Telecom Research & Publications

Scientific Publications by Dr. Lavian

Dr. Tal Lavian is a telecommunications expert witness and internet expert witness who has co-authored over 25 scientific publications, journal articles, and peer-reviewed papers published in venues including IEEE Communications Magazine, ACM workshops, and the Berkeley Technology Law Journal. His research spans telecommunications, network communications, Internet protocols, and mobile wireless technologies.

Dr. Lavian’s publications address topics directly relevant to modern telecommunications litigation, including:

Programmable network architectures and active flow manipulation in commercial routing platforms
Grid computing and optical network service orchestration (DARPA-sponsored research)
Open source software licensing and derivative works under copyright law
R&D models for advanced corporate research at firms such as Cisco, Intel, and Google
Network security, fine-grained access control, and mobile user authentication
Dynamic classification in silicon-based forwarding engines
Video streaming, edge device multi-unicasting, and information switching networks

These publications have been cited in the technology industry and academia, and reflect Dr. Lavian’s expertise in telecommunications, network communications, Internet protocols, and mobile wireless technologies.

Communications Architecture – Grid Computing

Tal Lavian, Scholar’s Press 2013 ISBN 978-3-639-51098-0.

The practice of science experienced several paradigm shifts in the 20th century, including the growth of large geographically dispersed teams and the use of simulations and computational science as a third branch, complementing theory and laboratory experiments. The recent exponential growth in network capacity, brought about by the rapid development of agile optical transport, is resulting in another shift as the 21st century progresses. Essential to this new branch of e-Science applications is the capability of transferring immense amounts of data: dozens and hundreds of TeraBytes and even PetaBytes. The invention of the transistor in 1947 at Bell Labs was the triggering event that led to the technology revolution of the 20th century. Grid Computing has become the fundamental platform to conduct this e-Science research. Vast increases in data generation by e-Science applications, along with advances in computation, storage, and communication, affect the nature of scientific research. During this decade, crossing the “Peta” line is expected: Petabyte in data size, Petaflop in CPU processing, and Petabit/s in network bandwidth.

R&D Models for Advanced Development

Understanding Six Models of Advanced R&D

Ikhlaq Sidhu, Tal Lavian, Victoria Howell – University of California, Berkeley. Accepted paper for 2015 ASEE Annual Conference and Exposition. June 2015.

We aim to develop new models that define the advanced development & corporate research approaches of modern global high-tech firms. While the world has moved on from Bell Labs' famous advanced research model, visionary and farsighted technology-driven innovation is still vital to many of today's most successful global technology companies. Corporate innovation strategies are implemented through research laboratories, academic collaborations, advanced technology groups, standards groups, CTO office prototypes, internal/external incubations, and open innovations. Unlike the well-understood nature of short-term product development, long time frames, fuzzily defined goals, and unclear measures of success lead to uncertainty about how to run best and fund advanced technology and applied corporate research. While all firms agree that cutting-edge research is vital, their measures and processes differ widely. To identify modern models of practical advanced research approaches, the context in which such approaches are most effective, and the metrics by which they should be evaluated, we interviewed leaders at various successful and established global firms such as Cisco, Intel, Google, and others. We used the data collected to inductively arrive at six models that characterize modern advanced research approaches. These models' approaches differed in that some rely on academic and industry collaboration while others revolve around disrupting the status quo. The fact that the companies included in this study were successful means that all the models reflect a practical approach to advanced research. Therefore, no single model should be considered better or ideal than the other. The models could be helpful to a company trying to create an appropriate advanced research approach based on its goals and needs. Similarly, these models could help a company fine-tune its existing R&D approach as its goals and identity develop over time. The models we present here provide proper terminology and will serve as the backbone for further study of advanced development & corporate research approaches.

Secure Lightpath Creation Across Heterogeneous Domains

Applications Drive Secure Lightpath Creation Across Heterogeneous Domains, Feature Topic: Optical Control Planes for Grid Networks: Opportunities, Challenges and the Vision.

Gommans L.; Van Oudenaarde B.; Dijkstra F.; De Laat C.; Lavian T.; Monga I.; Taal A.; Travostino F.; Wan A.; IEEE Communications Magazine, vol. 44, no. 3, March 2006, pp. 100-106.

We realize an open, programmable paradigm for application-driven network control by way of a novel network plane - the “service plane” - layered above legacy networks. The service plane bridges domains, establishes trust, and exposes control to credited users/applications while preventing unauthorized access and resource theft. The authentication, authorization, and accounting subsystem and the dynamic resource allocation controller are the two defining building blocks of our service plane. In concert, they act upon an interconnection request or a restoration request according to application requirements, security credentials, and domain-resident policy. We have experimented with such service plane in an optical, large-scale testbed featuring two hubs (NetherLight in Amsterdam, StarLight in Chicago) and attached network clouds, each representing an independent domain. The dynamic interconnection of the heterogeneous domains occurred at Layer 1. The interconnections ultimately resulted in an optical end-to-end path (lightpath) for use by the requesting grid application.

Data communications architecture grid computing

The practice of science experienced a number of paradigm shifts in the 20th century, including the growth of large geographically dispersed teams and the use of simulations and computational science as a third branch, complementing theory and laboratory experiments. The recent exponential growth in network capacity, brought about by the rapid development of agile optical transport, is resulting in another such shift as the 21st century progresses. Essential to this new branch of e-Science applications is the capability of transferring immense amounts of data: dozens and hundreds of TeraBytes and even PetaBytes.

Tal Lavian, Randy H. Katz; Doctoral Thesis, University of California at Berkeley. January 2006.

As we navigate the 21st century, the practice of science is undergoing significant shifts, particularly in the realm of e-Science applications. The exponential increase in network capacity, facilitated by the rapid development of agile optical transport, is ushering in a new era. This evolution is crucial for the burgeoning field of e-Science, which necessitates the transfer of immense data volumes, ranging from dozens to hundreds of TeraBytes and even PetaBytes. The invention of the transistor in 1947 at Bell Labs was the triggering event that led to the technology revolution of the 20th century. The completion of the Human Genome Project (HGP) in 2003 was the triggering event for the life science revolution of the 21st century. Understanding the genome, DNA, proteins, and enzymes is a prerequisite to modifying their properties and advancing systematic biology. Grid Computing has become the fundamental platform for conducting this e-science research. Vast increases in data generation by e-science applications, along with advances in computation, storage, and communication, affect the nature of scientific research. During this decade, crossing the “Peta” line is expected: Petabyte in data size, Petaflop in CPU processing, and Petabit/s in network bandwidth. Numerous challenges arise from a network with a capacity millions of times more remarkable than the public Internet. Currently, the distribution of large amounts of data is restricted by the inherent bottleneck nature of today"'s public Internet architecture, which employs packet-switching technologies. Bandwidth limitations of the Internet inhibit the advancement and utilization of new e-science applications in Grid Computing. These emerging e-science applications are evolving in data centers and clusters; however, the potential capability of a globally distributed system over long distances is yet to be realized. Today's network orchestration of resources and services is done manually via multi-party conference calls, emails, yellow sticky notes, and reminder communications, all of which rely on human interaction to get results. The work in this thesis automates the orchestration of networks with other resources, better utilizing all resources time-efficiently. Automation allows for a vastly more comprehensive use of all components and removes human limitations from the process. We demonstrated automatic Lambda setting-up and tearing-down as part of application servers over MEMs testbed in the Chicago metro area in a matter of seconds and across domains over transatlantic links in around a minute. The central aim of this thesis is to construct a novel grid-computing paradigm that fully exploits the available communication infrastructure. An optical network acts as the third leg in orchestration with computation and storage. This tripod architecture forms the basis for the global distribution of vast data volumes in emerging e-science applications, emphasizing this research's practical benefits and efficiency. One of the key areas of investigation in this thesis is the potential of Lambda on demand technology to revolutionize e-Science applications in Grid Virtual Organization (VO). This innovative technology provides crucial networking fundamentals that are currently absent from the Grid Computing environment. By overcoming current bandwidth limitations, it paves the way for the realization of VO, thereby eliminating some fundamental barriers to the growth of this new big science branch and instilling a sense of optimism about the future of e-Science applications. Within this thesis, the Lambda Data Grid serves as the knowledge plane that enables e-science applications to transfer enormous data volumes over a dedicated Lightpath. This practical application of the research enhances science research by facilitating the efficient collaboration of large distributed teams, utilizing simulations and computational science as a third branch of research.

Information Switching Networks

Circuit switching and packet switching have been developed to achieve statistical gain in sharing transmission bandwidth of a “passive” transport network whereby voice and data are transported end-to-end without content modifications by the network. This paper promotes a radical switching technology that enables the network to transport as well as process/transform its contents.

Hoang D.B.; T. Lavian; The 4th Workshop on the Internet, Telecommunications and Signal Processing, WITSP 2005, December 19-21, 2005, Sunshine Coast, Australia.

Circuit switching and packet switching have been developed to achieve a statistical gain in sharing transmission bandwidth of a “passive” transport network whereby voice and data are transported end-to-end without content modifications by the network. This paper promotes a radical switching technology that enables the network to transport as well as process/transform its contents. In this paper, I propose “information switching” as a technology for the future generation of the internet that embeds networks with intelligence that is necessary to build truly cognitive information processing systems. By “Cognitive information processing” means that network elements can intelligently and selectively deliver relevant, filtered, pre-processed/information to the desired destinations. Masses of raw data can be processed and primed, on the move to their destination, by the network into a form that is suitable for human interaction and decision. A plausible information-switching architecture that makes use of advances in/formation, computer, and communication technologies is also presented.

Grid Network Services, Draft-ggf-ghpn-netservices-1.0

Network services are services that specialize in the handling of network-related or network-resident resources. Examples of network services are data transport service, network advance reservation service, network Quality of Service (QoS) service, network information service, network monitoring service, and AAA1 service.

George Clapp, Tiziana Ferrari, Doan B. Hoang, Gigi Karmous-Edwards, Tal Lavian, Mark J. Leese, Paul Mealor, Inder Monga, Volker Sander, Franco Travostino, Global Grid Forum(GGF).

Network services are services that specialize in the handling of network-related or network-resident resources. Examples of network services are data transport service, network advance reservation service, network Quality of Service (QoS) service, network information service, network monitoring service, and AAA1 service. This informational draft describes how several network services combine and yield a rich mediation function-a resource manager-between grid applications and legacy networks. Complements of these services, the network resource is seen joining CPU and storage as a first-class, grid-managed resource (and handled, as such, by a community scheduler, or other OGSA services). A network service is further labeled as a Grid network service whenever the service has roles and/or interfaces that are deemed to be specific to a grid infrastructure. The three dominant foci of this GHPN effort are a) the relationship between network services and the known elements of grid infrastructure, b) the functional characterization of each grid network service, and c) the interplay among grid network services. The definition of any particular grid network service (e.g., in terms of actual portTypes) is out of scope. The breadth exercise captured by this document is meant to spawn depth work around several grid network services, resulting in standard-track documents homed in either existing working groups or new working groups within the GGF.

Grid Computing – Network Operators

Grid computing is an attempt to make computing work like the power grid. When you run a job, you shouldn't know or care where it runs, so long as it gets done within your constraints (including security). However, in attempting to accomplish this, Grid researchers are presenting network access patterns and loads different from what has been typical of Internet traffic. MPI applications are looking for latency critical, bursty, small message traffic, some applications are producing data sets in the 100's of GBs and even Terabytes that need to be moved quickly and efficiently, or you might need remote control of earthquake shake tables and thus require constant jitter.

Allcock B.; Arnaud B.; Lavian T.; Papadopoulos P.B.; Hasan M.Z.; Kaplow W.; IEEE Hot Interconnects at Stanford University 2005, pp. 89-90.

Grid computing is an attempt to make computing work like the power grid. When you run a job, you shouldn't know or care where it runs, so long as it gets done within your constraints (including security). However, in attempting to accomplish this, Grid researchers are presenting network access patterns and loads different from what has been typical of Internet traffic. MPI applications are looking for latency critical, bursty, small message traffic, some applications are producing data sets in the 100's of GBs and even Terabytes that need to be moved quickly and efficiently, or you might need remote control of earthquake shake tables and thus require constant jitter. Grid researchers are asking for finer grained control of the network, dynamic optical routes, allowing user apps (via middleware) to alter router configurations, etc. For some network operators, this sounds like their worst nightmare come true. For the network HW vendors, this presents challenges to say the least. This panel is intended to bring together Grid researchers, network operators, and network HW vendors to discuss what the Grid researchers want and why, what impact that will have on network operations, and what challenges it will bring for the future HW designs.

Project DRAC: Creating an applications-aware network

Intelligent networking and the ability for applications to more effectively use all of the network's capability, rather than just the transport “pipe,” have been elusive. Until now. Nortel has developed a proof-of-concept. software capability - service-mediation “middleware” called the Dynamic Resource Allocation Controller (DRAC) - that runs on any Java platform and opens up the network to applications with proper credentials, making available all of the properties of a converged network, including service topology, time-of-day reservations, and interdomain connectivity options.

Travostino F.; Keates R.; Lavian T.; Monga I.; Schofield B.; Nortel Technical Journal, February 2005, pp. 23-26.

Intelligent networking and the ability for applications to more effectively use all of the network's capability, rather than just the transport “pipe,” have been elusive. Until now. Nortel has developed a proof-of-concept software capability - service-mediation “middleware” called the Dynamic Resource Allocation Controller (DRAC) - that runs on any Java platform and opens up the network to applications with proper credentials, making available all of the properties of a converged network, including service topology, time-of-day reservations, and interdomain connectivity options. With a more open network, applications can directly provision and invoke services, with no need for operator involvement or point-and-click sessions. In its first real-world demonstrations in large research networks, DRAC is showing it can improve user satisfaction while reducing network operations and investment costs.

Data intensive Grid service –Optical networks

Next generation applications and architectures (for example, Grids) are driving radical changes in the nature of traffic, service models, technology, and cost, creating opportunities for an advanced communications infrastructure to tackle next generation data services. To take advantage of these trends and opportunities, research communities are creating new architectures, such as the Open Grid Service Architecture (OGSA), which are being implemented in new prototype advanced infrastructures.

Lavian T.; Mambretti J.; Cutrell D.; Cohen H.J; Merrill S.; Durairaj R.; Daspit P.; Monga I.; Naiksatam S.; Figueira S.M.; Gutierrez D.; Hoang D.B., Travostino F.; CCGRID 2004, pp. 762-764.

Next generation applications and architectures (for example, Grids) are driving radical changes in the nature of traffic, service models, technology, and cost, creating opportunities for an advanced communications infrastructure to tackle next generation data services. To take advantage of these trends and opportunities, research communities are creating new architectures, such as the Open Grid Service Architecture (OGSA), which are being implemented in new prototype advanced infrastructures. The DWDM-RAM project, funded by DARPA, is actively addressing the challenges of next generation applications. DWDM-RAM is an architecture for data-intensive services enabled by next generation dynamic optical networks. It develops and demonstrates a novel architecture for new data communication services, within the OGSA context, that allows for managing extremely large sets of distributed data. Novel features move network services beyond notions of the network as a managed resource, for example, by including capabilities for dynamic on-demand provisioning and advance scheduling. DWDM-RAM encapsulates optical network resources (Lambdas, lightpaths) into a Grid service and integrates their management within the Open Grid Service Architecture. Migration to emerging standards such as WS-Resource Framework (WS-RF) should be straightforward. In initial applications, DWDM-RAM targets specific data-intensive services such as rapid, massive data transfers used by large scale eScience applications, including: high-energy physics, geophysics, life science, bioinformatics, genomics, medical morphometry, tomography, microscopy imaging, astronomical and astrophysical imaging, complex modeling, and visualization.

quality of control loop on programmable routers

Current Diffserv architecture lacks mechanisms for network path discovery with specific service performance. Our aim is to introduce an enhanced-Diffserv scheme utilizing a feedback loop to gather path information and allow better flexibility in managing Diffserv flows. We utilize state-of-the-art programmable routers that can host the control loop operation without compromising their normal routing and switching functionalities. Furthermore, the control feedback loop implemented on the control plane of the router can selectively alter the behaviour of a specific data flow in real-time.

Nguyen C.; Hoang D.B.; Zhao, I.L.; Lavian, T.; Proceedings, 12th IEEE International Conference on Networks 2004. (ICON 2004) Singapore, Volume 2, 16-19 Nov. 2004, pp. 578 - 582.

Current Diffserv architecture lacks mechanisms for network path discovery with specific service performance. Our aim is to introduce an enhanced-Diffserv scheme utilizing a feedback loop to gather path information and allow better flexibility in managing Diffserv flows. We utilize state-of-the-art programmable routers that can host the control loop operation without compromising their normal routing and switching functionalities. Furthermore, the control feedback loop implemented on the control plane of the router can selectively alter the behaviour of a specific data flow in real-time.

Large-Scale Grid Data Networks

Lavian T.; Hoang D.B.; Mambretti J.; Figueira S.; Naiksatam S.; Kaushil N.; Monga I. ; Durairaj R.; Cutrell D.; Merrill S.; Cohen H.; Daspit P.; Travostino F; GridNets 2004, San Jose, CA., October 2004.

Data intensive Grid applications often deal with multiple terabytes and even petabytes of data. For them to be effectively deployed over distances, it is crucial that Grid infrastructures learn how to best exploit high-performance networks (such as agile optical networks). The network footprint of these Grid applications show pronounced peaks and valleys in utilization, prompting for a radical overhaul of traditional network provisioning styles such as peak-provisioning, point-and-click or operator-assisted provisioning. A Grid stack must become capable to dynamically orchestrate a complex set of variables related to application requirements, data services, and network provisioning services, all within a rapidly and continually changing environment. Presented here is a platform that addresses some of these issues. This service platform closely integrates a set of large-scale data services with those for dynamic bandwidth allocation, through a network resource middleware service, using an OGSA-compliant interface allowing direct access by external applications. Recently, this platform has been implemented as an experimental research prototype on a unique wide area optical networking testbed incorporating state-of-the-art photonic components. The paper, which presents initial results of research conducted on this prototype, indicates that these methods have the potential to address multiple major challenges related to data intensive applications. Given the complexities of this topic, especially where scheduling is required, only selected aspects of this platform are considered in this paper.

Optical Network ggf-ghpn-opticalnets standard

Dimitra Simeonidou, Reza Nejabati, Bill St. Arnaud, Micah Beck, Peter Clarke, Doan B. Hoang, David Hutchison, Gigi Karmous-Edwards, Tal Lavian, Jason Leigh, Joe Mambretti, Volker Sander, John Strand, Franco Travostino, Global Grid Forum(GGF) GHPN Standard GFD-I.036 August 2004.

During the past years it has become evident to the technical community that computational resources cannot keep up with the demands generated by some applications. As an example, particle physics experiments produce more data than can be realistically processed and stored in one location (i.e. several Petabytes/year). In such situations where intensive computation analysis of shared large scale data is needed, one can try to use accessible computing resources distributed in different locations (combined data and computing Grid). Distributed computing & the concept of a computational Grid is not a new paradigm, but until a few years ago, networks were too slow to allow efficient use of remote resources. As networks' bandwidth and speed have increased significantly, the interest in distributed computing has taken to a new level. Recent advances in optical networking have created a radical mismatch between the optical transmission world and the electrical forwarding/routing world. A single optical fiber strand can transmit more bandwidth than the entire Internet core. Moreover, only 10% of potential wavelengths on 10% of available fiber pairs are lit. This represents 1-2% of the possible bandwidth that is actually available in the fiber system. The result of this imbalance between supply and demand has led to severe price erosion of bandwidth products. Annual STM-1 (155 Mbit/sec) prices on major European routes have fallen by 85-90% from 1990-2002. Therefore, it becomes technically and economically viable to think of a set of computing, storage, or combined computing storage nodes coupled through a high-speed network as one large computational and storage device. The use of the available fiber and DWDM infrastructure for the global Grid network is an attractive proposition, ensuring global reach and vast amounts of cheap bandwidth. Fiber and DWDM networks have been great enablers of the World Wide. Just as fiber and DWDM networks have been instrumental in fulfilling the capacity demand generated by Internet traffic and providing global connectivity, optical technologies are expected to play a crucial role in creating an efficient infrastructure for supporting Grid applications. This reassures us that the future of grid applications is secure and promising. The need for high throughput networks is not just a theoretical concept but a pressing reality in e-Science applications. The USA National Science Foundation (NSF) and European Commission have acknowledged this, underlining the urgency and importance of this issue. These applications require very high bandwidth between a limited number of destinations. With the drop in prices for raw bandwidth, a substantial cost is going to be in the router infrastructure in which the circuits are terminated. “The current L3-based architectures can't effectively transmit Petabytes or even hundreds of Terabytes, and they impede service provided to high-end data-intensive applications. Current HEP projects at CERN and SLAC have already generated Petabytes of data. This will reach Exabytes (10^18) by 2012, while the Internet-2 cannot effectively meet today's transfer needs.” The present document aims to discuss solutions for an efficient and intelligent grid network infrastructure, taking advantage of recent developments in optical networking technologies.

Enabling Grid Services with Dynamic Optical Networks

Figueira S.; Naiksatam S.; Cohen H.; Cutrell D.; Daspit, P.; Gutierrez D.; Hoang D. B.; Lavian T.; Mambretti J.; Merrill S.; Travostino F; Proceedings, 4th IEEE/ACM International Symposium on Cluster Computing and the Grid, Chicago, USA, April 2004, pp. 707-714.

Advances in Grid technology enable the deployment of data-intensive distributed applications, which require moving terabytes or even petabytes of data between data banks. The current underlying networks cannot provide dedicated links with adequate end-to-end sustained bandwidth to support the requirements of these Grid applications. DWDM-RAM is a novel service-oriented architecture, which harnesses the enormous bandwidth potential of optical networks and demonstrates their on-demand usage on the OMNInet. Preliminary experiments suggest that dynamic optical networks, such as the OMNInet, are the ideal option for transferring such massive amounts of data. DWDM-RAM incorporates an OGSI/OGSA compliant service interface and promotes greater convergence between dynamic optical networks and data intensive Grid computing.

Programmable Internet Service Architecture

programmable, commercial-grade internet service architecture,

Lavian T.; Hoang D.B.; Travostino F.; Wang P.Y.; Subramanian S.; Monga I.; IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics on technologies promoting computational intelligence, openness and programmability in networks and Internet services Volume 34, Issue 1, Feb. 2004, pp. 58 - 68.

With their increasingly sophisticated applications, users promote the notion that there is more to a network (be it an intranet, or the Internet) than mere L1-3 connectivity. In what shapes a next generation service contract between users and the network, users want the network to offer services that are as ubiquitous and dependable as dial tones. Typical services include application-aware firewalls, directories, nomadic support, virtualization, load balancing, alternate site failover, etc. To fulfill this vision, a service architecture is needed. That is, an architecture wherein end-to-end services compose, on-demand, across network domains, technologies, and administration boundaries. Such an architecture requires programmable mechanisms and programmable network devices for service enabling, service negotiation, and service management. The bedrock foundation of the architecture, and also the key focus of the paper, is an open-source programmable service platform that is explicitly designed to best exploit commercial-grade network devices. The platform predicates a full separation of concerns, in that control-intensive operations are executed in software, whereas, data-intensive operations are delegated to hardware. This way, the platform is capable of performing wire-speed content filtering, and activating network services according to the state of data and control flows. The paper describes the platform and some distinguishing services realized on the platform.

Edge device multi-unicasting for video streaming

After a decade of research and development, IP multicast has still not been deployed widely in the global Internet due to many open technical issues: lack of admission control, poorly scaled with large number of groups, and requiring substantial infrastructure modifications. To provide the benefits of IP multicast without requiring direct router support of the presence of a physical broadcast medium, various application level multicast (ALM) models have been attempted.

Lavian T.; Wang P.; Durairaj R.; Hoang D.; Travostino F.; Telecommunications, 2003. ICT 2003. 10th International Conference on Telecommunications, Tahiti, Volume 2, 23 Feb.- 1 March 2003, pp. 1441 - 1447.

After a decade of research and development, IP multicast has still not been deployed widely in the global Internet due to many open technical issues: lack of admission control, poorly scaled with large number of groups, and requiring substantial infrastructure modifications. To provide the benefits of IP multicast without requiring direct router support of the presence of a physical broadcast medium, various application level multicast (ALM) models have been attempted. However, there are still several problems with ALM: unnecessary coupling between an application and its multicasting supports, bottleneck problem at network access links and considerable processing power required at the end nodes to support ALM mechanisms. This paper proposes an architecture to address these problems by delegating application-multicasting support mechanisms to smart edge devices associated with the application end nodes. The architecture gives rise to an interesting edge device any-casting technology that lies between the IP-multicasting and the application layer multicasting and enjoys the benefits of both. Furthermore, the architecture may provide sufficient cost-benefit for adoption by service providers. The paper presents initial results obtained from the implementation of a video streaming application over the testbed that implements the proposed architecture.

Service Composition Across Multiple Providers

Services are capabilities that enable applications and are of crucial importance to pervasive computing in next-generation networks. Service Composition is the construction of complex services from primitive ones; thus enabling rapid and flexible creation of new services. The presence of multiple independent service providers poses new and significant challenges. Managing trust across providers and verifying the performance of the components in composition become essential issues.

Raman B.; Agarwal S.; Chen Y.; Caesar M.; Cui W.; Lai K.; Lavian T.; Machiraju S.; Mao Z. M.; Porter G.; Roscoe T.; Subramanian L.; Suzuki T.; Zhuang S.; Joseph A. D.; Katz Y.H.; Stoica I.; Proceedings of the First International Conference on Pervasive Computing. ACM Pervasive 2002, pp. 1 - 14.

Services are capabilities that enable applications and are crucial to pervasive computing in next-generation networks. Service Composition is the construction of complex services from primitive ones, thus allowing the rapid and flexible creation of new services. The presence of multiple independent service providers poses new and significant challenges. Managing trust across providers and verifying the performance of the components in composition become essential issues. Adapting the composed service to network and user dynamics by choosing service providers and instances is yet another challenge. In SAHARA, we are developing a comprehensive architecture for creating, placing, and managing services for composition across independent providers. This paper presents a layered reference model for composition based on a classification of different kinds of composition. We then discuss the different overarching mechanisms necessary for the successful deployment of such an architecture through a variety of case studies involving composition.

Active Flow Network Forwarding Engines

These services are dynamically loaded through Openet by the CPU-based control unit of a network node and are closely coupled with its silicon-based forwarding engines, without negatively impacting forwarding performance. AFM is exposed as a key enabling technology of the programmable networking platform Openet. The effectiveness of our approach is demonstrated by four active network services on commercial network nodes.

Lavian T.; Wang P.; Travostino F.; Subramanian S.; Duraraj R.; Hoang D.B.; Sethaput V.; Culler D.; Proceeding of the Active Networks Conference and Exposition, 2002.(DANCE) 29-30 May 2002, pp. 65 - 76.

A significant challenge arising from today's increasing Internet traffic is the ability to incorporate intelligent control in high-performance commercial network devices flexibly. The paper tackles this challenge by introducing the active flow manipulation (AFM) mechanism to enhance the traffic control intelligence of network devices through programmability. With AFM, customer network services can exercise active network control by identifying distinctive flows and applying specified actions to alter network behavior in real time. These services are dynamically loaded through Openet by the CPU-based control unit of a network node and are closely coupled with its silicon-based forwarding engines, without negatively impacting forwarding performance. AFM is exposed as a key technology enabling the programmable networking platform Openet. The effectiveness of our approach is demonstrated by four active network services on commercial network nodes.

Active Network Services Content Gateways

The Internet has seen an increase in complexity due to the introduction of new types of networking devices and services, particularly at points of discontinuity known as network edges. As the networking industry continues to add revenue generating services at network edges, there is an increasing need to provide a systematic method for dynamically introducing and providing these new services in lieu of the ad-hoc approach that is in use today.

Subramanian S.; Wang P.; Durairaj R.; Rasimas J.; Travostino F.; Lavian T.; Hoang D.B.; Proceeding of the DARPA Active Networks Conference and Exposition, 2002. 29-30 May 2002, pp. 344 - 354.

The Internet has seen an increase in complexity due to the introduction of new types of networking devices and services, particularly at points of discontinuity known as network edges. As the networking industry continues to add revenue-generating services at network edges, there is an increasing need to provide a systematic method for dynamically introducing and providing these new services in lieu of the ad-hoc approach used today. To this end, we support a phased approach to “activating” the Internet and suggest that there exists an immediate need to realize active network concepts at the network edges. In this context, we'd like to present our efforts towards the development of a content-aware active gateway (CAG) architecture. With the help of two practical services running on our initial prototype, built from commercial networking devices, we give a qualitative and quantitative view of the CAG potential.

Active Networks on A Programmable Network Platform

A Programmable Network Platform

Wang P.Y.; Lavian T.; Duncan R.; Jaeger R.; Fourth IEEE Conference on Open Architectures and Network Programming (OPENARCH), Anchorage, April 2002.

Current active network research projects are mainly realized in software-based host systems since commercial network devices lack the required networking programmability. This paper studies the active networking approach using the Openet programmable networking platform. Openet comprises ORE (Oplet Runtime Environment) and hierarchical services from low-level systems to high-level applications and provides neutral service-based programmability to network devices. Moreover, Openet can have customer network services, including active network based services deployed on current commercial network platforms. We demonstrate active networking with commercial network devices by deploying the active network service ANTS onto the Accelar routing switches. The performance of active network communication is examined by the experiment in an Accelar-routed active net and compared with regular non-active network communication. The experimental result reveals that Java network I/O is a bottleneck in enhancing capsule processing capability and ends up a look at what active network services are applicable to current commercial network platforms. Finally, we present observations and future works on active networking through the Openet platform.

Active networking – programmable networking platform

Lavian T.; Wang P.Y.;Proceedings of Open Architectures and Network Programming, 2001 IEEE, pp. 95 - 103.

Current active networks research projects are mainly realized in software-based host systems since commercial network devices lack required networking programmability. This paper studies the active networking approach using the Openet programmable networking platform. Openet comprises ORE (Oplet Runtime Environment) and hierarchical services from low-level systems to high-level applications, and provides a neutral service-based programmability to network devices. Moreover, Openet can have customer network services including active networks based services deployed on current commercial network platforms. We demonstrate the active networking with commercial network devices by deploying the active network service ANTS onto the Accelar routing switches. The performance of active network communication is examined by the experiment in an Accelar-routed active net and compared with regular non-active network communication. The experimental result reveals that Java network I/O is a bottleneck of enhancing capsule processing capability and ends up a look at what active network services are applicable to current commercial network platforms. Finally we present observations and future works about active networking through the Openet platform.

Intelligent Network Active Flow Manipulation

A significant challenge in today’s Internet is the ability to efficiently introduce intelligent network services into commercial high-performance network devices. This paper tackles the challenge by introducing the active flow manipulation (AFM) mechanism, a key enabling technology of the programmable networking platform Openet. AFM enhances the control functionality of network devices through programmability. With AFM, customer network services can exercise intelligent network control by identifying specific flows and applying particular actions thereby altering their behavior in real time.

Lavian T.; Wang P.; Travostino F.; Subramanian S.; Hoang D.B.; Sethaput V.; Intelligent Network Workshop, 2001 IEEE 6-9 May 2001, pp. 73 - 82.

A significant challenge in today’s Internet is the ability to efficiently introduce intelligent network services into commercial high-performance network devices. This paper tackles the challenge by introducing the active flow manipulation (AFM) mechanism, a key enabling technology of the programmable networking platform Openet. AFM enhances the control functionality of network devices through programmability. With AFM, customer network services can exercise intelligent network control by identifying specific flows and applying particular actions, thereby altering their behavior in real time. These services are dynamically deployed in the CPU-based control plane and are closely coupled with the silicon-based forwarding plane of the network node, without negatively impacting forwarding performance. The effectiveness of our approach is demonstrated by several experimental applications on a commercial network node.

Silicon-based Network Forwarding Engine

A significant challenge arising from today’s increasing Internet traffic is the ability to flexibly incorporate intelligent control in high performance commercial network devices. The paper tackles this challenge by introducing the active flow manipulation (AFM) mechanism to enhance traffic control intelligence of network devices through programmability. With AFM, customer network services can exercise active network control by identifying distinctive flows and applying specified actions to alter network behavior in real-time.

Lavian, T.; Wang, P.; Travostino, F.; Subramanian S.; Hoang D.B.; Sethaput V.; Culler D.; Journal of Communications and Networks, March 2001, pp. 78 - 87.

A significant challenge arising from today’s increasing Internet traffic is the ability to incorporate intelligent control in high-performance commercial network devices flexibly. The paper tackles this challenge by introducing the active flow manipulation (AFM) mechanism to enhance the traffic control intelligence of network devices through programmability. With AFM, customer network services can exercise active network control by identifying distinctive flows and applying specified actions to alter network behavior in real time. These services are dynamically loaded through Openet by the CPU-based control unit of a network node and are closely coupled with its silicon-based forwarding engines without negatively impacting forwarding performance. AFM is exposed as a key technology enabling the programmable networking platform Openet. The effectiveness of our approach is demonstrated by four active network services on commercial network nodes.

Fine-grained Network Access Control Mobil net

We are facing a trend towards ubiquitous connectivity where users demand access at anytime, anywhere. This has lead to the deployment of public network ports and wireless networks. Current solutions to network access control are inflexible and only provide all-or-nothing access.

Mike Chen, Barbara Hohlt, Tal Lavian, December 2000.

We are facing a trend towards ubiquitous connectivity where users demand access at any time, anywhere. This has led to the deployment of public network ports and wireless networks. Current solutions to network access control are inflexible and only provide all-or-nothing access. It is also becoming increasingly important to protect Intranet hosts from other mobile and static hosts on the same Intranet to contain damages in the event that a host is compromised. We present an architecture that addresses these issues and does so with utmost efficiency. By using a programmable router to provide dynamic, fine-grained network access control, we can offer a solution that is both flexible and efficient. The Java-enabled router dynamically generates and enforces access control rules using policies and user profiles as input, significantly reducing administrative overhead. Our modular design seamlessly integrates with existing authentication and directory servers, reducing administrative costs. Our prototype, implemented using Nortel’s Accelar router, effectively moves users to VLANs with the appropriate access privilege, demonstrating the practicality and potential of our approach.

Open Networking – Networking Programmability

Nortel Seminar, Tal Lavian, August 2000.

Active Networks on a Gigabit Routing Switch

Current Active Networks (AN) research projects are mainly realized in software-based network systems since available hardware lacks networking programmability. This paper studies the deployment of AN services on the Accelar Gigabit Routing Switch. The Accelar is one of the Nortel Networks programmable networking products, and uses the ASIC technology to reach the high-speed forwarding capability.

Wang P.; Jaeger R.; Duncan R.; Lavian T.; Travostino F.; 2nd Workshop on Active Middleware Services, 2000.

Current Active Networks (AN) research projects are mainly realized in software-based network systems since available hardware lacks networking programmability. This paper studies the deployment of AN services on the Accelar Gigabit Routing Switch. The Accelar is one of the Nortel Networks programmable networking products, and uses the ASIC technology to reach the high-speed forwarding capability. The Oplet Running Environment (ORE) and the Java Forwarding (JFWD) API provide the programmable interface to the Accelar. The ORE is a pure Java environment that enables the Accelar to download and initiate network services dynamically. Using the oplet encapsulation, AN execution environments (EEs) can be deployed on the Accelar as ORE services. The JFWD API provides access to underlying hardware resources to perform network operations such as diverting packets and altering packet processing. We demonstrate the deployment of Active Networks EEs as network services managed by the ORE, specifically, the MIT ANTS EE. We have wrapped the MIT ANTS implementation with the ORE-mandated structure and successfully run ANTS applications over a network comprised pure and ORE encapsulated ANTS EEs. In conclusion, we present observations about the AN service deployment on the Accelar.

Dynamic Classification Forwarding Engine Environments

Current network devices enable connectivity between end systems with support for routing with a defined set of protocol software bundled with the hardware. These devices do not support user customization or introducing new software applications. Programmable network devices allow for the dynamic downloading of customized programs into network devices, allowing for the introduction of new protocols and network services.

Jaeger R.; Duncan R.; Travostino F.; Lavian T.; Hollingsworth J.; Selected Papers. 10th IEEE Workshop on Metropolitan Area and Local Networks, 1999. 21-24 Nov. 1999, pp. 103 - 109.

Current network devices enable connectivity between end systems with support for routing with a defined set of protocol software bundled with the hardware. These devices do not support user customization or introducing new software applications. Programmable network devices allow for the dynamic downloading of customized programs into network devices, allowing for the introduction of new protocols and network services. The Oplet Runtime Environment (ORE) is a programmable network architecture built on a Gigabit Ethernet L3 Routing Switch to support downloadable services. Complementing the ORE, we introduce the JFWD API, a uniform, platform-independent portal through which application programmers control the forwarding engines of heterogeneous network nodes (e.g., switches and routers). Using the JFWD API, an ORE service has been implemented to classify and dynamically adjust packet handling on silicon-based network devices.

Programmable Architecture Java Network

Current network devices enable connectivity between end systems given a set of protocol software bundled with vendor hardware. It is impossible for customers to add software functionality running locally on top of network devices to augment vendor software. Our vision is to open network devices so that customized software can be downloaded, allowing for more flexibility and with a focus on industry and customer specific solutions. This brings considerable value to the customer.

Lavian, T.; Jaeger, R. F.; Hollingsworth, J. K.; IEEE Hot Interconnects Stanford University, August 1999, pp. 265-277.

Current network devices enable connectivity between end systems given a set of protocol software bundled with vendor hardware. It is impossible for customers to add software functionality running locally on top of network devices to augment vendor software. Our vision is to open network devices so that customized software can be downloaded, allowing for more flexibility and with a focus on industry and customer-specific solutions. This brings considerable value to the customer. We have chosen to use Java because we can reuse its security mechanism and dynamically download software. We can isolate the Java VM and download Java programs from the core router functionality. We implemented Java Virtual Machines (JVMs) on a family of network devices, implemented an Open Services framework, and developed an SNMP MIB API and a Network API, upon which we can demonstrate the value of network device openness and programmability.

Open Java SNMP MIB API

Java-Based Open Service Interface Architecture

Lavian T.; Lau S.; BAL TR98-010 Bay Architecture Lab Technical Report, March 1998.

Parallel SIMD Architecture for Color Image Processing

Lavian T.; Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel, November 1995.

Dangerous Liaisons – Software Combinations as Derivative Works?

Companies have been fighting about software interoperability and substitutability for decades. The battles have usually involved wholesale copying and significant modifications of code to achieve compatibility, and the law seems fairly settled in this respect. More recently, however, software developers and users alike have started to wake up to potential problems regarding combinations of separate programs, particularly in connection with open source software. Fear, uncertainty and doubt (“FUD”) prevail in all quarters and have become a prominent topic in the computer lawyer community.

Determann L.; Berkeley Technology Law Journal. Volume 21, Issue 4, Fall 2006. (Lavian T. contributor to the technical section).

Companies have been fighting about software interoperability and substitutability for decades. The battles have usually involved wholesale copying and significant modifications of code to achieve compatibility, and the law seems fairly settled in this respect. More recently, however, software developers and users alike have started to wake up to potential problems regarding combinations of separate programs, particularly in connection with open source software. Fear, uncertainty and doubt (“FUD”) prevail in all quarters and have become a prominent topic in the computer lawyer community. This Article begins with a brief introduction to the issue and its context (I), examines the relevant copyright law principles in general (II) and the application of copyright law to software in particular (III), goes on to illustrate the classification of software combinations under copyright law in a few common technical and commercial scenarios (IV), and addresses the practical implications in the context of commercial (V) and open source licensing (VI), which is especially timely in light of the current debate surrounding the update of the General Public License (GPL). The article concludes that most forms of software combinations are less dangerous than commonly assumed, because they do not constitute derivative works (but instead either compilations or sui generis aggregations outside the scope of the copyright owner’s exclusive rights), and a number of statutes and legal doctrines significantly limit a copyright owner’s ability to contractually prohibit software combinations that do not also constitute derivative works under copyright law.