Independent active program representation using ASN.1

Abstract

The future success of computer communications will largely depend on how effectively applications achieve their desired quality of service (QoS). Active networks move closer to the goal of application specified QoS by allow-ing user-specified network related computation to be injected into the network elements. Although research into active networks is in its infancy, one area that has not yet received much attention is the representation of active programs. The Active Network Encapsulation Protocol (ANEP) has made a significant effort towards producing a common definition, however, as the name suggests, ANEP has only gone as far as the packet header for encapsu-lating an active program. The contribution of this paper is to show how an independent packet representation such as Abstract Syntax Notation One (ASN.1) can be used as a common substrate for representing active programs. An active networking framework, using ASN.1 whereby any active network solution can be deployed indepen-dently of the active network element’s architecture is discussed. In this paper, we demonstrate the independent representation using a simple procedural language. This technique however is language independent and can be extended to cover any language including all those currently used in active networks. ASN.1 is ideally suited to this purpose since it was originally conceived as a language for the representation of programs and data types in protocol data units (PDUs). This solution maintains security, mobility and efficiency. 1