AVC: - Access Virtual Circuit
Description: - An individual NBN connection. The circuit part is a holdover from ADSL days when the copper lines created a circuit (Still true for VDSL). Because the circuit doesn't really exist, we call these virtual circuits.
CVC: - Connectivity Virtual Circuit
Description: - The connectivity for an RSP to a particular POI.
C-TAG: - An inner VLAN identifying a connection from/to a customer. These directly correlate to a single AVC.
S-TAG: - The outer VLAN to a POI which contains a collection of C-TAGs.
FNN: - Full National Number
Description: - A phone number bound to a telephone line. Not technically an NBN term but the NBN require the FNN to churn a service from ADSL to VDSL if migrating to the NBN. Sometimes a line will have no FNN and instead will have a ULL.
ULL: - Unconditional/Unbundled Local Loop
Description: - The older name for a CPI in pre-NBN technologies.
POI: - Point Of Interconnect
Description: - 121 POIs all over the country which allow access to the individual parts of the NBN network. An RSP/ISP must connect to these to service an area. For more info see here.
POP: - Point Of Presence
Description: - A set of gear located in a data center usually per state.
NTD: - Network Termination Device
Description: - The box that connects a property to the NBN usually inside the customer's property.
NCD: - Network Connection Device
Description: - Similar to an NTD but only used for FTTC and also provides power to the DPU in the pit.
DPU: - Distribution Point Unit
Description: - Only used for FTTC and provides 4 properties with FTTC connections. The DPU is actually a mini DSLAM and gets power from the NCD.
DSLAM: - Digital Subscriber Line Access Multiplexor
Description: - An aggregator for *DSL type technologies.
GPON: - Gigabit Passive Optical Network
Description: - The connectivity network to FTTC and FTTP which allows a single wavelength to be split 32 ways between customers.
ADSL: - Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line
Description: - Not technically an NBN technology but many FTTN and FTTC services replace ADSL directly. An older technology to deliver broadband services over a copper phone line.
VDSL: - Very High Bitrate Digital Subscriber Line
Description: - A technology for getting a digital broadband signal to a property at speeds in excess of ADSL's theoretical speed cap of 25Mbps.
ONU/ONT: - Optical Network Unit/Optical Network Terminal
Description: - The industry standard name for an NTD. This device connects a fibre connection to a property and converts it into copper twisted pair. (Ethernet)
OLT: - Optical Line Termination
Description: - The other end of a fibre connection, back at the NBN end of things.
CPE: - Customer Premises Equipment
Description: - Generic term for a customer's modem/router.
UNI-D/V: - User Network Interface Data/Voice
Description: - The name for the physical data or voice connection to the NBN. Fibre and Fixed Wireless connection have 4 UNI-D ports and fibre also has 2 UNI-V ports.
FTTP: - Fibre To the Premesis
Description: - A direct fibre connection to a property with no other intermediate technologies. Terminates into an NTD.
FTTC: - Fibre To The Curb
Description: - As the name implies, a fibre connection to the curb of the customer's property that then uses copper to get inside the bulding. Terminates into a DPU and then the copper terminates into an NCD inside the house.
FTTN: - Fibre To The Node
Description: - Similar to FTTC however the location that the fibre terminates is much further away from the customer's property and usually services many more properties.
FTTB: - Fibre To The Building
Description: - Identical to FTTN but the "node" is inside the basement of the building. Usually used for large multi user buildings such as hotels.
FW: - Fixed Wireless
Description: - A technology for provising internet access to areas where a direct line is impractical. A dish is fitted to the building and a point-to-multi point wireless tower provides the signal.
HFC: - Hybrid Fibre Coaxial
Description: - A technology very similar to FTTN but instead of using telephone line copper inside the customer's premesis. A coax cable connection is used instead.
CPI: - Copper Pair ID
Description: - A unique identifier for a single pair of copper telephone wires used for FTTN, FTTC or other VDSL technologies.
RSP/ISP: - Retail Service Provider
Description: - An RSP is an NBN term for a provider that operates on their network. The older term of ISP has typically been reserved for providers that have their own physical network infrastucture.
EE: - Enterprise Ethernet
Description: - A 1-to-1 fibre connection aimed at businesses. EE can do symmetric speeds such as 100/100 or 1000/1000.
LOCID: - Location Identification
Description: - The unique ID for a property.
TC(1,2,3,4): - Traffic Class (1,2,3,4)
Description: - The type of traffic permitted over an AVC. The lower numbers being higher priority over the higher ones if multiple traffic types are present.
CIS: - Critical Information Summary
Description: - A required document for customers to see the plans and pricing available.
SC: - Service Class
Description: - A classification for a given location that shows what state the deployment of NBN technologies is in. (e.g. SC3 for fibre connected and ready to go)
PRD: - Planned Remediation Date
Description: - The date for which NBN have set to fix a fault or to install equipment.
BGP: - Border Gateway Protocol
Description: - The backbone of the internet. This is the routing protocol that allows individual ISP and company networks to talk to each other and find each other.
BNG: - Border Network Gateway
Description: - The router in Launtel's network that handles a customer's connection directly.
OSPF: - Open Shortest Path First
Description: - Another routing protocol typically used on a smaller scale to BGP but can be found on large scale networks too.
(D,S)NAT: - (Destination,Source) Network Address Translation
Description: - A technology used for translating an IP address into a another address usually used for allowing multiple devices to access the internet when only one IP address is available (NAT Masquerade).
LAN: - Local Area Network
Description: - A private network "behind" a customer's router.
WAN: - Wide Area Network
Description: - The "internet". Any network that is connected to other networks.
VLAN: - Virtual Local Area Network
Description: - Like a LAN but no extra physical hardware is needed to logically seperate it from other LANs.
QinQ: - A VLAN inside a VLAN (802.1q)
Description: - The name comes from the VLAN standard of 802.1q. Essentially it allows for a nested VLAN so you can deliver a bunch of VLANs to an endpoint over 1 master VLAN.
RIP: - Routing Information Protocol
Description: - A really old routing protocol, barely used anymore.
(D)DOS: - (Distributed) Denial Of Service
Description: - A method for a malicious attacker to take a network offline by bombarding it with more requests than it can handle.
SSH: - Secure Shell
Description: - A technology for connect to a remote server's shell.
FTP: - File Transfer Protocol
Description: - An old method for transfering files from system to system. Insecure.
FTPS: - File Transfer Protocol Secure
Description: - An encryption layer on top of FTP.
SFTP: - Secure Shell File Transfer Protocol
Description: - A method for transfering files over SSH. Not to be confused with FTPS.
Packet: - A packet is a unit of layer 3 data. (See OSI)
Frame: - A frame is a layer 2 data transmission unit, usually but not always encapsulating a layer 3 packet inside.
MTU: - Maximum Transmission Unit
Description: - MTU is the maximum size of a layer 2 frame that a given piece of network equipment can accomodate. As more and more encapsulating protocols are added to a stack of data the MTU shrink to accomodate the data. If a device cannot accomodate the MTU being sent to it, the device may send a message back to the origin point asking it to "fragment" the packet.
Fragment: - The act of splitting a packet (Layer 3) into 2 or more parts at the requested MTU size. In IPv6 fragmentation is not possible and PMTUD (Path MTU Discovery) is used instead.
PMTUD: - Path Maximum Transmission Unit Discovery
Description: - Used in both v4 and v6 internet protocols but is optional for v4. Using this technology devices discover the lowest MTU for the entire link end to end and set their MTU accordingly.
ARP: - Address Resolution Protocol
Description: - Is a communication protocol used for discovering the link layer address, such as a MAC address, associated with an IP address.
IMAP: - Internet Message Access Protocol
Description: - A method for retrieving email data from a server and for telling the server to update messages and folder information.
POP3: - Post Office Protocol 3
Description: - One of the original methods of reading and handling email. Dated and not frequently used anymore, POP3 only allows users to download email and then work with it locally, it has no native folder control and/or ability to sync information back to the server.
SMTP: - Simple Mail Transfer Protocol
Description: - The standard method for sending emails both from a client to a server and server to server.
VPN: - Virtual Private Network
Description: - A virtual connectivity layer between two networks that otheriwse would not be able to exchange information.
DHCP: - Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol
Description: - A "bootstrap" protocol for a device to discover a DCHP server and then request information about it's immediate network from the server.
IPoE: - Internet Protocol Over Ethernet
Description: - Basically just "ethernet" (The layer 2 protocol not the colloquial term for Cat5/6/7 cabling) but in terms of a customer's connection to an RSP. Essentially IPoE indicates that not further encapsualtion of the data is being done beyond ethernet.
PPPoE: - Point to Point Protocol Over Ethernet
Description: - A method for a customer to establish a "session" tunnel to an RSP by encapsulating the data in a packet. This protocol is considered obsolete in modern ethernet network but is still in use by some RSPs.
DNS: - Domain Name System
Description: - The system for finding an IP address to connect to by providing a human readable domain name.
PTR: - Pointer Record
Description: - A DNS record but in reverse. Finds a domain name from an IP address. Used heavily by mail servers to ensure that mail is not being sent by a spam bot.
NOC: - Network Operations Center
Description: - The command center of any network of a decent size.
SFP: - Small Form-Factor Plugable
Description: - A module that can be attached to a device with an SFP cage to augment the devices capabilities such as to add the ability to connect a fibre cable.
MAC: - Media Access Control
Description: - The physical hardware address of a piece of equipment.
NIC: - Network Interface Card
Description: - A physical piece of hardware for connecting to a network.
FORM: - FailOver Manager
Description: - A more powerful failover solution with a dashboard and manual overrides.
QIP: - Queue Interface Portal
Description: - A tool for logging remote mobiles into and out of a PBX queue with a mobile friendly web interface.
WSP: - Wholesale Service Provider
Description: - A physical network provider that allows RSPs to provide services, NBNCo is a WSP.
CFR: - Customer Facing Router
Description: - A Launtel internal term for a BNG. Not really used anymore.
CHR: - Cloud Hosted Router
Description: - A term used for the Mikrotik virtual machines that Launtel used to run. Technically software but treated like hardware.