Paradyne software monitors frame nets

By Tim Greene
Network World, 11/16/98

Largo, Fla. - New software from Paradyne could help users keep closer tabs on their frame relay service providers.

Paradyne promotes honest frame relay services

Frame Saver Service Level Verification software features tools to check that frame relay service providers deliver what they promise:

TruPut, a feature that measures throughput on links both below and above the committed information rate.
Details availability, throughput and delay for each frame relay virtual circuit.
Allows service providers to share network performance statistics with customers
Paradyne's Enhanced FrameSaver Service Level Verification (SLV) software keeps track of packet loss and delay across frame relay links and measures that loss against the customer's service-level agreements, the company says.

The software is loaded on Paradyne FrameSaver 9624, 9124 and 9580 DSU/CSU hardware and collects data about traffic moving in and out of each site on a network.

Previous frame-monitoring tools measured lost frames but did not say whether those losses violated the rock-bottom bandwidth guaranteed by a contracted committed information rate (CIR). CIR is the bandwidth the customer is guaranteed to receive all the time, Paradyne representatives say.

A typical frame relay service will accept frames above the CIR, but those excess frames could be dropped if the network becomes congested.

The capability to measure frames lost within the CIR, which Paradyne calls TruPut, augments Paradyne's existing monitoring software, OpenLane FrameSaver. OpenLane measures network delay and availability on a virtual-circuit-by-virtual-circuit basis.

Being able to verify that information independently can be important, especially when the customer is relying on the service provider to supply reports on network performance, according to Rick Glasberg, manager of data communications for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

"I think FrameSaver SLV will be a useful tool to see what's going on in the Bell Atlantic network," Glasberg says. The state bases its 350-node frame relay network largely on circuits provided by Bell Atlantic.

Currently, Bell Atlantic's reports are not detailed enough for Glasberg's purposes, he says. He does request more specific reports, but it takes more time to get them.

Glasberg already generates some reports using Paradyne's DCE Manager element management software in conjunction with Concord Communications' Network Health software. While Glasberg will use FrameSaver SLV to collect information from his network, the same software could be used by service providers to generate reports.

Those reports could then be posted on secure Web servers so customers could get near real-time performance details about their networks.

Enhanced SLV Reports with TruPut will be available in December as part of Paradyne's OpenLane FrameSaver management suite. The product will cost $18,985 for Unix operating systems or $10,685 for Windows.

Paradyne: (813) 530-2000.