The implementation of broadband network technologies in CARNet

Abstract

During the first decade of its existence, Croatian Academic and Research Network—CARNet faced a number of changes in all segments of its activities. In its efforts not to wait for future to happen, but to predict its users needs, and present acceptable solutions to them, a lot of research and practical work is done concluding with a strong network infrastructure and a number of network services, including real-time applications. In this paper, researches in the field of lower layers network technologies and multimedia application like videoconferencing, media on demand and broadcast technologies implementation in CARNet network is presented.

Introduction

Croatian academic and research network—CARNet is a national academic computer network and the Croatian academic part of the Internet. CARNet is also a test bed for research of the latest information technologies in Croatia. As a government institution founded by the Ministry of Science and Technology, CARNet is established with the aim of connecting Croatia's own computer network with the worldwide information systems. Being the first Internet service provider in Croatia, CARNet was offering its services free of charge to all individuals, institutions, foreign visitors and international organizations, until the rapid popularization of the Internet brought to light first commercial ISPs in Croatia.

With the palette of its activities, CARNet is more than just an Internet provider for academic community. Through a number of pilot projects with its member institutions, case studies are performed, in order to explore the application of information technology in various areas of human activities. Special courses and helpdesk services are organized for groups of CARNet users: end users, system administrators, trainers and member institutions. In modern equipped laboratories, communication and computer equipment, and application programs are examined in order to explore the possibilities to improve the quality, dynamics and organization of work in all areas of human activities.

In this paper, the survey of present CARNet achievements is given, regarding the implementation of broadband technologies and incorporation of multimedia applications into the network. The paper is organized as follows: Section 2 presents CARNet network infrastructure with brief network usage statistics. In Section 3, research in the field of network technologies is given. Section 4 points out to the integration of multimedia services. Conclusions are given in Section 5.