Date: Sun, 15 Dec 91 10:54:24 PST
From: "Daniel Pimienta" <ulat-dp@frmop11>
To:[email protected],[email protected],[email protected],
[email protected], [email protected],[email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]
Subject: COMPLEMENT TO "NETS: Peru Academic/NGO Net Online!"

I would like to add some precisions to the John Bonine's
communication on the new Peru network.

The author of the note he is referring to, Jose Soriano, have
omitted to specify his titles and responsibilities and the
framework of his action. The reason is he was writing
specifically to the REDALC listserv where he is implicitly known
and identified and where he already have explained these points.

Jose Soriano, is Sub-Director of the REDALC project of Union
Latina and his mission for the realization of the RCP was
financed by UNION LATINA, an International Organization,
Responsible of the coordination of the REDALC project (a project
aiming at a Latin American and the Caribbean Network Regional and
comprehensive solution, currently in a feasibility study funded
by EEC and with the collaboration of UNESCO).

Union Latina have decided to develop, on the side of the Redalc study (outside EEC budget), some pilot network developments with the following criterias:
-use the "REDALC
 methodology",
  
  
  
  
-plays catalyst
counterparts.
 for international
 agency
 supports
 and
 local

The REDALC methodology consists (in a very short summary) in this set of rules for the creation of national networks in developing
countries:
  
  
  
A- Solve the
1) politic
 problems
 following
 these PRIORITIES:

2) organization

  1. finance
  2. technic.

B- Put the emphasis in the END-USER in each step of the network growth (start, administration, education, support, interfaces,
evolutions...).
-Create one unique ASSOCIATIVE entity with ALL institutions
involved in research (Public, Autonomous or private Universities,
NGO's, Science and Technology Councils and other State
entities...).
-Minimize node creations, use UUCP as a start-up with a migration
path to TCP-IP, use the PC with high level interfaces as the
terminal to the networks (Union Latina is developing a high
level, multi-lingual, PC state of the art, network transparent,
software prototype named MULBRI).
-Promote the national X25 access and good relationship with
national telecom providers (reach tariffs agreements in
counterpart of the decisive push for the VAN market creation).
-Take sub-regional and regional steps for international
connections (prior to the establishment of a true regional
backbone) and always keep present the REGIONAL INTEGRATION as a
key decision factor.
-Try to make the network beneficed the whole COUNTRY DEVELOPMENT
(in particular, integrate the industrial research sector in the
model).

In the case of Peru, Jose Soriano, together with the Peruvian
group have, ON UNION LATINA DIRECTIVES AND FUNDS:
-created the peruvian dynamic,
-paved the ground for the RCP Association birth (Union Latina, in excess of a 20,000 US$ grant for mission costs, contributes for a 5000$ first stone to the building of the Association), -started the negotiation with Peruvian Authorities both for X25 access special tariffs and for satellite access,
-catalyzed the offers of help from various international and
national entities.

IN FEW WORDS, UNION LATINA, FOR ITS PART, AND WITHIN THE FRAME OF
THE REDALC PROJECT CREATES THE CONDITIONS IN ORDER THAT THE
TECHNICAL SOLUTION BE INSTALLED AND SOON BE USED BY A LARGE AND
GROWING NUMBER OF ORGANIZED AND SUPPORTED USERS.

Of course, this does not reduce the key role played by UNDP (Enzo
Puliatti) and the Ted/Randy team: on the contrary we think it
magnifies it! On that very point, this operation shows the
effectiveness of a framework where International Agencies can
cooperate on a coordinated and complementary fashion for helping
developing countries to gain access to research networks.

Of course, also, the work is not finished: it's just starting!

Using the same rule of the game, Union Latina is creating the
condition for the emergence of the Dominican and Haitian
networks. In that case we expect to welcome CRESALC of UNESCO
together with UNDP as International Contributors.


Daniel Pimienta,
REDALC Project Director
UNION LATINA
SANTO DOMINGO
The note sent by John Bonine:


?The following posting was received from the new Peru Scientific Network, sent to a discussion list of Latin American and Caribbean academic and research sites, carried on the worldwide Bitnet network.

?This is the first official worldwide announcement and thanks from the RCP (Red Cientifica Peruana) (following by two weeks the first ping transmitted through Randy Bush's house in Portland, Oregon).

?RCP was put together with the enthusiasm and hard work of Peruvian computer scientists and engineers, advised and assisted by counterparts in Argentina, Brasil, and elsewhere in Latin America. The crucial final funding link for a main network server, other equipment, and travel expenses for a low-cost networking expert from Costa Rica and one from Oregon, US, was provided by Enzo Puliatti of the U.N. Development Program, which also has been a crucial force in the launching of Huracan ( Central America), Ecuanex (Ecuador), Unbol (Bolivia), and other academic/NGO networks in the region.

?Near the end of the following message, Jose Soriano of RCP says that he cannot find words adequate to express his gratitude to Ted Hope (Huracan, Costa Rica) and Randy Bush (m2xenix and psg.com, Oregon), whose human qualities and hacker spirit were necessary to make RCP function, between coffee, ceviche, and calidez. He says that the debt of Peruvians to them is strong: Ted and Randy, wherever they may be -- almost certainly constructing other networks -- are PERUANOS!

?(My impressionistic translation of the message is, I am afraid, limited by my few weeks of Spanish language study in Ecuador in July 1989.)

?I might add that Randy and Ted spent a single week in
Peru, at the beginning of December -- nada mas. But Randy,
 who
wrote the protocols for international FidoNet networking
 and
provides the Fido/uucp gateway, and Ted, who created
 the
Spanish-interface software used by other networks in Latin
America, don't need a lot of time to make miracles.
  

?I had lunch with Randy yesterday and learned two of the secrets of this effort. First, he said that the cooperative spirit of the Peruvian experts, all working together with enthusiasm, was crucial. The network consists of computers at each of five locations that periodically poll each other to eaxchange messages and one that provides the international gateway (which, in the early stages, has been provided by his programming one of his computers to dial Peru periodically from the U.S.). Academics and scientists at each of the locations thus have access to each other and to the world. In addition, a few dozen NGOs (nongovermental citizen groups) will have access without the high costs of individual x.25 packet network calls out of Peru. The second secret is mentioned in Jose Soriano's message, and a little more detail fills it in. After the first message went out to the world, the day after Randy and Ted arrived, messages came back from Novosibirsk, Russia, and from Zimbabwe (via another link that Randy and Jacot established to southern Africa in recent years). The latter was a message advising the Peruvian experts to provide adequate coffee to Randy Bush. That seems to have done the trick.

?Those of us in the NGO community worldwide salute the technical experts in low-cost networking and the UNDP that helped make this a reality, but most of all the Peruvian heart and spirit to break down the barriers to free information flow in the world.

?John E. Bonine
?Environmental Law Alliance Worldwide (E-LAW), U.S. [email protected] (Econet)

?Univ. of Oregon School of Law, Eugene, OR 97403 [email protected]