Network Configuration with plugandplay

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Network Configuration with plug-and-play
Components
IM '99 IM'99 Sixth IFIP/IEEE International
Symposium on Integrated Network Management
Boston Park Plaza Hotel, Boston, MA, USA 24 - 28
May 1999 by Syed Kamran Raza
Summer 2001,Seminar Jong wook ,
Choi jwchoi_at_cespc1.kumoh.ac.kr http//cespc1.kumoh
.ac.kr/jwchoi/
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Contents

• Introduction
• Mobile Agent Technology
• The Plug-and-Play Printer
• Conclusions and future work

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1.Introduction
Network management is getting increasingly
complex and harder because of the rapid growth
of todays computer and telecommunication
networks One of these important management tasks
is installation and configuration of a new
component in an existing network
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1.Introduction
One of the solutions to the problem is to
automate the installation and configuration
process of a new network component using the
plug-and-play concept In this paper, focous on
an implementation of a network plug-and-play
scheme using mobile agents technology The
flexibility and power of the mobile agent
paradigm is well suited to any application
dealing with a dynamic network environment
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2.Mobile Agent Technology
Traditionally, computer communication networks
are based on computing paradigms that operate in
client/server manner The major problem with
client/server transactions is the consumption of
network bandwidth because network remains engaged
for the entire duration of a transaction
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2.Mobile Agent Technology
An alternative computing paradigm that
has evolved recently is Remote Programming(RP) In
this approach, instead of shouting a request
across the network to the server, the client
computer supplies the procedures to be performed
to other computer The salient feature of the RP
approach is saving network bandwidth as the
network is used only one time during the
transportation of procedures
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2.Mobile Agent Technology
Code Mobility The idea of moving software
programs by means of the network is quite
old More recently, the trend has been to move
programs while they run, such software programs
are termed as Mobile Code this approach yields a
powerful computing paradigm that is called Code
Mobility Code Mobility is defined the
capability to dynamically change the bindings
between code fragments and the locations where
they are executed
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2.Mobile Agent Technology
Mobile Agent A running computation that has a
migration capability is called a Mobile Agent
Mobile Agent is a software agent(procedure and
state) that can move from one host to another
host over the network Mobile Agent System(MAS)
provide benefits in many application domains
distributed informaiton retrieval,
telecommunication service management,remote
device control and configuration ..
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2.Mobile Agent Technology
Mobile Agent (Cont.) This paper explores the
use of mobile agents for the configuration of the
components in telecommunication and computer
networks
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2.Mobile Agent Technology
Infrastructure for Code Mobility Mobile agents
require an environment in which to execute The
environment should support agent facilities for
agent execution,migration,serialization,communicat
ion,lifecycle,security etc. Object Management
Group(OMG) is working on defining standard
facilities that are called Mobile Agent
Facilities(MAF)
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2.Mobile Agent Technology
Infrastructure for Code Mobility(Cont.) The MAF
specifications mainly address agent management,
tracking and transport facilities It is obvious
that the basic requirement for the Code Mobility
is the presence of an infrastructure that can
support specified mobility facilities. It is
called that a mobility framework
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2.Mobile Agent Technology
Infrastructure for Code Mobility(Cont.) To
implement such an infrastructure, the choice of
technology is critical Java supports the kind of
services required for this infrastructure One of
the basic requirements for a mobility framework
is that a mobile agent must be able to run on
each network component in a machine-independent
manner The Java Virtual Machine(JVM) provides
the solution to this requirement by ensuring safe
and secure execution of received mobile code,
independent of underlying executing machine
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2.Mobile Agent Technology
Mobile Code Toolkit The infrastructure that we
have used for building our application is called
the Mobile Code Toolkit It is necessary to
have an infrastrusture that provides a framework
for code mobility Three major interacting
components Mobile Code Daemon(MCD), Mobile
Agents Interface to Network Resources
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2.Mobile Agent Technology
Mobile Code Toolkit(Cont.)
every Network Component(NC) contains a Mobile
Code daemon(MCD) running within a Java Virtual
Machine the MCD provides a number of services
that facilitate the excution of mobile
agents assumed that a mobile code daemon runs
within a Java virtual machine on each network
component the deglet is then injected into the
network and travels by the means of the
implemented migration patterns
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2.Mobile Agent Technology
Mobile Code Toolkit(Cont.) MCD Included are a
Mobile Code Manager(MCM) that manages the life
cycle of a mobile agent from its arrival and
authentication at the network component to its
migration or perhaps destruction a Migration
Facilitate(MF) to trnasport mobile agents
between NCs The VMC is responsible for
management of the mobile agents access rights and
the allocation of resources to that agent the
VMC is the only interface to managed resources
and ensures secure access to them
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2.Mobile Agent Technology
Mobile Code Toolkit(Cont.)
NC
NC
compressed code
JVM
MCD
Port
MF
MCD
MCM
NC
JVM
MCD
NC Network Component MCD Mobile Code
Daemon MF Migration Fcility MCM Mobile Code
Manager VMC Virtual Managed Component JVM
Java Virtual Machine
vmc
JVM
kenel(managed resources)
Fig 1Mobile Code Toolkit framework
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3.The Plug-and-Play Printer
Simple scenario The printer is plugged-in and
attached to the network As soon as it is turned
on(by discovery agent), its bootstrap program
installs and activates some software
modules These modules are capable of sending
mobile agents on the network. The configuration
process(agent) starts with the dispatch of a
mobile agent to the vendor site for the
registration purposes(1 on Fig.2) After
successful registration, another mobile agent is
sent over the network to discover the
configuration requirements of other network
components (2 on Fig.2)
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3.The Plug-and-Play Printer
Simple scenario(Cont.) when the mobile agent
returns to its origin(printer), the plug-and-plug
components software determines the configuration
requirements of the supported network and sends
another mobile agent with these demands(request
for drivers) towards the vendor site(3 on
fig2) The agent arrives at the vendor component
and access the corresponding interface to the
driver repository
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3.The Plug-and-Play Printer
Simple scenario(Cont.) Through this interface,
the requested drivers are copied into mobile
agents data structure and sent back to the
printer The printer prepares and dispatches
separate dedicated setup mobile agents towards
each discovered component, carrying corresponding
drivers(4 on fig.2)
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3.The Plug-and-Play Printer
Simple scenario(Cont.)
Fig 2The Plug-and-Plug printer scenario
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3.The Plug-and-Play Printer
Implementation General setup simple network
comprised of three main interacting
components -Plug-and-play component(printer) -Ve
ndor components -Other Network Components
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3.The Plug-and-Play Printer
Implementation Assumptions Each network
component is Java-enabled Each network component
is running a mobility framework The PnP
component(printer) is shipped with a
vendor-supplied plug-and-play module, called
PnP-VMC The PnP component knows the URL/IP
address of its vendor Migration paths are already
established among the existing network
components Migration paths are configured on
components so as to form a single complete ring.
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3.The Plug-and-Play Printer
Implementation Detailed Description have
developed two kinds of modules 1.Mobile Agents
that are to be sent to different network
components with specific delegated tasks 2.VMCs
interfaces that provide access to actual network
resource and component
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3.The Plug-and-Play Printer
Implementation Detailed Description(Cont.) The
steps of the Plug-and-Play scenario can be
listed 1.Installation, booting and initial
configuration of the plug-and-play
printer 2.Registration of the plug-and-play
printer with the vendor 3.Scan of the existing
network to discover configuration
requirements 4.Fetching the required printer
drivers from the vendor site
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3.The Plug-and-Play Printer
Implementation Detailed Description(Cont.) The
steps of the Plug-and-Play scenario can be
listed(Cont.) 5.Distribution of the drivers to
the network components 6.Auto-discovery of a new
network component in future 7.Upgrade
notifications sent by the vendor to the printer
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3.The Plug-and-Play Printer
Evalution Having implemented a plug-and-play
scheme, we feel that the scheme based on mobile
agents is superior to traditional client/server
schemes the flexibility provided by the mobile
agents is the biggest advantage
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3.The Plug-and-Play Printer
Evalution(Cont.) The other notable advantages of
this mobile agent scheme are platform-independen
t The auto-discovery of network components(by
discovery agent) There are,however, some
drawbacks associated with the scheme big
overhead is associated with running a JVM and a
mobility framework on each network
component sending code over the network has
inherent security risks considerable network
bandwidth may be consumed by the permanent
discovery agents
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4.Conclusions and future work
Mobile Agent makes building applications for
dynamic telecommunications and computer
networks results validated the theme that dynamic
networks of plug-and-play services are possible
in the near future Future work is in progress
for making enhancements like error control and
recovery, auto-discovery of components and
notification facilities for driver
updates extended the idea of plug-and-play from a
printer to other network components like routes
and switches