🚀 go-pugleaf

For the past week and a half the CA*net PSP router located at SFU
Harbour Centre has been crashing with alarming frequency. 
 
When the PSP is down, traffic travelling from BCnet to the rest of
Canada cannot travel directly via Toronto and Edmonton as it does when
the PSP is working.  Instead it travels via Seattle, Ithaca NY, and
Toronto, or Seattle, Princeton NJ, and Montreal.  So we maintain
connectivity with the rest of Canada, but our traffic is much slower. 
The biggest effect is on traffic between BCnet and Alberta. 
 
SFU HC does not have operators available 24 hours per day, and I have
had to make several trips on the past two weekends to reset the
router.  I have been in frequent communication with CA*net encouraging
them to improve the situation. 
 
The problem is a serious one which is also subtle and elusive.  Last 
Friday all hardware except the hard drives was swapped between the
PSP and the EPSP, the router which manages the link to Seattle.  But
the problem still occurs only on the PSP, reinforcing the conclusion 
that the problem is not caused by faulty hardware.
 
CA*net has been trying to run software on the router which would 
let them get more information about the cause of the crashes.  But
since operators are not always readily available, this has led to 
longer outages than desirable.  So CA*net has just installed new
code which will re-boot the router automatically when it crashes.
 
CA*net is continuing to look for the cause of the crashes.  The new
software should at least minimize their effect on BCnet. 
 
  -- Mike Patterson, BCnet manager
 
e-mail: Mike@BC.net   Phone:  (604) 822-3932   Fax: (604) 822-5116