IBM And Seventh Grader Projects

Eric Aupperle, director of the Merit Computer Network, explains that Merit's internal data network carries a great deal of packet-switching equipment, the software and hardware of which Merit has developed on its own during the years. Merit itself is bound to benefit from any advances in packet switching. "There are 30 of our larger packet switches and 240 smaller packet switches along with 270 nodes in Merit that stretch across Michigan," Aupperle says. "Therefore, much of the NSFnet switching development will also find its way to Merit's own network."

IBM already has some Seventh Grade Science Projects in place that runs on IBM's RT Personal Computers and implements the X Window network user interfaces developed at MIT. IBM's network management software runs under TCP/IP's Simple Gateway Management Protocol but is only the first step toward the kind of extensive TCP/IP network management system at which IBM is aiming.

According to Ellen Hancock, general manager of IBM's Communications Systems Division, the NSF network project will pay the company big dividends later on. In talking with Hancock, a bigger networking picture emerges.

"Our agreement with the NSF's Seventh Grade Science Projects is that we will use that same network management support to migrate NSFnet from TCP/IP to OSI," she says, adding that IBM will provide OSI support for its Application System/400 minicomputer line.

Already supporting TCP/IP under IBM's VM operating system, the company has recently migrated the protocol to IBM's large systems MVS operating system, a mainstay of the company's Systems Network Architecture (SNA), Hancock says.

The NSFnet project will no doubt help IBM position Netview as the network management link bridging its de facto and official standards networking environments: SNA first, then TCP/IP and, eventually, OSI. Seen in this light, IBM's work with NSFnet could play a big part in its commercial product strategy.

IBM also has its research fingers in the Andrew File System, a high-speed file exchange network that it is co-developing with the Information Technology Center at Pittsburgh's Carnegie-Mellon University. The Andrew File System will involve special software protocols and a high-speed network that will initially connect to at least 10 sites outside the university.

The Andrew File System network is a mixture of Ethernet and IBM-supplied Token-Rings tied together by network bridges. It uses Sun Microsystems, Inc. workstations, IBM RT PCs and Digital Equipment Corp. VAXs as file servers.