**************** A RARE UPDATE No.8, February 1993 **************** NEWS FROM THE COA by Josefien Bersee at the RARE Secretariat The 25th meeting of the RARE Council of Administration took place on February 4/5 1993. Progress and results on major subjects are summarized below. _________________________________________________________ SEPARATE MEMBERSHIP FOR CZECH AND SLOVAK NETWORKS Czechoslovakia, formerly represented by the Institute of Applied Cybernetics as Associate National Member of RARE, split up into two republics recently. Therefore membership to RARE had to be changed accordingly. The COA accepted separate Czech (CESNET) and Slovak (SANET) networking organizations as new Full National Members. RTC REAPPOINTED FOR TWO YEARS' TERM The RARE Technical Committee, which started its activities in April last year has been reappointed for a two years' term, ending 1 May 1995. In addition to the existing members Milan Sterba will represent RIPE. Currently there is one vacancy, as Eike Jessen had to resign. The current RTC is chaired by Tomaz Kalin, RARE Secretary-General; Tim Dixon, RARE Project Development Officer acts as Secretary. Other members are: Brian Gilmore (Edinburgh University, United Kingdom), Erik Huizer (SURFnet, Netherlands), Jean-Paul Le Guigner (CICB, France), Bernhard Plattner (ETH Zuerich, Switzerland), and Sven Tafvelin (NORDUnet, Chalmers Technical Institute, Sweden). Howard Davies (RARE Vice-President, University of Exeter, UK) liaises between the RTC and the RARE Executive Committee and Christian Huitema (INRIA, France) liaises between RARE and the Internet Architecture Board. PROGRESS ON RARE TECHNICAL PROGRAMME The preparation of a Survey on Multimedia Research, Standards, and Products was contracted to the University of Edinburgh. In January editor Chris Adie made a draft version of the survey available. Work on the GIX route server and IP specification work is progressing well. Tony Bates, formerly working as Assistant Network Manager at ULCC, has been hired to work on the project; he is housed with the RIPE NCC. A RARE/RIPE Task Force concerned with IP version 7 has started its activities; two or 3 pilots are already on the way. The RTC will take action to raise the necessary additional funds. NEW PROJECT DEVELOPMENT OFFICER AT RARE SECRETARIAT Jeroen Houttuin has started work as PDO at the RARE Secretariat in Amsterdam on January 1st. He studied telematics at the University of Twente and has been involved in R&D networking projects at GMD-FOKUS, ETH Zuerich, and SWITCH. He participated in the COSINE MHS Project Team. Jeroen will be involved in RARE Working Group activities, upper-layer related issues in particular. EBONE IN 1993 The EBONE'92 backbone continues in 1993. At the Ebone consortium meeting on Feb. 3 in Luxembourg the partners finalized the budget, decided on an upgrade of the backbone and set up the organization to operate Ebone in 1993. Ebone's long term strategy was confirmed to concentrate in the future on providing a neutral interconnect for all networks, while it is assumed that provision of backbone services will be offered by one or more (competing) providers in the longer run. Until such offers are forthcoming, Ebone will take care of its partners' needs in this area too. The RARE Secretariat will continue to provide administrative services and act as a clearing house. LAUNCH EuropaNET On 9 February EuropaNET, the multi-protocol backbone for the European research community, was launched in The Hague, The Netherlands. EuropaNET replaces IXI, COSINE's International X.25 Infrastructure pilot which connected European researchers over the past two years. START-UP CONTRACT OPERATIONAL UNIT SIGNED BY RARE RARE has signed the contract with the CEC for the start-up of the Operational Unit for provision of networking services to the European research community. The RARE Executive Committee and the OU Steering Committee have reached agreement on RARE acting on behalf of the Operational Unit. PUBLICATION OF PAPER VERSION RARE/EARN JOURNAL APPROVED The COA approved the budget for publishing a paper version of a new journal jointly published by RARE and EARN. It will appear as a quarterly supplement to the Elsevier North Holland journal "Computer Networks and ISDN Systems" Publication of the first issue is planned for April. PRELIMINARY PROGRAMME 4TH JENC AVAILABLE The preliminary programme and registration form for the 4th Joint European Networking Conference are now available from the RARE Secretariat, on paper as well as electronically. The deadline for the early registration fee is March 29th.