PHAROS: enabling a Software-defined (SDN) and cross-layer optimized reconfigurable converged core optical network

Τίτλος: PHAROS: enabling a Software-defined (SDN) and cross-layer optimized reconfigurable converged core optical network

Ομιλητής: Prof. Cesar Santivanez, Electrical Engineering Department Pontificia Universidad Catolica del Peru

Αίθουσα: Α56

Ώρα: 14.00

Περίληψη:

Software defined networking (SDN) is an emerging architecture for software-based, flexible, and agile network control using an abstracted model of the network.  By utilizing a powerful abstracted network model with enough information to capture network devices’ properties and interdependencies, virtual separation of network resources can be achieved, as well as vertical control (joint optimization) across all the network levels (from service to resource management). The result will be not only a more efficient use of resources, but in the enabling of network operators to easily and quickly specify and install new network services without replacing existing devices or re-wiring existing inter-device connections. Most of the community efforts with SDN/OpenFlow to date have focused on data centers, access networks, and the like. With the notable exception of Google – who has implemented an SDN WAN to interconnect its data centers – no significant effort has been made to bring the SDN promise to core networks. This is understandable since at this early stage SDN/OpenFlow lacks many of the important features required to support a carrier-grade backbone: scalability, reliability, security, etc. In this talk we present PHAROS (Petabit Highly-Agile Robust Optical System), a system providing cross-layer optimization of a SDN core network.

PHAROS, originally funded under the DARPA CORONET program provides architecture, protocols and algorithms for traffic engineering, resource management and signaling solutions for highly-agile, large-capacity core optical networks.  PHAROS main goals were rapid configuration (less than 2 seconds), guaranteed data flow protection to up to 3 simultaneous failures, high stability (including graceful degradation under excessive load), and high degree of security/fault-tolerance in a multi-technology, multi-vendor, and multi-domain environment. Key to achieving these goals was PHAROS creation of abstract representations for all levels of the network. The representations extend down to an abstract network model of the essential contention structure of a node, and extend upward to address successive (virtual) levels of functionality across the entire network. Thanks to these multilevel topology abstractions PHAROS was able to achieve global multi-dimensional optimization over the fundamental dimensions of network management: network extent, technology levels, route protection, and timescales. Abstraction allows a given request to be optimized across the network, simultaneously trading off costs of resources within individual network levels as well as the costs of transit between levels (such as the optical-electrical boundary). Resources of all levels can be considered, including wavelengths, timeslots, grooming ports, and IP capacity. With this uniform approach, common to all levels of resource representation and allocation, PHAROS accurately exploits the capabilities of all network elements, while remaining independent of the switching technology or vendor particularities. Another key enabler was PHAROS unitary approach that combines the best features of centralized and distributed approaches. Long term planning and coordination of resource usage (i.e., “Decision”) were undertaken by a central entity, while the actual switching elements’ configuration and quick reaction to failures (“action”) were undertaken by a distributed network of control elements, following the central entity guidelines (“playbooks”). PHAROS “centralized decision” guaranteed stability and predictable dynamics, while PHAROS “distributed action” achieved quick response to failures.

Σχετικά με τον ομιλητή:

Dr. Cesar Santivanez is a professor at the Electrical Engineering Department of the Pontificia Universidad Catolica del Peru, where he is the head of the Advanced Networks Research Lab. Until very recently, he was a Network Scientist in the Network Research group at Raytheon BBN Technologies, where over the past decade he made significant contributions to the field of mobile ad hoc networking (MANET). Among Cesar's many contributions to the field are the development of the theory of MANET routing scalability, the first scalable routing protocol (HSLS), and the characterization of the transport capacity for dynamic spectrum access (DSA) cognitive networks. Cesar has been a key person in several DARPA contracts including DARPA neXt Generation (XG), DARPA CORONET. As part of the latter program, Cesar has applied his expertise on routing on highly dynamic environments to the design of architecture and algorithms for highly efficient resource assignment for reconfigurable optical networks. Cesar has over twenty scholarly publications, was a Fulbright scholar, and received the best student paper award for his paper in the fifth international workshop in Multimedia Communications ( MoMuc' 98). He holds an MS and PhD in EE from Northeastern University.