ComTech to offer virtual campus networks

OIT Communication Technologies (ComTech) will begin offering virtual campus networks in the near future.

With the recent deployment of multiprotocol label switching (MPLS), ComTech now has the ability to define entire virtualized network architectures for units and colleges, data centers and cloud computing environments over the campus network infrastructure. MPLS can virtualize the campus network by providing multiple virtual routing and forwarding instances. On-campus subnets and the systems they contain can be moved into different virtual networks with a simple configuration change.

Without impacting the main network, MPLS will allow researchers and others to move data across a separate virtual network, with firewall functionality. MPLS will permit ComTech to improve network resilience by mitigating certain types of potential failures, and it will optimize other existing processes such as keeping guest users isolated from certain campus resources. ComTech is now in the process of piloting MPLS and will offer the new service to campus colleges and units soon.