an Application Controlled Photonic Network

1. an Application Controlled Photonic Network Dr. Paola Grosso UvA - Universiteit van Amsterdam The Netherlands

2. Applications controlling networks Research efforts around the world: UCLP, AutoBahn, DRAGON, G-Lambda, Enlightened Research efforts in the Netherlands: SURFnet and CPL, EnlightenYourResearch and … StarPlane • When do applications need this level of control? • Research involves very large datasets • Data needs to be transported securely • No hick-ups in the connection allowed • Remote collaborations • - Access to distributed resources • Use of HD-video or high quality media (4k digital cinema) e-Science applications need more control over the network

3. Lightpaths Two approaches to delivery of lightpaths: • Static: ‘Here is your path, bye.’ • Dynamic: ‘Tell me when you need it, tell me when you are done’ Two approaches to control of the paths characteristics: • Provider controlled: ‘Tell me what you need’. • User/application controlled: ‘Do-it-yourself’ • Lightpaths are: • Dedicated connection in the network; • Guaranteed QoS: • jitter, delay and bandwidth; • Use optical/photonic equipment: lambdas Lightpaths provide the best service

4. The StarPlane project Dynamic and application controlled lightpaths StarPlane is an NWO-funded project. UvA and VU (Vrije Universiteit) perform the research together, in close cooperation with SURFnet and Nortel Networks. Five DAS-3 clusters communicate over the WAN using controllable lightpaths in a portion of SURFnet6.

5. Network setup The ‘traditional’ LAN side: Ethernet siwtches to connect to the local area network The ‘innovative’ WAN

6. CPL and WSS • CPL- Common Photonic Layer • dark fiber network (6000Km) with Nortel DWDM and TDM equipment; • DAS3 sites connected on one ring. WSS- Wavelength-Selective Switches - allow to redirect a selected input color to a selected output fiber; - goal is sub-second switching, and topology reconfiguration.

7. 5 TUD TUD TUD VU VU 7 7 5 7 5 1, 8 3 3 UvA 2 8 8 1 1 1 1 2 4, 6 2, 3 4 4 LU VU UvA UvA LU LU 1 6 Network topologies Star network Mesh network Ring network Slide material courtesy of Roeland Nuijts

8. StarPlane management plane

9. Monitoring the paths Lightpaths provide applications with deterministic QoS/QoE. End-to-end performance monitoring via rTPL package. Applications need end-to-end monitoring

10. First applications: SCARIe eVBLI: correlation of astronomical data. Lightpaths transport data from telescopes to correlation centers. Software correlation: dividing the incoming data into small chunks of data that are correlated independently. SCARIe over StarPlane: dynamic photonic lightpath switching is an efficient solution to distribute datasets for network intensive tasks.

11. First applications: AWARI AWARI: a distributed game-tree search. Performance on distributed cluster approaches that of a single large cluster. Slide material courtesy of Kees Verstoep

12. Conclusions First results: • First batch of applications making use of the StarPlane network. • Starting to test the integration of the management plane and the control plane (SPMP and DRAC). Work ahead: • Involve more applications; • International links and expanding infrastructures, Grid5k in France. More information: • StarPlane web site: www.starplane.org • StarPlane monitoring: http://rembrandt0.uva.netherlight.nl/rtpl/das3/table/net_data.html