1Presentation_ID © 1999, Cisco Systems, Inc. Unified Field Theory of Middleware Bob Aiken Internet Ronin Advanced Internet Initiatives Office of the CTO.

1Presentation_ID © 1999, Cisco Systems, Inc.

Unified Field Theory of

Middleware

Unified Field Theory of

Middleware Bob AikenInternet RoninAdvanced Internet InitiativesOffice of the [email protected]

2Presentation_ID © 1999, Cisco Systems, Inc. www.cisco.com

Middleware WorkshopMiddleware Workshop

• Co-sponsored by Cisco, IBM, iCAIR, and NSF in 12/98 ; chaired by Cisco

• Goal: define middlware- existing/R&D

• Applications, MW, & Network experts

• Initial focus - persistent core services


WHY Middleware ?WHY Middleware ?

• Intelligent advanced applications

• mobile and nomadic environments

• 3D tele-immersive applications/CAVEs

• ubiquitous computing (BANS, PANs,..)

• electronic persistent presence (EPP) - “being on the net” : agents, avatars...


And the MW definition is:And the MW definition is:

• By a very rough ( and I mean VERY rough- IETF style - hmmmmmm) consensus - well its something sort of like - uh - like somewhere between the API and - umm - the IP transport - generally speaking that is. Its hard to say what it is - but we can recognize it if we see it - maybe.


HISTORY of Middleware

• first the earth cooled

• then there were dinosaurs

• then there was oil

• then there were Mercedes Benz

• then there was middleware


HISTORY of Middleware

• Distributed Computing 1970-present

• IETF RFC1862 1994 by IAB

• I-WAY / SC95

• NGI 1996 R&D workshop

• Globus, Legion, Condor, ...

• December 1998 MW workshop

• draft-aiken-middleware-reqndef-00.txt


PerspectivesPerspectives

• Applications

• MW enabling Network Services

• OS and End System enabling services

• Security (AAA, AAAA, AAAAA,…)

• Networked Info Discovery and Retrieval

• Directories

• Policy - Resource Management


Policy Management ModelPolicy Management Model

Management Tool

Policy Decision Point

Policy Enforcement Point

PolicyRepository

Translation

Validation

Control

LDAP/XML

LDAP/XML

LDAP/XMLTelnet/CLI, COPS,

SNMP

LDAP, COPS, proprietary

• Entry & Viewing• Modification• Enabling/Disabling• Admin/Mgmt

• Policy Conflict Resolution• Satisfiability• Feasibility,• Optimization

•Traffic Conditioning•Filtering•Access Control•Encryption


MW Research topicsMW Research topics

• Inter and Intra domain policy management (policy conflict?)

• resource / policy management and specification languages

• providing infrastructure status (real time) to applications and other MW

• metadata - for objects/relationships/...


MW Research topics ctdMW Research topics ctd

• PKI related MW : revocation lists, multiple certificate proxy agents

• multidomain accounting/billing

• scheduling for resources/ deadlock?

• support for load balancing/ mirroring

• New MW for Ubiquitous computing and electronic persistent presence (EPP)


SummarySummary

• Defining MW is like boiling the ocean

• No dictionary definition of MW - dependent on context / perspective

• NO 1 core set of middleware services that ALL applications required

• we identified some essential core persistent MW building blocks : directories, naming services, AAA, etc.


Summary ctdSummary ctd

• MW services (e.g. resource mgrs) will build on core sets of MW services

• Education Folks felt a need for a focus group to define EDU core MW services

• IETF Informational Draft out May 99

• Do we need a forum / mechanism to focus the many activities and standards: IETF, DMTF,WWW, GRIDs, ?


1Presentation_ID © 1999, Cisco Systems, Inc. Unified Field Theory of Middleware Bob Aiken Internet Ronin Advanced Internet Initiatives Office of the CTO.

Documents

cisco systems

middleware slide

mw workshop

cisco goal

mw definition

mw metadata

perspectives applications

resource policy management