How's Internet traffic flowing these days? Where are the backups? Which highways need extra lanes? Where should roads and interchanges be added or upgraded?
On the Net -- where the highways are fiber-optic data lines, the interchanges are packet routers, and the cars are bits of the Web and email -- finding answers to these questions could help the Net's traffic crews create a smoother-flowing data highway.
But the Web is a conglomeration of many networks, whose keepers can only see inside their own network tunnels. So how do you possibly begin to get a complete reading of the Net at large?
Matrix Information and Directory Services (MIDS) hopes it has found the answer with Matrix IQ, a new service launched Monday, which aims to create an accurate, real-time readout of the Net's performance.
"Matrix IQ provides the ability for us to gather data from ISPs to see not only what's going on inside their network, but also what's going on externally, on the Internet as a whole," said Philip Worob, Matrix's vice president of sales.
The company plans to put its own sensing "beacons" (a bunch of Sun workstation computers) in all of the Net's component networks, from the largest Internet backbones to regional ISPs. This, Matrix believes, will result in a tool capable of measuring everyday performance.
"The beacons send data back and forth and are able to collect information on ISPs and how they're sending information around the network," Worob said. With this "matrix" of speedometers and RPM dials talking to each other, Matrix IQ hopes to feed the Internet an accurate picture of its sprawling, disparate self.
Hour-to-hour data is especially important if the Net is going to become a live medium where doctors can perform "virtual surgery," or where researchers can gather to analyze 3D computer models with colleagues a continent away. The Net needs to establish "quality of service" levels, which require the kind of data MIDS plans to provide.
Internet quality-of-service guarantees could also help the Web deal with unusually heavy use, like the kind generated by the release of the Starr report or President's Clinton's videotaped testimony.
So far, so-so
Various services have tried for years to provide a snapshot of Net traffic to see which parts were performing the best. The Internet Traffic Report and two others with the same name -- Internet Weather Report -- are among them.
But critics have argued that any conclusions drawn from existing reports are unscientific at best. MIDS, which runs one of the Internet Weather Reports, has drawn some praise.
The complexity and cost of accurately measuring the speed, volume, and choke points of the world's Internet traffic makes finding a reliable monitor difficult. Another significant roadblock is the competition factor. MCI, Sprint, and all the other keepers of the network backbone are loathe to surrender their network-performance secrets.
To get around that, MIDS wants to negotiate agreements with each ISP regarding the kind of information that can be made public. Certain data will only be seen by MIDS itself, while less proprietary information will be shared.
Publicly useful data, such as Web-page retrieval times for individual ISPs, will be posted free to the public.
Still, there are logistical problems to surmount. Before it can provide an accurate, real-time picture of the Net, Matrix IQ has to work its beacons into the Net infrastructure.
The first step is selling its internal network monitoring to providers. To help ISPs make their own networks hum -- and to provide information to customers on how well it's humming -- Matrix will sell the service on a sliding scale to customer ISPs.
By Monday's launch, it had signed on one major backbone provider, PSINet, as well as a regional ISP in Austin, where MIDS is based.
PSINet is, for now, most interested in the third-party monitoring value of MIDS' service. Just as car companies point to J.D. Power and Associates for independent performance reviews, the large ISP will point to Matrix IQ in selling its performance to corporations seeking network connectivity.
"MIDS is setting themselves apart from other evaluators out there because they're remaining independent and not affiliating themselves with a publication or analyst groups," said PSINet spokesman Michael Binko. "And they're not trying to promote themselves as something they're not."
By positioning itself as a kind of Consumer Reports for the ISP industry, MIDS hopes it can get its beacons more broadly established on the Net. After that, it wants to build a network nerve center.
Time is also a factor. At least one other company is known to be developing a similar tracking system.
Meanwhile, though, MIDS is negotiating with larger ISPs in the United States, Europe, and Japan. If enough of them climb aboard, perhaps the Internet will finally get the accurate traffic reporting it has long dreamed of.
