi-whats-the-differe...
TallGuyShort 6y ago
No particular resource to recommend, though I first learned about it in a book by Radia Perlman, but BGP is a protocol you don't hear much about unless you work in networking, and is one of the key pieces in a lot of wide-scale outages. I'd start with that.
q3k 6y ago
Unfortunately, this infrastructure is at an uncanny intersection of technology, business and politics. To learn the technical aspect of it, you can follow any network engineering certification materials or resources that delve into dynamic routing protocols, notably BGP. Inter-ISP networking is nothing but setting up BGP sessions and filters at the technical level. Why you set these up, and under what conditions is a whole different can of worms, though. The business and political aspect is a bit more difficult to learn without practice, but a good simulacrum can be taking part in a project like dn42, or even just getting an ASN and some IPv6 PA space and trying to announce it somewhere. However, this is no substitute for actual experience running an ISP, negotiating percentile billing rates with salespeople, getting into IXes, answering peering requests, getting rejected from peering requests, etc. :) Disclaimer: I helped start a non-profit ISP in part to learn about these things in practice.
- bausano_michael 6y ago
  Judging by other comments, it seems there's a space to fill this niche with a series of blog articles or a book, if you're that sort of person.
  - kitteh 6y ago
    There are plenty of presentations out there. See nanog, ripe. The books are meh because they're not written by operators. They're more academic and dated. Plenty of clueful folks on the right IRC channels.
    - hpkuarg 6y ago
      Second time in this thread you've mentioned the right IRC channels. Does one need to invoke some secret code to find out what they are? :-)
      - rolph 6y ago
        in certain instances, yes depending on the nature or subject matter of the channel ok lets go for broke, there are a LOT of clandestine IRC servers and exclusive gatekeeping of channels. you wont know about unless you have an IRL reference
colechristensen 6y ago
I don't know something holistic, but if you are the Wikipedia rampage sort of person, here is a good place to start: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_exchange_point https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_exchange_point
throw0101a 6y ago
"An Open Platform to Teach How the Internet Practically Works" from NANOG perhaps: * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SRjTqH5Z8M https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SRjTqH5Z8M The Network Startup Resource Center out of UOregen has some good tutorials on BGP and connecting networks owned by different folks: * https://learn.nsrc.org/bgp https://learn.nsrc.org/bgp NANOG also has a lot of good videos on their channel from their conferences, including one on optical fibre if you want to get into the low-level ISO Layer 1 stuff: * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKeZaNwPKPo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKeZaNwPKPo In a similar vein, NANOG "Panel: Demystifying Submarine Cables" * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pk1e2YLf5Uc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pk1e2YLf5Uc
gkanai 6y ago
Don't forget Neal Stephenson's classic, "Mother Earth, Mother Board." 25 years old but still relevant. https://www.wired.com/1996/12/ffglass/ https://www.wired.com/1996/12/ffglass/
- walrus01 6y ago
  The business structures, ISP ownership and national telecoms have changed quite a lot in the past 25 years. But in terms of the physical OSI layer 1 challenges of laying cable across an ocean, that remains the most difficult and costly part of the process.
Famicoman 6y ago
It likely has some inaccurate info as I'm not a network engineer, but I gave a talk about BGP (with a history, protocol overview, and information on how it fails using real world examples) at Radical Networks last year. https://livestream.com/internetsociety/radnets19/videos/198024463 https://livestream.com/internetsociety/radnets19/videos/1980... I tried to make it accessible to those who have only a basic understanding of home networking. Assuming you know what a router is and what an ISP is, you should be able to to ingest it without needing to know crazy jargon.
maxmouchet 6y ago
"Tubes" is a good book to get an high level overview: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/178533/tubes/9780141049090 https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/178533/tubes/9780141049090
EvanAnderson 6y ago
It's important to recognize that there is a "layer 8" in Internet routing-- the political / business layer-- that's not necessarily expressed in technical discussion of protocols and practices. The BGP routing protocol is a place where you'll see "layer 8" decisions reflected very starkly in configuration. You may have networks that have working physical connectivity, but logically be unable to route traffic across each other because of business or political arrangements expressed in BGP configuration.
mmaunder 6y ago
Read Internet Routing Architectures by Sam Halabi. It’s almost 20 years old now but BGP hasn’t changed and the book is still called The Bible by routing architects.
- kitteh 6y ago
  It's dated and not particularly useful if you want to learn how things are really done on the internet in a practical sense. So if you read it, be prepared to unlearn a bunch of stuff.
bogomipz 6y ago
You want to learn about BGP in order to understand how routing on the internet works. The book "BGP" by Iljitsch van Beijnum is a great place to start. Don't be put off by the publication date, as almost everything in there is still relevant.[1] Once you understand BGP and Autonomous Systems(AS), you can then understand peering as well as some of the politics that surround it.[2] Then you can learn more about how specific networks are connected via public route servers and looking glass servers.[3][4][5] Probably one of the best resource though still is to work for an ISP or other network provider for a stint. [1] https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/bgp/9780596002541/ https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/bgp/9780596002541/ [2] http://drpeering.net/white-papers/Internet-Service-Providers-And-Peering.html http://drpeering.net/white-papers/Internet-Service-Providers... [3] http://www.traceroute.org/#Looking%20Glass http://www.traceroute.org/#Looking%20Glass [4] http://www.traceroute.org/#Route%20Servers http://www.traceroute.org/#Route%20Servers [5] http://www.routeviews.org/routeviews/ http://www.routeviews.org/routeviews/
antsoul 6y ago
US and Israel looking at China's strategy at BGP-level in 2018 : https://scholarcommons.usf.edu/mca/vol3/iss1/7/ https://scholarcommons.usf.edu/mca/vol3/iss1/7/
late2part 6y ago
read the last 26 years of NANOG archives
ZWoz 6y ago
DrPeering is good material: http://drpeering.net/tools/HTML_IPP/ipptoc.html http://drpeering.net/tools/HTML_IPP/ipptoc.html Geoff Huston paper "Interconnection, Peering, and Settlements" is older, but still interesting and several ways relevant. I suggest "Where Wizards Stay Up Late: The Origins Of The Internet" - generic and talks about Internet history, but mentions several common misconseptions.

marmshallow 6y ago

+1 Many of the comments here presume knowledge about this stuff, and I can’t follow.

albertTJames 6y ago

https://mobile.twitter.com/Level3 https://mobile.twitter.com/Level3 (not an internet level, just a company :)

Vinnl 6y ago
Were their tweets protected (i.e. only visible to approved followers) when you posted that link, or is that in response to this event?
- iso947 6y ago
  Level3 was qquired/merged/changed to century link a year or so back, I think they closed their old twitter account then When someone says level3, read century link. L3 have been a major player for decades though (including providing the infamous 4.2.2.2 dns server), so people still refer to them as level3. The account to follow for them now is https://mobile.twitter.com/CenturyLink https://mobile.twitter.com/CenturyLink but it won’t tell you much.
  - Godel_unicode 6y ago
    Note that L3 is a separate company from Level 3 Communications, which was the ISP that was acquired by CenturyLink. L3 is an American aerospace and C4ISR contractor. CenturyLink's current CEO, Jeff Storey, was actually the pre-acquisition Level 3 CEO.

vesh 6y ago

This might help https://community.fs.com/blog/tcpip-vs-osi-whats-the-difference-between-the-two-models.html https://community.fs.com/blog/tcpip-vs-osi-whats-the-differe...

TallGuyShort 6y ago

No particular resource to recommend, though I first learned about it in a book by Radia Perlman, but BGP is a protocol you don't hear much about unless you work in networking, and is one of the key pieces in a lot of wide-scale outages. I'd start with that.

q3k 6y ago

Unfortunately, this infrastructure is at an uncanny intersection of technology, business and politics. To learn the technical aspect of it, you can follow any network engineering certification materials or resources that delve into dynamic routing protocols, notably BGP. Inter-ISP networking is nothing but setting up BGP sessions and filters at the technical level. Why you set these up, and under what conditions is a whole different can of worms, though. The business and political aspect is a bit more difficult to learn without practice, but a good simulacrum can be taking part in a project like dn42, or even just getting an ASN and some IPv6 PA space and trying to announce it somewhere. However, this is no substitute for actual experience running an ISP, negotiating percentile billing rates with salespeople, getting into IXes, answering peering requests, getting rejected from peering requests, etc. :) Disclaimer: I helped start a non-profit ISP in part to learn about these things in practice.

bausano_michael 6y ago
Judging by other comments, it seems there's a space to fill this niche with a series of blog articles or a book, if you're that sort of person.
- kitteh 6y ago
  There are plenty of presentations out there. See nanog, ripe. The books are meh because they're not written by operators. They're more academic and dated. Plenty of clueful folks on the right IRC channels.
  - hpkuarg 6y ago
    Second time in this thread you've mentioned the right IRC channels. Does one need to invoke some secret code to find out what they are? :-)
    - rolph 6y ago
      in certain instances, yes depending on the nature or subject matter of the channel ok lets go for broke, there are a LOT of clandestine IRC servers and exclusive gatekeeping of channels. you wont know about unless you have an IRL reference

colechristensen 6y ago

I don't know something holistic, but if you are the Wikipedia rampage sort of person, here is a good place to start: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_exchange_point https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_exchange_point

throw0101a 6y ago

"An Open Platform to Teach How the Internet Practically Works" from NANOG perhaps: * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SRjTqH5Z8M https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SRjTqH5Z8M The Network Startup Resource Center out of UOregen has some good tutorials on BGP and connecting networks owned by different folks: * https://learn.nsrc.org/bgp https://learn.nsrc.org/bgp NANOG also has a lot of good videos on their channel from their conferences, including one on optical fibre if you want to get into the low-level ISO Layer 1 stuff: * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKeZaNwPKPo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKeZaNwPKPo In a similar vein, NANOG "Panel: Demystifying Submarine Cables" * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pk1e2YLf5Uc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pk1e2YLf5Uc

gkanai 6y ago

Don't forget Neal Stephenson's classic, "Mother Earth, Mother Board." 25 years old but still relevant. https://www.wired.com/1996/12/ffglass/ https://www.wired.com/1996/12/ffglass/

walrus01 6y ago
The business structures, ISP ownership and national telecoms have changed quite a lot in the past 25 years. But in terms of the physical OSI layer 1 challenges of laying cable across an ocean, that remains the most difficult and costly part of the process.

Famicoman 6y ago

It likely has some inaccurate info as I'm not a network engineer, but I gave a talk about BGP (with a history, protocol overview, and information on how it fails using real world examples) at Radical Networks last year. https://livestream.com/internetsociety/radnets19/videos/198024463 https://livestream.com/internetsociety/radnets19/videos/1980... I tried to make it accessible to those who have only a basic understanding of home networking. Assuming you know what a router is and what an ISP is, you should be able to to ingest it without needing to know crazy jargon.

maxmouchet 6y ago

"Tubes" is a good book to get an high level overview: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/178533/tubes/9780141049090 https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/178533/tubes/9780141049090

EvanAnderson 6y ago

It's important to recognize that there is a "layer 8" in Internet routing-- the political / business layer-- that's not necessarily expressed in technical discussion of protocols and practices. The BGP routing protocol is a place where you'll see "layer 8" decisions reflected very starkly in configuration. You may have networks that have working physical connectivity, but logically be unable to route traffic across each other because of business or political arrangements expressed in BGP configuration.

mmaunder 6y ago

Read Internet Routing Architectures by Sam Halabi. It’s almost 20 years old now but BGP hasn’t changed and the book is still called The Bible by routing architects.

kitteh 6y ago
It's dated and not particularly useful if you want to learn how things are really done on the internet in a practical sense. So if you read it, be prepared to unlearn a bunch of stuff.

bogomipz 6y ago

You want to learn about BGP in order to understand how routing on the internet works. The book "BGP" by Iljitsch van Beijnum is a great place to start. Don't be put off by the publication date, as almost everything in there is still relevant.[1] Once you understand BGP and Autonomous Systems(AS), you can then understand peering as well as some of the politics that surround it.[2] Then you can learn more about how specific networks are connected via public route servers and looking glass servers.[3][4][5] Probably one of the best resource though still is to work for an ISP or other network provider for a stint. [1] https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/bgp/9780596002541/ https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/bgp/9780596002541/ [2] http://drpeering.net/white-papers/Internet-Service-Providers-And-Peering.html http://drpeering.net/white-papers/Internet-Service-Providers... [3] http://www.traceroute.org/#Looking%20Glass http://www.traceroute.org/#Looking%20Glass [4] http://www.traceroute.org/#Route%20Servers http://www.traceroute.org/#Route%20Servers [5] http://www.routeviews.org/routeviews/ http://www.routeviews.org/routeviews/

antsoul 6y ago

US and Israel looking at China's strategy at BGP-level in 2018 : https://scholarcommons.usf.edu/mca/vol3/iss1/7/ https://scholarcommons.usf.edu/mca/vol3/iss1/7/

late2part 6y ago

read the last 26 years of NANOG archives

ZWoz 6y ago

DrPeering is good material: http://drpeering.net/tools/HTML_IPP/ipptoc.html http://drpeering.net/tools/HTML_IPP/ipptoc.html Geoff Huston paper "Interconnection, Peering, and Settlements" is older, but still interesting and several ways relevant. I suggest "Where Wizards Stay Up Late: The Origins Of The Internet" - generic and talks about Internet history, but mentions several common misconseptions.