[e2e] NDDI & OpenFlow

[Vimal]

On 28 April 2011 09:33, Bob Braden <braden at isi.edu> wrote:
> On 4/27/2011 1:08 PM, A.B. Jr. wrote:
>
> I think that if end systems become able to dynamically reconfigure the
> network to suit their needs, this can change many of the assumptions made by
> present days e2e protocols, rendering some parts of them unnecessary, and
> other parts insufficient.
>
> – abj
>
> What a GREAT idea. I don't know why we never thought of it. As a starter, I
> would like my end system to reconfigure the network to give me all the
> available bandwidth and to drop none of my packets.  So, that gets rid of
> the "fairness" assumption of present day E2E protocols and avoids the
> messiness of statistical multiplexing.

:-)  I think there's a misconception here.  OpenFlow exposes a vendor
agnostic API to control network elements by an end host.  It doesn't
mean that every end host gets to choose what it wants.

Also, I am a bit curious about the wordings in the OpenFlow paper,
which starts as: "... a way for researchers to run experimental
protocols in the networks they use everyday..."

It seems like OpenFlow would allow testing experimental *routing*
protocols, or anything that only depends on control path.  For any new
protocol that requires datapath support, OpenFlow (at the moment)
cannot support it.  Examples of such protocols: XCP, RCP, etc.

-- 
Vimal