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NEWS

08.07.2020
The latest issue of the NIX.CZ Newsletter has been published

The summer issue of the NIX.CZ newsletter brings information on the new price list, valid from July 1st. Furthermore, readers will find news on the first open source project of NIX.CZ, the BIRD Spy tool. Those interested in what is happening in the network community should also look out for the information on the start of registration for the Czech and Slovak network administrators’s meeting, CSNOG 2020. The event will take place on September 8th and 9th in Brno. You are all cordially invited! And we haven't forgotten about our mascot, the tapir. Little Morse was born in March in Prague Zoo and we wish him all the best.
07.07.2020
Bird Spy provides detailed information on individual route servers status

The very first open source project of the NIX.CZ Association is a tool called Bird Spy. It is based on a product called Bird's Eye (also open source) created within the Euro-IX Association, mostly on the premises of the Irish peering node, INEX.

The main goal of Bird Spy is to monitor the status of individual route servers and evaluate operational data, chiefly for monitoring purposes. The secondary goal is then to allow members and customers a remote view of their interconnections within the NIX.CZ platform. The BIRD Spy tool provides a detailed view of the status of individual connections, the transmission of routing information and compliance with network security. A novelty of these route servers is also the direct support of the Resource Public Key Infrastructure (RPKI), which serves to mitigate the consequences of incorrectly reported routing information.

What are route servers?

At the beginning of this year, the NIX.CZ Association introduced completely redesigned route servers. This, now the basic service of each interconnection node, ensures secure, controlled and transparent interconnections of subscriber networks. In addition to direct connections, route servers also enable fast connections of new networks, without the need to configure each network separately, which greatly simplifies the management and setup of routing protocols. Thanks to the already built-in security filters, such a connection is also protected against configuration errors or misuse.

Route servers are used to exchange routing information between interconnection partners using the BGP protocol. Data traffic that does not flow through these servers is the control part of network routing (control-plane). Route servers, which are duplicated in each segment (to ensure their high availability), pass instructions on where to route traffic based on data from individual networks.
01.07.2020
NIX.CZ introduces new price list, connection prices fell by one-fifth

A new price list of NIX.CZ was presented by Ondřej Filip,the Chairman of the Board of Directors at the June members’ meeting. The changes, which apply from the beginning of July, concern the monthly fees for the use of 10GE, 40GE and 100GE connections. In the first case, the new price of the monthly connection is 10 000 CZK (before 12,500 CZK). Those interested in a 40GE connection will currently pay 30 000 CZK per month (before 37,500 CZK) and in the case of 100GE connections, the price has dropped to 38 000 CZK (from 48,500 crowns).

"In the case of 10GE and 40GE capacities, prices are reduced by 20 percent, for 100GE connections we decided to reduce the price by 22 percent. Such a significant reduction in prices has been enabled by the growth of number of connections in the past year. This growth was strongly supported by the promotion to help the networks in the state of emergency. I would like to thank our members and customers for being active, which pleasantly surprised and pleased us," said the Chairman of the Board of Directors Ondřej Filip.

"During the crisis, we registered an increased interest in capacity upgrades of connected networks. A large part of the population worked from home during the state of emergency, which generated a great strain on the networks of our members and customers. That is why we have come up with an offer of assistance, in the form of a opromotion, that was a free upgrade of capacity for two months. During this event, there was an increase in capacity by 1.3 Tb," adds Adam Golecký, director of the NIX.CZ association.

A new price list is also being announced in euros, particularly for foreign companies in order to make financial planning easier for them, not having to consider changes in the exchange rates. Fees for 10GE connections will be for 400 EURO per month, for 40GE it will be 1,150 EURO per month and 100GE connection will cost 1,500 EURO per month.

The price list of the Slovak interconnection node NIX.SK for connections exclusively to the Bratislava node remain the same. The above-mentioned rates will apply to connections to both the Czech Republic and Slovakia at the same time.
14.05.2020
Call for Abstracts for CSNOG 2020 are open till mid June

The organizers of the third community meeting of the network specialists CSNOG 2020 (including the NIX.CZ association) announced a Call for Abstracts. The programme board of the community meeting of (not only) Czech and Slovakian network operators will welcome contributions aimed at network maintenance, infrastructure or security. Anyone interested in presenting their topic can submit their abstracts till June 15 at the event website.
08.04.2020
CSNOG 2020, the community meeting of Czech and Slovak network of administrators, should take place in Brno in September

Providing the situation permits, the third community meeting of Czech and Slovak network administrators (CSNOG 2020) will take place on September 8th - 9th in Brno. The aim of this traditional two-day event is not only to present news and current trends in the field of Internet networks and their administration, but also to discuss and share the know-how that will lead to the development of the industry in both countries. The main organizers of the event are CZ.NIC, NIX.CZ and CESNET.

The CSNOG (Czech and Slovak Network Operators Group) community meeting fas been listed among other similar events held in different countries and regions of the world since 2018. These include non-commercial expert meetings where ISPs, CDNs, hosting companies, network administrators, domain name registrars and people interested in Internet networks and technologies meet and discuss these topics openly.


“We strongly believe that our event, CSNOG 2020, which has been planned for a long time now will take place in September. Therefore, we have decided to start preparations despite the ongoing emergency. After announcing the date and venue, we would like to publish the event website by the end of the month and open the Call for Papers. We hope to see a number of interesting contributions from Czech and Slovak network specialists as well as from colleagues from abroad, ”explains Sergey Myasoedov, who is in charge of the CSNOG 2020 programme selection.

The programmes of the past two years consisted of topics related to the domain name system, interconnection in internet exchanges, new tools in network security or telecommunications. Individual presentations and video recordings of these are available on the CSNOG 2018 and CSNOG 2019 event websites.

Up-to-date information will be gradually published by the organizers on the community website and on the social media such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.