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, ?


Documents

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