An Architecture for Concurrent Future Networks

One of the key interests in Future Internet research is network virtualization [1]. It allows to operate multiple networks in parallel, each possibly having different applications, requirements, protocols, and even users. For the 4WARD Project1 network virtualization is one of the core concepts to let 1000 networks bloom. With such highly specialized virtual networks, users do not just use a single network but will use several virtual networks in parallel. A user could, for example, have one virtual network optimized for voice communication with family members, while another virtualized network is used for communicating sensitive information with business partners. A third general purpose network, like today’s Internet, could be used for exchanging electronic mail. These networks could be even of different Network Architectures, e. g. using different protocols, and different addressing schemes. To benefit from the possibilities of such specialized virtual networks, it is important to throughly consider the architecture of the end-node participating at a multitude of networks. We call this architecture a Node Architecture. In addition, a good design process is needed to allow for rapid creation of protocols for new networks. It is very likely that different approaches, like composing or generating communications protocols, will accelerate the implementation and deployment in some cases significantly, while in other cases other approaches, like third party software, might give better results. Therefore, it is essential to support different approaches of constructing communication protocols, so that the network architect or user can choose the best approach for the virtual network and application at hand. We define the following goals for our concepts: • Support multiple virtual networks with possibly different architectures in parallel • Support different approaches for creating protocols • Support novel communication paradigms, like Network of Information [2] • Allow new naming and addressing schemes • Be efficient, flexible, and extensible • Leave room for business cases and services This paper is structured as follows: Section II will present our Node Architecture including the main concepts to achieve the aforementioned goals. After that, Section III will sketch