Subject: [Nfvrg] Interfaces for Multidomain NV

From: Pedro Martinez-Julia <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 18 Nov 2016 10:14:10 +0900

Hi,

I have given a thought to the interfaces proposed for Multidomain NV, in
page 9 of [1], and I propose to make IF1 and IF3 to be the same as they
are actually the external interaction point for orchestration. This also
favors the abstraction and modularity principles and enables the virtual
network to have orchestration hierarchies, which IMHO is essential in a
generalized virtualization technology or environment. What do you think?

Regards,
Pedro

[1] https://www.ietf.org/proceedings/97/slides/slides-97-nfvrg-03-draft-bernardos-nfvrg-multidomain-00.pdf

-- 
Pedro Martinez-Julia
Network Science and Convergence Device Technology Laboratory
Network System Research Institute
National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT)
4-2-1, Nukui-Kitamachi, Koganei, Tokyo 184-8795, Japan
Email: [email-masked]
---------------------------------------------------------
*** Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem ***

---

From: Ishan Vaishnavi <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 29 Nov 2016 12:55:11 +0000

Hi Pedro,

Apologies for the late reply.

I have to say I really appreciate the observation. In essence IF1 and  IF3 are the same to enable endless recursive-ness in the number of   levels of orchestration. However, at the lowermost level where there  are domain specific issues I believe there is a distinction between setting up a link in the SDN domain or requesting VM in Openstack.  I do admit if we can figure out a generic enough service/slice description language then the interfaces even at the lowest layer  would be very similar. However I am not sure if it is possible to completely abstract all the different technical domains to a common level of abstraction that easily.

In addition, if you consider a bit further, IF2 will also be quite similar to the above two, technically at least. There might be differences due to the nature of the actors using those interfaces, technically however we do expect a lot of similarities.

BR,

Ishan
---------
Dr. Ishan Vaishnavi
Area Leader,
Management and Orchestration
Future Network Technologies

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-----Original Message-----
From: Nfvrg [mailto:[email-masked]] On Behalf Of Pedro Martinez-Julia
Sent: Friday, November 18, 2016 2:14 AM
To: [email-masked]
Subject: [Nfvrg] Interfaces for Multidomain NV

Hi,

I have given a thought to the interfaces proposed for Multidomain NV, in page 9 of [1], and I propose to make IF1 and IF3 to be the same as they are actually the external interaction point for orchestration. This also favors the abstraction and modularity principles and enables the virtual network to have orchestration hierarchies, which IMHO is essential in a generalized virtualization technology or environment. What do you think?

Regards,

Pedro

--

Pedro Martinez-Julia

Network Science and Convergence Device Technology Laboratory Network System Research Institute National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT) 4-2-1, Nukui-Kitamachi, Koganei, Tokyo 184-8795, Japan

Email: [email-masked]<mailto:[email-masked]>

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From: Pedro Martinez-Julia <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 30 Nov 2016 09:15:18 +0900

Hi,

> I have to say I really appreciate the observation. In essence IF1 and
> IF3 are the same to enable endless recursive-ness in the number of
> levels of orchestration. However, at the lowermost level where there
> are domain specific issues I believe there is a distinction between
> setting up a link in the SDN domain or requesting VM in Openstack.  I
> do admit if we can figure out a generic enough service/slice
> description language then the interfaces even at the lowest layer
> would be very similar. However I am not sure if it is possible to
> completely abstract all the different technical domains to a common
> level of abstraction that easily.

Yes they would have different levels of abstraction but, for me, that
depends more on the usage (instance) of the functions offered through
such interfaces rather than the definition. For instance, a potential
use case would be:

- There is a N-layer hierarchy of virtual network operators.
- A customer (application provider) requests its provider (the top-most
  operator) a link and two switches, with the aim of connecting its
  application frontend and backend, which are in separate sites.
- This top-most operator deploys two Open vSwitch instances in its own
  premises, as they meet the location requirements, but requests to its
  provider, the (N-1)-operator, the instantiation of a new virtual link
  between them.
- The (N-1)-operator instantiates "M" links across its infrastructure to
  provide the requested link, but needs to request the (N-2)-operator to
  allocate an additional /lower layer/ link in order to fully accomplish
  with the demand.
- The (N-2)-operator instantiates the requested link.
- The provisioning is finished and the customer receives the virtual
  elements it has requested.

This could look a bit silly but is a typically envisioned scenario when
dealing with a fully virtualised ecosystem. On it we can differentiate
how a low level request (switches, link) is translated to a higher level
request and then again to a lower level request.

I defend that IF1 and IF3 should provide the same semantics and they
would be more or less abstract depending on the specific operator and
instantiation, but not limited by the definition of the interfaces.

> In addition, if you consider a bit further, IF2 will also be quite
> similar to the above two, technically at least. There might be
> differences due to the nature of the actors using those interfaces,
> technically however we do expect a lot of similarities.

Of course you can also generalize it, but the top-bottom request flow is
quite different from the horizontal flow. In general they would have the
same concepts, virtual elements, but not the same functions related to
them, as IF2 would also deal with coordination and interconnection, that
would would not be required in the vertical flow of information.

Regards,
Pedro