Networks
WNL are responsible for the management of two Wide Area Networks in Wales. The first of these networks (SWMAN2) provides high-speed internet access to academic institutions and other public sector organisations in South Wales. The second network is the ground-breaking Lifelong Learning Network for Wales which connects all 22 unitary authorities to a high speed ring network.

South Wales MAN (SWMAN2)
In May 2002 Welsh Networking Limited accepted delivery from NEOS networks of a high-speed backbone with access links to interconnect Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) and Further Education Colleges (FECs) in the South Wales region.

NEOS Networks partnered with Surf Telecoms and MLL Telecoms to deliver the initial SWMAN2 infrastructure.

The backbone of the SWMAN2 network is centred on Cardiff with Gigabit Ethernet links  from this main "star" out to Swansea, Glamorgan and Newport establishing four core Point of Presence (PoP) locations of the SWMAN 2 network. An additional SWMAN PoP site was created at Aberystwyth, connected back to Swansea using 155Mbps radio links.

Backbone Gigabit links were provided over an underlying DWDM infrastructure with the majority of links to sites employing Fast Ethernet LAN Extension Services centred on the PoP sites. Due to the geographic distribution of four institutions in the west of the region, these sites fell beyond the reach of LAN Extension services and were connected to the Swansea PoP over 34Mbps Microwave circuits provided by MLL Telecom.

Since November 2005, as part of the Public Sector Broadband Aggregation strategy, WNL reached an agreement with the Welsh Assembly Government for shared use of the Lifelong Learning Network backbone. This has allowed WNL to transit SWMAN traffic over the LLNW thereby closing down the SURF gigabit backbone gigabit links.

Starting in March 2006 interconnects were setup between the SWMAN Core-PoP and the co-located LLNW Core-PoP routers. SWMAN sites were migrated over onto the LLNW backbone over the following six months, with the final SWMAN PoP site at Cardiff cut over on August 1st.

Lifelong Learning Network for Wales (LLNW)
WNL is the managing agent for the LLNW, and works with an established network operator (Logicalis) to deliver an efficient and reliable service to all 22 Unitary Authorities across Wales. Additionally WNL provide a front-line Helpdesk based at Swansea University for handling technical calls, and providing additional core network services and monitoring.

The driver to deliver the LLNW came from Welsh Assembly Government strategy "Cymru Ar-lein: Online for a Better Wales" which had an overarching vision that that all parts of Wales should enjoy the benefits and opportunities that broadband services and applications can offer.

A key strand of the approach to Broadband Wales was the development and enhancement of networking facilities to support lifelong learning. This also underpins the National Assembly for Wales Learning Country strategy.

In mid 2002 the LLNW was rolled out with the goal of delivering high-speed network links to enable fast Internet access to schools, libraries and ICT Learning Centres. The network became operational in August 2002, and Unitary Authority corporate networks also began the migration onto the network over the following nine-months.

The network shown schematically below is a 622Mbps SDH-ring inter-connecting 8 Core-PoP sites (based at Higher Education institutions) delivering a minimum of 100Mbps connectivity to all 22 Local Authority Access PoPs. The core routing technology is provided by Cisco GSR carrier-grade hardware; with Cisco 7206 devices used as CPE access routers within Unitary Authorities.

Access to the global internet is delivered via the SuperJANET5 backbone, and resilient connectivity to SJ5 provided through two Regional Network Entry Points (RNEPs) in Cardiff, each delivering 2.5Gbps of uncontended bandwidth.
 

Selected Network Diagrams of the SWMAN and LLNW
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SWMAN Network Topology (pdf)	SWMAN Microwave Links Topology (pdf)

LLN, SWMAN and NWMAN (pdf)	LLNW and Unitary Authorities (pdf)	Connections onto LLNW (pdf)
These network diagrams may also be downloaded as Adobe PDF format files. Click on the Get Acrobat Reader logo on the right to download Adobe's free PDF reading software if required.