[e2e] a means to an end

[RAMAKRISHNAN, KADANGODE K (K. K.)]

Dirk and Craig,
In this context of information centric networks, we have been working
for a while on an architecture called "XTreeNet". We focus on
disseminating information from producers to interested information
consumers as well as enabling consumers to query and find information of
interest. A high level overview of our architecture can be found in the
WCW 2005 proceedings (see:
http://www.cs.utexas.edu/%7Eyzhang/papers/xtreenet-wcw05.pdf ). While we
start with making this work in an overlay, our goal is to make it
efficient for forwarding in the underlay. At a high level, we probably
have similar goals as Van's content centric networks.

If you want to make information access work at a fine enough
granularity, scale becomes an issue - to this end, we have been looking
at how to make multicast scale up, somewhat in the context of what Dirk
speaks of.
When you focus on the "unit" of information, disseminating it to
consumers of information on a subscription tree and finding it by
forwarding the query along a sink tree associated with the unit of
information, then the notion of location can be thought of as being
orthogonal (not necessarily irrelevant).

Thanks,

---
K. K. Ramakrishnan                  Email: kkrama at research.att.com
AT&T Labs-Research, Rm. A161        Tel: (973)360-8764
180 Park Ave, Florham Park, NJ 07932    Fax: (973) 360-8871
      URL: http://www.research.att.com/info/kkrama

-----Original Message-----
From: end2end-interest-bounces at postel.org
[mailto:end2end-interest-bounces at postel.org] On Behalf Of
dirk.trossen at bt.com
Sent: Friday, November 07, 2008 4:54 AM
To: craig at aland.bbn.com; dpreed at reed.com
Cc: end2end-interest at postel.org
Subject: Re: [e2e] a means to an end

Craig,

indeed, you need to get to the rendezvous point that 'serves' your
information, i.e., can match the consumers and producers and therefore
build the delivery tree. 

Conceptually, a particular rendezvous point implements a 'network of
information' (being information in itself), i.e., you can identify the
information network itself with an identifier (which is place-free) to
which the rendezvous points serving this particular network of
information, can subscribe. And you're back to information-centric
routing without a-priori knowledge of location.

Of course, you need to get to the 'global' rendezvous system that helps
you find the rendezvous point that serves the network in which your
information reside. That's similar to a network attachment process in IP
during which you receive local gateway information (DHCP). But that does
not relate to any particular information at hand, only to enabling the
general process of information retrieval.

More can be found indeed on http://www.psirp.org on these principles of
building information-centric networks.

Dirk


-----Original Message-----
From: end2end-interest-bounces at postel.org on behalf of Craig Partridge
Sent: Thu 06/11/2008 21:30
To: David P. Reed
Cc: end2end-interest at postel.org
Subject: Re: [e2e] a means to an end
 

Hi Dave:

Interesting you invoked Van as it was a talk with Van last week that led
to
my comment.  I suspect this means you mean one thing by your comment and
I mean something else (i.e. we're in agreement but having a semantics
problem).

So let me try restating what I took from chatting with Van (with the
understanding that this is my take, not necessarily Van's).

    * Information is place free.

    * Actually accessing that information, in the worst case, requires
      a rendezvous point (if it is popular data, it doesn't -- someone
      near you will have a copy -- but information that is of only
occasional
      interest requires more effort).

    * To get to the rendezvous point, you need some way to convert from
the
      name/label/ID of the information to a location of a rendezvous
      point that knows where the information currently resides (or,
better,
      can get the information sent to you).

Thanks!

Craig