| It is recognized that high-speed networks have become an
increasingly major part of the communications
infrastructure. High-speed networks can provide many
benefits and enable new applications that are required in an
information dominated society. High-speed networks also pose
many serious hurdles for exploitation of those applications.
The physical layer of the network--which may be wireline or
wireless in nature--may well be the simplest
of these hurdles to overcome. In addition to physical data
transport, networks running at high speeds require changes
in almost every network element at all levels to cope with
the limitations of delay. This will require architectural
changes in computer end-systems, packet switches, gateways,
and routers, both in hardware and software.
The driving applications for high-speed networks will
likely continue to evolve from emerging applications at
university, government, and industrial research
institutions. It is logical therefore that the IEEE
Communications Society have a technical committee of
interested users, network administrators, researchers,
developers, and manufacturers to provide a focal point for
needed technical interaction that is driven by user needs.
This technical committee also pioneers some of the technical
discussion, publications, and technical forums concerned
with the evolving architectures needed to meet the
applications being considered by the network administrators.
This committee is expected to concentrate on end-to-end
cross-layer issues, such as user impact, applications,
transport and higher layer protocols, operating systems, and
host/network interface architecture best suited for
visualization, multimedia, imaging, massive file transfer,
and other emerging national and grand challenge
applications, so that high-performance is enabled. Beyond
its technical focus, this committee is also focused on key
member development initiatives. Namely, committee
members and officers will actively work to nominate deserving members
for various awards, distinguished speaker roles, and
promotion to IEEE Senior Member and Fellow grades.
Broader liason and contribution activities in high-speed
networking standards organizations are also envisioned. |
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