US Air Force Building Space Router

Saint Aardvark writes "From the ISTS daily news comes a story on the US Air Force seeking to build a space router. From TFA: "Northrop Grumman and Caspian Networks are collaborating to develop an Internet Protocol router that can withstand the constant barrage of solar radiation in orbit. The space-hardened IP router will be part of the Air Force's Transformational Satellite Communications System, which will provide IP-based communications to warfighters." I wonder what the ping times would be like..."

Comments

Ping times.

[grub]

I wonder what the ping times would be like...

(nb: I worked on some satellite internet stuff a few years ago.) If this unit is in geosynchronous orbit (so a fixed dish can always hit it), it's sitting almost 36,000 Km over the equator. Assuming your dish is at the equator a round trip is ~72,000 Km / 300,000 Km/sec (the speed of light) means the signal travels about a quarter second earth->earth not including any processing time at the satellite midway point or either end.

Re:wtf?? This is new?

[ebrandsberg]

You didn't catch that current technology doesn't do the routing IN space, it does it at a single point on the ground. This allows several uplinks to be used more effectively. As an example, if you make use of these vsat IP providers to connect between two remote sites, the communications would be ground->sat->ground (hub)->sat->ground, meaning the packets have to traverse twice as far as they otherwise would if routed in space.

Re:Ping Times

[RealityMogul]

You're pings are not being routed through a satellite.

Hardly the first router in space...

[Mondoz]

The ISS (International Space Station) has been flying a Smart Switch Router for years in the Russian Segment of the onboard network.

The Router
Here's an ISS status report that mentions it.