The Internet has become a victim of its own success – its size and scope makes further development very difficult, holding back innovation. Changes to improve today’s Internet or to add new services have to be introduced slowly, in an incremental manner, with even minor changes only being made through the accretion of point solutions that embed knowledge in the network, optimising today’s applications at the expense of tomorrow’s. The EU-funded project CHANGE (‘Enabling innovation in the internet architecture through flexible flow-processing extensions’) is working
to speed up the introduction of core technologies across the network, and also to enable completely new developments – resulting in a better, more efficient Internet for everyone. While the Internet is intrinsically flow-based, CHANGE researchers are creating a novel, flow-processing network architecture, making it possible to perform specific processing for some flows but not for others. This will allow developers to overcome the major barriers to the internet’s evolution. One very important aspect of the project is that the platforms being developed can be built from standard hardware that are scalable, powerful and flexible. Open-standard technology will direct traffic flows that need special processing through a set of these platforms,
allowing faster innovation and the deployment of new network technologies. The team’s long-term goal is the development a broad Internet architecture that combines multiple communicating flow-processing platforms, on which application-specific virtual networks can be constructed, without affecting other network services or traffic. This will boost the development of innovative products and services on the Internet and help reduce network costs. CHANGE’s flow-processing platform future uses could include – virtualisation of internet service provisioning; – dynamic network troubleshooting and re-locatable maintenance; – targeted, on-demand network monitoring; – dynamic intra- and inter-network traffic shaping;
– workable, targeted quality of service control of network traffic; – shippable attack mitigation. These features will make it easier for application developers and network operators to understand and control the resulting end-to-end behaviour of the Internet and applications. For the rest of us, it
will mean a more diverse and innovative yet still seamless Internet experience. The project’s team, led by Germany’s European Institute for Research and Strategic Studies in Telecommunications, will validate the new architecture by testing it with novel applications and services. The CHANGE project received EUR 3.9 million in EU funding and ended in September 2013. – Eurasia Review
