NETWORKS: XML routers, gateways transfer from Intel to AMD
Colorado Springs, Colo. -- Reactivity Inc., one of the few Extensible Markup Language appliances vendors retaining independence, is hitting the market with a triple whammy. The company is moving XML routers and security gateways from Intel Corp. to Advanced Micro Devices Inc. Opteron processors. It is launching its first, albeit limited, OEM effort to unbundle embedded code for specific security applications. And it is offering auto-discovery of all XML-based, Web Services Description Languages services within a network.
Reactivity vice president of marketing Joelle Gropper Kaufman said that the proliferation of XML services throughout a network warranted the use of a discovery tool that could identify any place a WSDL or application language is used in a network. Reactivity was planning to scale its family of security gateways, routers and accelerators for XML both up and down, and decided that the Opteron family from AMD, in both single-core and dual-core versions, was faster and lower-power than Intel equivalents.
"We'll support the Intel systems in the field, but we'll be offering an Opteron-equivalent midrange platform later," Gropper Kaufman said. "Where the advantage really stands out is with a 2U platform using two dual-core AMD processors."
The simplest Reactivity system, an XML accelerator, performs four functions: routing/ logging, acceleration, mediation/ transformation and encryption/ signing of traffic. The secure router includes those core functions and adds Secure Sockets Layer termination, credential mapping, identity management and Web services security. Finally, the XML secure gateway carries the function of a router and adds more privacy and threat-defense management.
Many corporate sites could use all three systems, placing accelerators nearest the application servers within the data center; using an XML router within the data center to unify application servers and registries; and using a security gateway next to an Internet Protocol load balancer, at the edge of a "demilitarized zone."
By adding auto-discovery to all platforms, the systems can identify XML nodes and set policies through a central console as well as add new WSDLs from external sources. Features such as schema validation, authentication and encryption could be added from a central management site, in custom frameworks defined by the manager.
Reactivity's first OEM program, structured as an embedded software firewall, is intended for integration with hardware companies that compete only minimally with Reactivity. Gropper Kaufman said that "our definition of an OEM product implies embedded and tightly integrated software. We don't think you can call two servers co-existing back-to-back an OEM relationship."
Reactivity will supply read-only code for denial-of-service attack mitigation, XML schemas, parser attacks and attack signatures, as part of its firewall kit. While Reactivity will offer a few additional software modules in its OEM program in the future, the company intends to keep the project tightly limited to avoid competing in its own channels.
The new Opteron platforms being introduced this month will include the 1U 1000, with one CPU and no ASICs for encryption, four Gbit Ethernet ports and 2-Gbyte memory.
The company's platforms offer a performance of 2,000 trans- actions per second and will be available at a price range of $15,000 to $40,000.
The high-end 4000 has dual dual-core processors, a separate crypto ASIC, four Gigabit Ethernet interfaces and 4 Gbytes of memory. Both systems offer 73 Gbytes of dual-RAID hot-swappable storage.
The 4000 offers more than 5,000 transactions/second. Versions with single crypto ASICs cost $60,000 to $80,000, while dual-ASIC systems start at $95,000.
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