ATM Interfaces

Some vendors sell PCI ATM interface cards for ATM25 DSL interfaces, 155-Mbps STM-1/OC3, as well as "exotic" 622-Mbps STM-4/OC12 NICs, featuring both optical and electrical RJ-45 interfaces.

OpenBSD, Linux, and FreeBSD provide an ATM stack, but only a limited family of adapters is supported. This family unfortunately includes almost no state-of-the-art models. The best support available for ATM adapters is provided for Marconi ForeRunner and Efficient Networks chipsets. Consult the hardware compatibility list of the respective operating systems for further details.

As far as I have researched the matter, it would be interesting to deploy ATM25 adapter cards for UNIX gateway devices. Unfortunately, few vendors supply PCI models; almost all development effort appears to go into embedded systems for deployment in integrated access devices (IADs). ATM25 supports approximately 10.5-Mbps high-speed, 8-Mbps full-rate, and 4-Mbps or G.Lite downstream speeds and can accommodate ADSL, SDSL, VDSL, and G.SHDSL.

Because I do not own ATM-PCI adapters, no lab is provided in this section. The following sections discuss the Linux and FreeBSD ATM stack and configuration tools in detail. If you own two ATM interfaces cards, you can use an optical crossover cable pair for a nice lab or connect them to an ATM switch for ILMI testing. For RJ-45 crossovers, consult the pin assignments of the vendor's adapter manual.

Linux ATM Support

Unfortunately, there appears to be no further development going on with regard to the Linux ATM Project (http://linux-atm.sourceforge.net), which, of course, does not mean that it is not stable or useful. The drivers are included in up-to-date kernels. In addition, you still need to download the ATM support tools from http://linux-atm.sourceforge.net. Linux ATM implements several ATM-related daemons: atmsigd, ilmid, and atmarpd, as well as several ancillary tools.

Example 4-1 presents configuration of ATM PVC/SVC pairs under Linux. Remember, ATM PVCs are point-to-point abstractions.

To configure the atm0 interface as 10.1.1.1/30 and build a PVC on PHY 0, VPI 0, VCI 51 (emphasized by the shaded text) to the far-end 10.1.1.2/30, type the commands in the order presented in Example 4-1.

Example 4-1. Simple Linux ATM Interface and PVC Configuration

[root@callisto~#] atmarp -c atm0

[root@callisto~#] ifconfig atm0 10.1.1.1 netmask 255.255.255.252 mtu 4470

[root@callisto~#] atmarp -s 10.1.1.2 0.0.51

For an in-depth discussion, consult the Linux ATM-on-Linux HOWTO.

The FreeBSD HARP ATM Subsystem

FreeBSD provides mature ATM support via the Host ATM Research Platform (HARP) software. For configuration details, consult the atm(8) man page and the links in the "Recommended Reading" section.