1. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 1 Active Networking at Washington University Dan Decasper

2. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 2 Overview Why do we need an Active Network platform? Our software architecture An example: Congestion control for multicast video Future work

3. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 3 What is Active Networking? The router does more than plain IP forwarding Packets can contain program code which is executed as the packet transits through the router Code can be installed by an administrator at run time Part of the application runs on the router

4. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 4 Why Active Networking? Network Protocols are hard to deploy Application-specific processing on routers can –Improve the end system application (congestion control, reliable multicast) –Reduce network bandwidth (sensor data mixing) End systems might not have enough capacity to properly display content (wireless devices)

5. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 5 Requirements for our AN Platform Code should be deployed automatically and on- demand to router –however this happens rarely! Simple security model we understand Fast enough for data-path applications –155 Mbits/s in software –1.2 Gbits/s with hardware support (FPGA)

6. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 6 Router Plugins Modular kernel software architecture developed at WashU and ETH Zurich Allows to –dynamically add code modules called Plugins at run- time into the IP forwarding loop –bind plugins to individual IP flows Provides fast packet classification

7. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 7 Plugin Identifiers Code identified by protocol numbers, port numbers or hardware

8. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 8 Plugin Identifiers Abstract view: F Plugin Identifier (PI) determines which plugin has to be called

9. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 9 Plugin Invocation based on Plugin IDs Active Function Dispatcher (AFD) Plugin Control Unit IP Security Video Congestion Control IP which plugin? return plugin to gate call plugin lookup plugin identifier which plugin? return plugin

10. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 10 Plugin Invocation based on Plugin IDs Active Function Dispatcher (AFD) Plugin Control Unit IP Security Video Congestion Control IP User Space Kernel Plugin Management IP which plugin? plugin not present request plugin check policies request plugin from code server

11. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 11 Downloading a Plugin plugin request Our Router MPEG Video CC Code Server Plugin Database Internet check policies locate plugin send plugin Video CC

12. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 12 Plugin Invocation based on Plugin IDs Active Function Dispatcher (AFD) Plugin Control Unit IP Security MPEG Congestion Control User Space Kernel Plugin Management IP check digital signatures load plugin plugin present return plugin call plugin plugin from code server Video CC

13. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 13 Plugin Management

14. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 14 Congestion Control for Multicast Video Problems with streaming multicast video –Feedback to the sender does not scale –Buffering does not work well for real-time video –Codec does not adapt very well Problems with layered multicast –Adapts slowly –High level of adaptability requires 100+ multicast groups Problem with media gateways –Code must be installed out-of-band

15. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 15 Our Approach Use our active network architecture –Allows for automatic on-the-fly deployment of scaling code to routers –Allows for scaling at OC-3 Use a wavelet-based codec (WaveVideo) –Provides approximately 100 levels of adaptability –Loss of packets results in smooth degradation (e.g. fewer artifacts or wrongly colored blocks than MPEG)

16. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 16 Our Approach (con’t) Use a WaveVideo scaling plugin –Talk to packet scheduler to find out about bandwidth available –Drops packets based on the available bandwidth and the importance of the individual packet Table lookup to determine whether to drop or forward packet

17. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 17 Video Packets 0x8002001

18. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 18 Test Network

19. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 19 Results 500 ms to download and install plugins 22.3 usto scale individual packet 45,000 packetscan be scaled per second 360 Mbit/sthroughput (1KB packets) + 15 dBPSNR active vs non-active

20. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 20 ANN Hardware Load Balancing

21. July 12th 1999Kits Workshop 21 The End Thank you!!!