The WIDE project is the research consortium with more than 100 companies, research institutes and universities. Members are mainly from Japan but some worldwide members are actively involved. The WIDE project is conducting various researches related to the Internet technology and Internet society among over 500 researchers in Japan, collaborating with foreign researchers from all over the world. The WIDE project operates the Internet Testbed “WIDE Internet”, with highly advanced technology shared by researchers in the world where variety of experimentation and demonstration are conducted.
The basic philosophy of the WIDE Project lies in the provision of a global connection between computers and all other equipment and the construction of a distributed system that will serve a useful purpose from an individual and social viewpoint and to bring to the fore the relative issues and problems in order to bring this to fruition. We have held this philosophy since the project was launched in 1988 to the present day amidst remarkable developments in network technologies. The Project aims to construct a highly public information infrastructure that will contribute to society in a variety of fields including medicine, finance, education and law.
The research that the WIDE Project is undertaking on the physical layers of Internet infrastructure can be likened to the water that cultivates vegetation in the soil. Although not visible on the surface, the results of our research are permeating through to and have great potential in all aspects of network environments. Just a few examples include the operation of the M Root DNS Server, forming the Internet backbone of the Asia-Pacific region, and the world’s first undertaking of IPv6 (Internet Protocol version 6). We are reaching into territories that go beyond that of the organizational boundaries of corporations and universities into the networking of a variety of fields that only an interdisciplinary research network can achieve.