Cars

Telstra turns to SDN for speedy intra-Asia subsea cable switcheroo

Published

5 years ago

January 17, 2019

(Image: Telstra)

Telstra has announced it is offering a rapid restoration service for subsea cable outages on three of its intra-Asia routes. Currently the telco offers restoration in eight hours, but has flagged that could be reduced to minutes.

The Australian telco is using Ericsson equipment with Ciena’s GeoMesh Extreme to “increase the intelligence”, or virtualisation and automation, of its subsea cable network.

“The Asian region presents one of the most challenging environments for subsea cable systems. Busy and shallow shipping ports in Hong Kong and Singapore, high-levels of fishing activity and an ecosystem prone to natural disasters, all threaten to disrupt or damage underwater infrastructure,” Telstra’s Head of Connectivity and Platforms Nadya Melic said.

See: How Telstra handles subsea cables during typhoons

“Damage to a subsea cable can take weeks or even months to fix. But with our new continuous connection service, we are able to reroute customers impacted by potential damage to another subsea cable path on our three path network in less than 30 minutes.”

Melic added the under half-hour period was “almost seamless restoration”.

Earlier this week, Telstra announced it had purchased more capacity on the New Cross Pacific cable, as well as made a new investment in the faster cable — the details of either were not disclosed.

“Capacity demand on our international network has almost doubled over the past two years to over 200Tb, driven by the explosion of cloud computing, video streaming, and e-commerce,” Telstra Enterprise Group Executive Michael Ebeid said at the time.

Last month, Telstra announced it was buying into the Southern Cross Cable Network through the purchase of new shares that will give the telco a 25 percent stake in the company.

The telco also agreed to purchase “substantial” capacity on Southern Cross’ existing network and the NEXT subsea cable.

Southern Cross announced in August last year that it will start building the $350 million NEXT submarine cable, which it touted as being the fastest between Australia and New Zealand, and the United States.

The third cable is expected to provide an additional 60Tbps capacity to the existing 20Tbps on the two present Southern Cross cables, and will be ready for service in early 2020.

Subsea cables across the globe

Vocus’ Australia-Singapore Cable (ASC)
Vocus’ North West Cable System (NWCS) between Darwin and Port Hedland, and the new Tiwi Islands spur being added
The Australian government’s Coral Sea subsea cable, being constructed by Vocus to connect Australia, Papua New Guinea, and Solomon Islands and funded through the foreign aid budget
Google’s Dunant transatlantic subsea cable between Virginia Beach in the United States to the French Atlantic coast
The Indian government’s Chennai-Andaman and Nicobar islands subsea cable, being built by NEC
Southern Cross Cables’ NEXT subsea cable system between Australia, New Zealand, and the United States, being built by SubPartners
The Trident subsea cable system connecting Perth with Singapore via Indonesia
The Jupiter subsea cable connecting the US, Japan, and the Philippines and being built by a consortium including Facebook, Amazon, SoftBank, NTT Com, PLDT, and PCCW
The Hawaiki subsea cable between Australia, New Zealand, and the US
Superloop’s Hong Kong cable
Telstra’s Hong Kong Americas (HKA) cable between Hong Kong and the US
Telstra’s Pacific Light Cable Network (PLCN) between Hong Kong and the US
Google’s Japan-Guam-Australia (JGA) cable system
The Asia-Pacific Gateway (APG) subsea cable connecting China, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam, and Singapore, owned by a consortium including China Telecom, China Unicom, China Mobile, NTT Communications, KT Corporation, LG Uplus, StarHub, Chunghwa Telecom, CAT, Global Transit Communications, Viettel, and VNPT, and being constructed by NEC
The Southeast Asia Japan 2 cable (SJC2), which will have 11 landing stations in Singapore, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Hong Kong, China, South Korea, Taiwan, and Japan, being built by NEC and funded by a consortium including China Mobile International, Chunghwa Telecom, Chuan Wei, Facebook, KDDI, Singtel, SK Broadband, and VNPT
The Bay to Bay Express Cable System (BtoBE), connecting Singapore and Hong Kong with the US, being funded by consortium including Facebook, Amazon Web Services (AWS), and China Mobile International, and being built by NEC
The South Atlantic Cable System (SACS) connecting Angola and Brazil, going live in October 2018 after being built by NEC

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Cars

The Cold War Mystery That Remains Unsolved

Published

11 mins ago

September 23, 2023

Francisco Peguero

The USS Scorpion was commissioned on July 29, 1960, and came as a formidable Cold War nuclear-powered vessel. The innovation of the submarine, combined with the high tensions of the time and the constant state of alert brought on by the Cold War, kept the Skipjack active and working almost constantly.

In August 1960, the Scorpion set out to European waters before eventually, in 1961, being transferred to a base in Norfolk, Virginia. The Scorpion kept a standard routine of patrolling the Atlantic coastline and practicing nuclear warfare drills. After a mechanical overhaul lasting from June 1963 to May 1964, the USS Scorpion began patrol of European waters. In 1966, the submarine was sent on an assignment to the Black Sea.

This constant state of patrol meant another overhaul was necessary after the voyage to the Black Sea. However, given the state of the Cold War and the need for submarines to be ready to combat the Soviets at a moment’s notice, the USS Scorpion’s readiness was put above proper maintenance even after years of constant patrol.

Cars

The Feature That You Likely Didn’t Know Your iPhone Camera Had

Published

1 hour ago

September 23, 2023

Francisco Peguero

Martin-dm/Getty Images

If you’ve ever wanted to take photos while recording video without having to resort to screen captures of video stills, Apple has something for that in almost all of the new phones it’s released since September 2019. QuickTake is a built-in and easy-to-use feature that lets you record video and snap pictures using the same device, with no need to switch between camera modes or download any additional camera apps.

There’s a small catch, however. While the process is very simple when you know how to turn it on, it may affect the overall quality of your photos. In essence, if your photo settings are adjusted for higher-quality images, those settings won’t carry over to video. And since QuickTake uses video camera sensors rather than the regular ones, there’s not much you can do to change that. Newer iPhone models do support up to 4K video, which could yield better results.

Regardless, whatever your reasons for wanting to take photos while simultaneously recording video with your iPhone may be, it’s a very simple process.

How to use QuickTake

Making use of your iPhone’s QuickTake feature doesn’t require any special setup or settings changes — it’s already part of the default Camera app so long as you’re using iOS 13 or newer.

Open the Camera app and leave it on the default Photo mode. You should see “Photo” highlighted in yellow, just above the Shutter Button.
When you’re ready to record, press and hold the Shutter Button to begin recording video. Recording will stop if you release the Shutter Button.
Slide your finger from the Shutter Button over to the Lock icon in the bottom-right corner of the screen (where the button for swapping between front- and rear-facing cameras normally is).
The Lock icon will change to a small Shutter Button, and the video recording button will change to the regular recording icon. At this point, your iPhone will continue to record video if you remove your finger from the screen.
While your video is recording, tap the small Shutter Button in the bottom-right corner of the screen to take photos.
Tap the recording button (it will look like a Stop button while recording) to stop taking video.

The QuickTake video you’ve recorded and all of the photos you snapped will appear in your Photos app. Due to videos being added to the Photos app once recording stops (rather than when it starts), the new video will appear after your QuickTake photos.

Cars

The Science Behind The Deadly Lake

Published

2 hours ago

September 23, 2023

Francisco Peguero

A buildup of carbon dioxide gas is not uncommon for crater lakes, with many of them occasionally releasing bubbles of it over time. Volcanic activity taking place below the Earth’s surface (and below the lake itself) will cause gasses to seep up through the lakebed and into the water. Something that generally isn’t a concern as deeper, colder water is able to absorb substantial amounts of carbon dioxide, but if the concentration gets too dense it can create bubbles that float up to and burst on the surface of the water.

This in itself is common, and the volume of carbon dioxide usually released in this manner will dissipate into the air quickly. However, it’s theorized that Lake Nyos had been amassing an uncharacteristically large amount of gas due to a combination of factors like location, local climate, overall depth, and water pressure. Once that buildup had been disturbed, it all came rocketing out.

Whether it was due to a rock slide, strong winds, or an unexpected temperature change throwing off the delicate balance is still unknown. But whatever the catalyst was, it caused the lower layer of deep, carbon-infused water to start to rise. Which then began to warm up, reducing its ability to contain the gas. The resulting perpetual cycle of rising waters and gasses creates the type of explosion you might see after opening a carbonated beverage after it’s been shaken vigorously.