Endless Arguments in Systems Design

1. Endless Arguments in Systems Design Jon Crowcroft, University of Cambridge Currently IMDEA Networks. Jon.Crowcroft@cl.cam.ac.uk http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~jac22

2. GENI – Global Environment for Network Innovation • US NSF/Extra Money • Calls for Intl participation • Planetlab++ (Intel/300 site)

3. FIND – Future Internet Design • NSF long term research in NeTS programme • 40+ Projects • Quite mixed bag • [EU Trilogy project (which UC3M and UCL and others are in) did analysis of them]

4. The Internet Protocol Hourglass(Deering) email WWW phone... SMTP HTTP RTP... TCP UDP… IP ethernet PPP… CSMA async sonet... copper fiber radio...

5. Putting on Weight email WWW phone... SMTP HTTP RTP... TCP UDP… IP + mcast + QoS +... ethernet PPP… CSMA async sonet... copper fiber radio... • requires more functionality from underlying networks

6. Mid-Life Crisis email WWW phone... SMTP HTTP RTP... TCP UDP… IP4 IP6 ethernet PPP… CSMA async sonet... copper fiber radio... • doubles number of service interfaces • requires changes above & below • major interoper-ability issues

7. Or is GENI losing its bottle? • Network Innovation is a Hot Topic • Internet problems abound • 2/3G problems abound • Convergence driving incremental • Critical Infrastrure driving radical • Many US GENI/FIND +EU +Asia projects • There appear to be some ok ideas • But also some wrong headedness • This is a case study on wrong headedness

8. Incremental from Convergence • SCTP (PSTN signaling transport on IP) • SIP&NAT traversal&VOIP in general • IPTV (Multicast & P2P) • BGP fast Convergence • Traffic Engineering (whether OSPF TE or RSVP or MPLS based) • Neutrality fights

9. Long Term • IP Service Best Effort • So DDoS not meaningul • Not helpful – need architectural change • Fundamentally, Mobile, Multicast, Multihome • Possibly Multiprotocol (esp. Control Plane) • DoS Resistence, built in • Possibly different economic/charging models • Need shift in model • Maybe not a stack anymore • Certainly not IP ++ ++ ++ • i.e. not just IPv6 with current IPv4 knobs and warts

10. Two wrongs that don’t make a right(#) • Virtualisation of Networks • Next Generation Wireless • Data Driven Networks (#) Two parts of FIND/GENI work in US that I feel they are doing wrong and we are doing right + one thing I think the US and EU are both doing right.

11. Veni, Vidi, Vici, but not Vini? • Virtualisation is not about VPNs(*) • Hierarchical Hard Multiplexing won’t scale • VPNs are an ok idea in the Enterprise • Its too slow to reconfigure on outages • Its bad for resource allocation in wireless • C.f. hard spectrum allocation • C.f. hard channel allocation * Not just VPI/VCI (for those who recall B-ISDN!)

12. Virtualisation of Control not Data • In Xen/Xorp work: • key is about dynamics and isolation of functionality, not fwding performance • Need to deploy disjoint service ctl • True, vpn style IP fwding is useful too • But no unified way of doing this on wireless • Or on multipath • Or for netcoded data • Or swarms…

13. Next Gen Wireless • Cooperative Diversity in all things • Antennae, coding, routing, power, spectrum, “channels” • Behavioural constraints enforced • (aside: F# smart phone:-) • Infrastructure still there for services, e.g. • To provide radio map (with memory) • Security/Identity/Location Assistence • Maybe even payment • Control plane for virtual wireless communities

14. Data Driven, Declarative, • We’ve seen 1-1, 1-n, n-1 comms patterns • Now we’re seeing 0-n and n-0 • US loves to re-invent(+) - but in fact • Pub/sub;event/notify isn’t all there is: • Think swarm • Think anysource multicast • Exaflood is no big deal when decentralised…properly • Think exploding google (aside: haggle:) (+) architecture is not just creative children’s stories.

15. Virtual, Wireless, Declarative Data? • We’d all like to get rid of wires • (on the other hand, we’d probably all like to get rid of batteries too:) • So high capacity applications should be user contributed content too • What is the control plane for these to co-exist with each other? • C.f. nano-datacenters and haggle, unified

16. 0wning half a PC (or hub or STB) • Significant fraction of internet access via Home Hubs • Significant fraction of wireless acces via smart phones • Home hub as PVR, smart phone as PC • Lots of storage + faces 3 ways • Faces “wide area”; faces home • Faces neighbours… … … • Changes economic relationships completely

17. Provider coexist w/ virtual providers • If provider wants to scale net, • Run P2P for CDN on home hub • And do end run on data centers • Let home user also run P2P CDN • Let wireless user also run community and ad hoc mesh • Virtualise STB + Handsets • With suitable declarative(pub) Ctl Plane • Paradigm shift now enabled • Revenue model from services not bitpipes

18. Way forward? • Devil is in detail • Remove separation of end + intermediate system • All systems may have storage • Must restore flow, congestion and reliability control functions to “network” • But do not need them “point-to-point” • So they are going to look very different • Everyone is a DTN custodian • & there is no “network”

19. Summary/Conclusions • GENI is ok for next generation core IP • Need more fundamental changes if we address high speed wireless everywhere • Especially since application paradigm already shifting • Europe well placed to contribute: • both wireless and application architecture, • which in turn contribute to immediate and long term network architecture better than incremental core work…. • not that that is a bad thing either!