Carrier Grade Linux gathering momentum

TIPPINST - A number of companies are starting to ship Carrier Grade versions of their realtime operating systems, the latest to do is FSMlabs who have registered their version with the ODSL. AS the name implies Carrier Grade Linux specifications adhere to the characteristics required by carrier-grade applications. Carrier Grade Linux complies to recognized standards such as the Linux Standard Base. The effort is aligned with existing forums and communities such as the Service Availability Forum.

Eventhough companies are adhering to a common standard they are going to great lengths to differeniate their products from a performance point of view

Until now carrier grade linux has focussed on the control plane and left companies such as Windriver to handle the data plane.

Control plane traffic is typically queued in multiple priority queues since it is not processed "on the fly" like data plane traffic. Examples of control plane include

•Protection against DoS attacks at infrastructure routers and switches

•QoS control for packets that are destined to the control plane of routers or switches

Hemant Trivedi at Commsdesign believes that integration of the control and data plane is essential if 10Gbs plus speeds are to be achieved. FSMlabs agree with Hermant and have this objective firmly in mind.

Network processors in the future will also have to achieve both control and data plane handling, this requires high speed low jitter solutions.