State Transition Diagram of Harness kernel. It provides another framework for active networking suitable for programmable group communication. It can also execute distributed algorithms .

Active Programmable Group Communication

Measurement and exchange of state information inside network is a basic task in networking. Many global optimization effort, whether it is the network layer protocol program, a human manager trying to trouble shoot a network fault, or an upper level network aware application, must efficiently collect the relevant local states of the pertinent network elements. 

 

Routing, dynamic multicast group management, QoS provisioning, mobile IP forwarding, sensor networks, distributed server, caching, proxy prefetch, all require exchange of such network state information. While some link and node local states can be obtained by generic protocols such as SNMP, no framework exists for network local states. Most dynamic applications have opted to build their own communication structure and let it work for the specific information they need.

 

The Harness—developed at Medianet lab is an active networking formalism- and novel network layer utility, which provides a unified programmable, scalable and versatile framework for state exchange and mini distributed computing mechanism for all those applications. 

 

>> WIC: Javed I. Khan and Asrar Haque, An Active Programmable Communication Harness for Measurement of Composite Network States, IEEE International Conference on Networking, ICN’ 2001, Colmer, France, pp628-638. [KhHa01]

 

>> WBC: Javed I. Khan, Asrar U. Haque, Computing with Data Non-Determinism: Wait Time Management for Peer-to-peer Systems, Special Issue on Disruptive Networking with Peer-to-Peer Systems, Journal of Computer Communications, Elsevier Volume 31, Issue 3, 25 February 2008, pp.629-642. Elsevier science direct http://www.sciencedirect.com/ ] [DOI] [PDF]

 

>> WIC: Javed I. Khan and Asrar U. Haque, Maximizing Lifetime of Power Limited Network with Active Minimum Spanning Tree Aggregation, Proceedings of the 17^th Parallel and Distributed Computing and Systems, PDCS 2004, MIT, Cambridge, USA, ACTA Press, ISBN: 0-88986-421-7, November 9-11, 2004, v.439-055. [ACTAPRESS] [KhHa04]

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Harness first makes a clear separation between the “communication” from the “information” of the state exchange and propagation process. Communication is handled by the component called harness. On the other hand the information inside the messages is controlled by a set of harness plug-ins.

 

The six-programmable plug-ins can be programmed to create any communication pattern. It can be programmed to solve topologically mapped algorithms.

 

The harness- a potential novel addition in network layer, can prove itself to be an essential tool for network optimization, management, fault-tolerance, network security, quality of service provisioning, and real time communication.

 

The formalism is also applicable in peer-to-peer paradigm, grid computing, web services, sensor networks etc. 

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Page last updated February, 2008, Medianet Laboratories.