“ Programmable Broadband Kernel ”

We completed the implementation of a broadband kernel, a flexible open programma-ble networking platform, for creating, deploying and managing sophisticated next generation multimedia services called xbind. xbind currently supports the creation, deployment and management of networked multimedia services (e.g. The building blocks of the broadband kernel consist of a set of objects typically modeling the underlying resources (" hardware ") and a set of objects modeling controllers (" software resources " belonging to the network control space). We propose to investigate the feasibility of deploying a set of controllers on an arbitrarily defined set of resources in such a way as to realize a fully operational service architecture controlling those resources. As a proof of concept we propose to demonstrate the deployment of virtual networks on demand that exhibit distinctive architectural characteristics and investigate trade-offs of location and degree of cooperation and competition among the various controllers that define the architecture. We plan to extend the capabilities of the xbind broadband kernel to: (i) realize on demand arbitrary virtual networks based on the switchlet model, (ii) design and characterize the properties of resource allocation mechanisms for network services that efficiently guarantee QOS, (iii) investigate trade-offs of location and degree of cooperation and competition among the controllers that define the architecture within a game theoretic framework, (iv) design, implement and demonstrate the deployment of virtual networks on demand that exhibit at least two distinct architectures, (v) investigate requirements for choosing among the different architectural realizations of the virtual network. (vi) visualize the service architecture of the switchlet based virtual networks. Deployment of an architecture as a " service " will make the xbind broadband kernel programmable to an unprecedented level-a feature that has not been achieved, to the best of our knowledge, anywhere. All deliverables will be demonstrated on our operational broadband network in the COMET laboratory at Columbia University.The work will be dissiminated, among others, via the OPENSIG working group on open signalling and service creation that we helped establish.