1. DEVELOPMENT OF NATIONAL LEVEL NETWORKS IN SRI LANKA Nimal Ratnayake Senior Lecturer/Peradeniya Vice Chair/ISOC Sri Lanka Chapter

2. National Level Networks? LEARN – Universities, Research Organizations, ATIs LGN – Government Departments, Ministries, Divisional Secretariats, Provincial & Local Govt. entities SchoolNet – Secondary schools NODES – Distance Education Banks – Branches, ATMs Other organizations

3. Who built these networks? Many people My involvement highlighted below Lanka Education and Research Network  Management Committee  Technical Manager  CEO/CTO after LEARN became a company  1994 to 2012 Lanka Government Network  CEO/CTO of LGII (ICTA Subsidiary)  2 years

4. LEARN - Before the Dawn In the mid/late 80's, Lankan graduate students in the U.S./elsewhere used the Internet  SLnet- distribution of SL news via e-mail  soc.culture.sri-lanka (USENET newsgroup) When they returned after their studies, they work towards bringing Internet to Sri Lanka  Developed LANs in their respective universities  Inter university connectivity was still missing

5. The Birth of LEARN In 1989, a proposal was submitted to GoSL by Dr. Abhaya Induruwa of U of Moratuwa for the establishment of the “Lanka Experimental Academic and Research Network”  based on X.25 protocols Decided to start with dial-up e-mail CINTEC provided first funding  Rs. 15,000 for a telephone line – a rare commodity

6. LEARNmail Operational since April 1990 Used uucp protocol “lkmor” relay at Moratuwa International Connectivity initially through servers in the U.S.  located at UC Davis, Stanford and Purdue In November 1991, 644 messages totaling 627kB were transferred over international link 50 sites in Sri Lanka by 1994

7. Inter-University Network Set up in 1995 Original X.25 proposal modified to use IP  first IP-based WAN in the country  funded by University Grants Commission (Rs. 1.8m) Used 64kb leased lines from SLT  why do subscribers need 64kb? Connected 3 sites  University of Moratuwa, University of Colombo, Open University

8. LEARN Phase 1 Network

9. International Connectivity First on-line connection in Sri Lanka was provided by Compuserve in early 1995 Lanka Internet on-line on 11 th May 1995 Sri Lanka Telecom (SLT) (Nov 1995) Electroteks (March 1996) and LankaCom (July 1996) followed SLT had 64kb/s connection to Internet  to JVNC network in the U.S. LEARN Internet connectivity through SLT

10. Expansion of LEARN More sites connected via 64kb links in 1996-98  U. Moratuwa,U. Colombo  OUU. Kelaniya  U. RuhunaU. Peradeniya  U. SJPNARESA  ACCMT via UoM

12. LEARN Phase 2 Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA) funded upgrade of LEARN 8 Sites connected at 2Mb/s 4 Sites connected at 128kb/s 2Mb/s link between Suntel and SLT Internet Access Bandwidth: ~3Mbps Video conferencing between 4 sites

13. Training LEARN conducted a series of training programmes at universities  Colombo, Moratuwa, Peradeniya, Rajarata, Ruhuna, Kelaniya, SJP, etc. Evangelised the use of applications  such as e-mail and the world-wide web Created a team of networking experts Built a camaraderie among the networking staff  continues even today

14. LEARN Phase 3 Phase 3 : 2005 to 2006 IP-VPN over MPLS network [SLT] Servers hosted at SLTiDC Many sites had one/two 2Mbps links Others are 256kbps – 1 Mbps Jan 2005: Internet access BW 4.5Mbps Dec 2006: Internet access BW 45Mbps (LEARN and SchoolNet) Routing voice calls between some sites

15. LEARN Phase 4 Phase 4 : 2007 - 2012 links upgraded to 10Mbps/34Mbps over optical fiber from 2007 3 links at 34Mbps 20 links at 10Mbps Internet access BW 120Mbps (LEARN and SchoolNet)

16. Status in 2012 ~ 20 sites around Colombo Fiber connectivity for most remote site also LEARN Became a Registered Internet Service Provider in Sri Lanka in 2011

17. Achievements Interconnect ALL public universities  Ownership: LEARN project is “our project” Benefits to members  Lower prices for local/international bandwidth  Value addition  Sharing of expertise / Technical workshops Champion of networking in Sri Lanka  Ahead of telecom operators in technology  IPv6, Multicasting 100% self sustaining

18. LEARN – Current status Links to universities at 500Mbps to 10Mbps over optical fiber from 2007 Internet access BW 1.5Gbps Direct International Connectivity in the works

19. TEIN3 Connectivity Major milestone in LEARN's history Connected to TEIN3 at 45Mbps since April 1, 2010 Very high quality connectivity Bridged an international V.conf. at 4Mbps per site

20. Facilities/Services Voice routing between campus PBXs Multicasting IP version 6 HD Video conferencing facilities at all public universities  Remote teaching  Meetings Video conferencing bridge (MCU)  Bridged SERENE V. Conf program at 4Mbps per site

21. Organizational Changes Previously a project undertaking of the UGC  Technical operations by UoM, UoP  Financial operations by UCSC Registered as an Association in 2009 15 universities and the UGC are the founding members All 16 institutions nominate a rep for the BoD Own office from May 2010

22. International Visibility Hosted the SERENE program/workshop  http://serene.learn.ac.lk/  As a “provider” country  BD, NP, BT, AF were “beneficiary” countries  Shared our experience in building/running LEARN APAN Community  First APAN member in South Asia (1996)  APAN Secretariat since Oct 2011

23. Lanka Government Network (LGN) National Network of the Government  Presidents Office / Prime Ministers Office / Parliament  Ministries / Departments  District and Divisional Secretariats  Provincial Councils  Other local government entities 700+ sites as of 2014  North and East connected in 2013  Link speeds 2Mbps to 256kbps

24. Are we where we should be after 20 years? Limitations in service provider offerings  No visibility of what happens to our traffic after it enters the service provider network  Troubleshooting nightmare  Performance guarantees Leased fiber? Available in other countries in the region (IN, PK, BD..) Software Defined Networking (SDN)? Slice the service provider network

25. Are we where we should be after 20 years? (2) LEARN / LGN focus only on the connectivity to the side Problems in the institution networks Lack of trained staff Problems of retaining trained staff (both LEARN and LGN) – Training needs to be a continuous process – Adjustment of salay / benefits Do we need so many separate national networks in the govt / education sector? – Learn from other countries? – National Knowledge Network (NKN) in India

26. Are we where we should be after 20 years? (3) Regulatory Framework Still focused on “voice” Approval to import networking equipment Legal issues over Voice Over IP? Voice of the Service providers gets heard What about the interests of the users?