User Controlled LightPaths Project

Last updated: 19-May-2005

• Version Beta1.5 (with SDH support) is now available for download. May 19 2005
• Version Beta1.4 (with Time Zone support) is now available for download. August 16 2004
• Version Beta1.3 (with SSL support) is now available for download. July 15 2004
• Version Beta1.2 is now available for download. June 4 2004
• Ireland and Taiwan connect across CA*net 4 via The University of Waterloo UCLP. March 26th 2004
• Version Beta1.1 is now available for download. March 23rd 2004
• The Waterloo UCLP System is now being tested by several organizations throughout North America, Europe and Asia.
• Version Beta1.00 is now available for download. January 9th 2004
• RISQ2003/CANARIE ANW2003 Workshop, Montreal, October 22, 2003:
  - The University of Waterloo team demonstrated a GridFTP 3rd party transfer using their Grid-centric UCLP implementation.
• University of Waterloo, Waterloo, September 29, 2003:
  - The University of Waterloo participated in the second CA*net 4 Design Meeting and demonstrated the operation of the Waterloo UCLP system.
• CRC, Ottawa, May 26-27, 2003:
  - The University of Waterloo participated in the CA*net 4 Design Meeting
  - The presentation and demonstration slides can be found here

The objective of the project is to provide a software system that allows users (e.g. research institutions, government departments, hospitals) to own and control lightpaths (e.g. WDM wavelengths or SONET STS channels). The system allows users to partition their lightpaths and lease unused resources to others, as well as to concatenate lightpaths into high-bandwidth end-to-end communication pipes across multiple management domains. This enables rapid provisioning of network resources and increases the pool of available lightpaths beyond what can be offered by a carrier.

The system provides a Web-based interface for human interaction, as well as a standard Grid interface that allows Grid applications to directly create end-to-end communication pipes for large data transfers. By placing ownership and control of lightpaths in the hands of network users and by facilitating the deployment of high-bandwidth Grid applications, the project reinforces Canada’s leadership role in promoting the widespread adoption of a next-generation user-controlled optical Internet.

CANARIE is Canada's advanced Internet organization and is supported by the Federal Government of Canada. For more information about CANARIE, please visit www.canarie.ca