| Full name | Toronto Internet Exchange Community |
|---|---|
| Abbreviation | TorIX |
| Founded | 1998 |
| Location | Toronto, Canada |
| Website | www.torix.net |
| Members | 142[1] |
| Ports | 154[1] |
| Peak in | 75Gbps Gb/s[2] |
| Peak out | 75Gbps Gb/s[2] |
The Toronto Internet Exchange Community (TorIX) is a not-for-profit Internet Exchange Point (IXP) located in a carrier hotel at 151 Front Street West in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. As of October 2011[update], TorIX had 142 members[1] and peak traffic rates of 75 Gbit/s,[2] making it the largest IXP in Canada. According to Wikipedia's List of Internet Exchange Points by Size, TorIX is the 11th largest IXP in the world in numbers of peers, and 20th in the world in terms of peak traffic. The Exchange is organized and run by highly qualified industry professionals in voluntary capacity. It is accessible directly in two separate locations within the building, at facilities operated by Equinix and Standard Connections. Access is also available via the buildings meet me room.
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TorIX initially started in July 1996 within the RACO facility in suite 604 at 151 Front Street West. In 2008 the exchange began offering 10GE ports.
The Exchange is Ethernet-based and currently operates 3 chassis-based switches, two Cisco 7600 series and a Cisco 7010 series (Operationalized April 2011). Peers connect to the Layer 2 fabric, and use IPv4 & IPv6 addresses provided by TorIX to connect with each other, utilizing the BGP routing protocol. Port speeds of 1000LX (GigabitEthernet) and 10GE are available, including in bonded configurations. Gigabit and greater speeds must use single-mode fiber, and can connect from anywhere in the building via the meet-me-room.
The Exchange also offers two BGP Route-Servers, which allow peers to exchange prefixes with each other while minimizing the number of direct BGP peering sessions configured on their routers. Participation is voluntary, with approximately 3/4's of the membership using the free service.
The Exchange operates a members-only portal which allows peers to publish their peering policies, contact other members with peering requests, configure Route-Server access and track traffic usage, amongst others. Created by Jon Nistor, the technical heart of TorIX, the Portal is considered unique amongst IXP's.
Membership is open to all companies capable of connecting to the Exchange at 151 Front Street West, and have their own Autonomous System Number (ASN). The typical peer is an ISP, communications company or a Content Delivery Network, though overall membership includes a broad range of enterprise companies, government, and educational institutions. Peers have autonomous control over their routing policies at the Exchange, and may peer with as few or as many as desired. The Exchange does encourage use of the Route-Servers.
Members are not required to have their own Provider-Independent Address Space, but it is recommended. For those that do not, and who wish to join the Exchange, companies are asked to provide a Letter of Authority from their ISP permitting them to advertise their IPv4 or IPv6 prefixes.
Organizations wishing to connect to TorIX must arrange colocation for their equipment with one of the many companies operating at 151 Front Street West.
Justification for joining the Toronto Internet Exchange is typical to most IXPs: financial and network performance.
Compared to commercial Internet transit pricing in Canada, the per-megabit cost of being a typical TorIX peer works out to cents-on-the-dollar, versus tens of dollars per megabit.
Most commercial Internet transit agreements require a minimum traffic commitment level, which the customer must pay regardless if their usage is below that point. If usage exceeds the contracted commitment level, the customer usually pays based on an agreed per-megabit charge. Billing is typically done based on the 95th percentile. As a not-for-profit, TorIX charges a small port-fee based on the speed of the port the member desires, rather than the amount of traffic traveling over TorIX. The more traffic, the better, but peers are not penalized for lower traffic levels.
The low-cost barrier to entry for prospective peers is attractive for the smaller companies, while larger companies can see significant operational expense savings by utilizing the Exchange at a fraction of the cost of commercial Internet transit.
By utilizing the Exchange, members can keep their Internet traffic "local", without the added latency of a third-party Internet transit provider. For example, Internet traffic between two points in the same province which utilize different last-mile ISP's may travel extensive physical distances, including to and from other countries, which would negatively impact latency-sensitive applications. Through direct peering relationships, members and their customers realize better network performance.
Peers are charged a small annual port-access fee, with the cost dependant on the type of port and the number of ports required. These fees are used to off-set the costs of running the Exchange, including vendor support contracts, spare optics and hardware upgrades.
TorIX operates several mailing lists; two are TorIX specific, one dealing with operational issues, the other a general member participation list. The Exchange also hosts a mailing list for wholesale ISPs which connect to Bell Canada (formerly Bell Nexxia)'s wholesale DSL services, and this is a key source for up-to-date information on day-to-day issues experienced by operators. This list was formerly hosted by a dissolved Ottawa, Canada ISP called iStop, and was moved to the TorIX servers after numerous requests by members after that ISP folded.
In November 2011, TorIX was a Gold sponsor of the Canadian ISP Summit in Toronto, Canada.
In April 2010, TorIX was a co-sponsor of ARIN's conference in Toronto, Canada.
In February 2007, TorIX was a co-sponsor of NANOG's conference in Toronto, Canada.