Automated Wide-Area Network Configuration from High-Level Specifications

Wide-area networks are essential to productivity in commercial enterprises and military organizations. Reliability is difficult to achieve because wide-area networks, such as the Internet, are built from many autonomously configured component networks. Today there exists a large gap between the intended design of a network and the implementation of that design. This is because complex network policies must be expressed in low-level, device-dependent configurations. Routes are computed by composing configuration instructions across the entire network; thus, simple logical errors, or typing mistakes could inadvertently compromise global connectivity. This work bridges the gap between routing-policy specification and implementation for Internet interdomain routing. We propose a new paradigm in network configuration: one in which network operators can declare a policy specification in a high-level language, leaving automated tools to check the policy for errors and distribute configuration instructions consistently and correctly among network devices. Our approach is to design a family of policy languages to support different configuration needs and will incorporate recent research advances that help prevent anomalies in routing protocols. Our toolset will automate the configuration process, so we can also develop tools that dynamically modify network configuration in response to network measurements for purposes of traffic engineering.