From: eric@remailer.net (Eric Hughes)
Date: Tue, 7 Feb 95 20:23:52 PST
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: RE: a new way to do anonymity
In-Reply-To: <Chameleon.4.01.950207192939.jcorgan@comet.aeinet.com>
Message-ID: <199502080422.UAA22395@largo.remailer.net>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


   From: Johnathan Corgan <jcorgan@aeinet.com>

   There are many, many analogies you can draw about a network of this
   type to an ATM (asynchronous transfer mode) network.  

Thank you for the analogy.  It's always good not to reinvent the wheel
when you don't need to.

   The switched path could be set up and torn down dynamically by the user by
   interacting with the "switch" at each point to select the next hop the 
   encrypted byte stream will follow.

When you set up a mapping on a packet forwarder, this is exactly the
kind of initialization that would be required.  It is also at this
point that keying would be negotiated, etc.

   Fixed length data packets (at the encrypted telnet level) also make it very
   easy to aggregate individual circuits into higher bandwidth pipes that
   connect server to server.

Now here's an important detail that needs to get done right.  Is the
forwarding for fixed length packets, variable length packets, or
streams?  Is this decision global or local?  What are the latency and
aggregatation effects?  How important are these for different classes
of data?  (telnet v. voice, e.g.)

I'd suggest just getting something running first, to get some
prototyping experience.

Eric