The Routing Over Large Clouds Mailing List Archive by date

[Yakov Rekhter <yakov@cisco.com>]

Curtis,

> Just like the application today should not need to know whether the
> destination is on the same subnet and do things differently, the
> application should only need to know it's requirements.  In passing
> the requirements through the API to make the reservation, the
> operating system can recognize that a direct connection is possible
> and make the decision as to whether one should be set up based on the
> characterisitics and the needs of the application.

Agreed.

> The application passes information through an API.  The information
> characterizes the expected traffic and requirements of the
> application.  The first cut-through decision occurs on the immediate
> host.  If cut-through is not chosen then the traffic and a periodic
> reservation request is forwarded to the next hop.  If the first hop
> was an uncongested ethernet, the next hop router may make a
> cut-through decision and decide to create an SVC or provide other
> special treatment for this traffic.

Agreed.

> The application should not need to know how the network service is
> being provided.

True. However, what would be the reason to make it impossible for an
application to know how the network service (e.g. direct SVC vs going
through routers) is being provided.

Yakov.