Current Active Networks (AN) research projects are mainly realized in software based network systems since available hardware lacks networking programmability. This paper studies the deployment of AN services on the Accelar Gigabit Routing Switch. The Accelar is one of the Nortel Networks programmable networking products, and uses the ASIC technology to reach the high-speed forwarding capability. The Oplet Running Environment (ORE) and the Java Forwarding (JFWD) API provide the programmable interface to the Accelar. The ORE is a pure Java environment that enables the Accelar to download and initiate network services dynamically. Using the oplet encapsulation, AN execution environments (EEs) can be deployed on the Accelar as ORE services. The JFWD API provides access to underlying hardware resources to perform network operations such as diverting packets and altering packet processing.

Current network nodes enable connectivity between end-systems by supporting a static and well-defined set of protocols. The forwarding service provided by these network nodes is fixed, simple, and increasingly being implemented in hardware. Active network nodes, on the other hand, enable the unattended, dynamic instantiation of custom programs into the network node, allowing for the introduction of new protocols and services at runtime. Current prototype implementations of active network nodes achieve this flexibility by injecting a significant amount of software into the forwarding path. This paper describes an Active Network platform that is ideally suited for integration into modern, commercial-grade network nodes, such as router and switches with silicon-based forwarding paths. This Active Network platform supports the dynamic introduction of application services that can alter packet processing; it comprises the Oplet Runtime Environment (ORE) and the Java Forwarding (JFWD) API. The ORE is the substrate that provides for the secure downloading, installation, and safe execution of network services. The JFWD API is a uniform, platform-independent portal through which software services can control the forwarding path of heterogeneous network nodes. We describe how existing active networking environments can be ported onto this Active Network platform and present performance results for dynamically loaded network services on the Accelar Gigabit Ethernet Routing Switch product.

vices. [28-29].Programmable network technology allows dynamic downloading of software programs tonetwork devices and moving intelligence to these devices. Downloading softwareenables customized application level computational interconnectivity between serversand network devices as well as among network devices. Programmable networks is anenabling technology for a new type of distributed applications that are not technicallypossible today.Tal Lavian August , 1999_ Hot Interconnects,...