Grant Amount: US$ 8,990

Keywords: INTERNET PROTOCOL, IPV6, NETWORK DEVELOPMENT, PHILIPPINES

Geographic coverage: Philippines

Objective

The objective of this project is to initiate Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) use by the Philippine Research Education and Government Information Network (PREGINET) infrastructure.

Research context

While the Philippines has experienced a rapid rate of adoption of the Internet since 1993, it has been slow to adopt IPv6, the new Internet Protocol (IP) standard that increases the address size to 128 bits and solves address availability problems. Considering high level of Internet use in the Philippines, this project recognized the need to start building internal capability and a knowledge base on IPv6. The education institutions involved in the project used a test-bed to explore transition mechanisms and pursue in-depth research on the protocol. Sustainability of the project is supported by PREGINET.

Target beneficiaries

The direct beneficiaries in this project are the participating educational institutes. This includes the faculty that builds the test-bed (an added research component in their laboratories) and the students who use it to conduct research on IPv6. The project benefits members the academe, government institutions, and the information technology (IT) industry that participated in seminars, trainings and workshops organized by the project. Philippine Internet users in general benefit through the diffusion of IPv6.

Outputs

• Papers outlining research findings delivered to at least two conferences or meetings;
• Online documentation of technical details and creation of how-to guides; and
• Final research report on the project experience and recommendations on universal access strategies and policies.

Research results and outcomes

The Advanced Science and Technology Institute (ASTI) initiated IPv6 research in the Philippines through the Asian Internet Interconnection Initiatives Project (AI3). ASTI drew on that experience for this project.

The project began with a call for participation and selected three partners based on the criteria of technical capability and geographic representation of the three major island clusters in the Philippines. The partners selected were the Electrical and Electronics Engineering Department of the University of the Philippines (UP-EEE) in Diliman, Quezon City, the Mindanao State University – Iligan Institute of Technology (MSU-IIT) in Iligan City and the Central Visayas Information Sharing Network (CVISNET) in Cebu City. The project team experienced some difficulties during the initial implementation due to a lack of experience with the intricacies of IPv6 among some of the institutions involved. There were also challenges relating to the fact that CVISNET and MSU-IIT are remote sites although the ultimately successful partnership demonstrates that distance is not necessarily a hindrance in achieving collaborative research.

The project has had a wide range of outputs beyond those outlined in the original proposal. It conducted a number of workshops on IPv6 routing, DNS servers, web servers, web proxies, email and IPv6-enabled applications for faculty, students, government staff and project managers. It organized an IPv6 Forum on applications, operations and business models that companies can use when adopting IPv6. The project deployed hardware to the three project sites, including computers, routers and application servers. It also connected several non-partner institutions to the test-bed. CVISNET, UP-EEE and MSU-IIT were able to establish IPv6 connectivity to ASTI, and to other international IPv6 networks through ASTI and AI3.

The project developed a number of presentations and materials. It produced a paper for the IPv6 Promotion Council Retreat entitled Hurdles and issues in advancing IPv6 deployment in the Philippines presented in the IPv6 Summer Retreat in Seoul, Korea on 23 August 2003. The project supported two Asia-Pacific College (APC) undergraduate students who developed Macromedia tutorials and an award-winning project by the students from MSU-IIT called Dynamic DNS Solution for a Campus Network. It made technical presentations on IPv6 to the Philippine Internet Services Organization (PISO). The project attended the APAN Conference held in Fukuoka, Japan, 22-24 January 2003 and PREGINET attended the first Asia-Pacific Global IPv6 Summit, APRICOT 2003 Conference in Taipei, Taiwan. The project provided research assistance to an undergraduate thesis entitled Internet Protocol Version 6 (IPv6) Implementation for the AMD Net 186 Demonstration Boar. Finally, the project provided technical support to the first Philippines IPv6 mailing list. The list supports research and deployment of IPv6 in the Philippines through the exchange of theoretical and practical information.

ASTI’s aim of deploying IPv6 in the Philippines has been enhanced through collaboration with schools and universities, Internet service providers, telecommunications companies, and other IPv6 stakeholders. The range of seminars, workshops and reports developed by the project has increased awareness and appreciation of IPv6 within the government and the network engineering community of the Philippines, and contributes to the global IPv6 research and development community and related advocacy efforts. The IPv6 network developed through this project continues to be used by faculty, researchers and students of participating institutions as a test-bed for the design, development and testing of IPv6 applications. ASTI continues to conduct research and development in IPv6.

Awards

Dynamic DNS Solution for a Campus Network project of the students from MSU-IIT was among the top 20 Grand Prize Winners of the 2004 Linux Scholars Challenge.

Duration

Start Date: November 2002
End Date: September 2003
Total Duration: 11 Months

Contact information

Denis F. Villorente, Director
Advanced Science and Technology Institute
ASTI Building, UP Technology Park Complex, C.P. Garcia Avenue
Diliman, Quezon City 1101, Philippines
Telephone: +63 2 426 9766 / 67
Fax: +63 2 426 9756
Email: denis@asti.dost.gov.ph

Website: http://www.pregi.net/content/section/10/64/

Reference website: http://www.ai3.net