Subject: [ncrg] Notes from the NCRG Call, 11 Jun 2013

From: "Michael Behringer (mbehring)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 11 Jun 2013 14:58:54 +0000

Notes from the NCRG Call, 11 Jun 2013

Attendees: Luca Caviglione; Monique Morrow; Tina Tsou; Michael Behringer (notes)

Excused: Dave Meyer; Rana Sircar; Alvaro Retana;

Michael presented a proposal to move forward: Complexity is generally defined as a property of a system with interacting components. We had a large number of discussions on various aspects of complexity. Some are about general complexity, some are about complexity in networks.

In the framework draft we should separate them (they are all over the document right now). We should have a first section that describes generic aspects of system complexity: RYF, tradeoffs and optimisations, predictability, catastrophic failure, emergence, etc.

Then a second section should describe the system that we're focusing on. The scope of our work. Network Complexity is a property of a system, the network; we should define this system, and its components. An example:

The system "network" contains:

*              The physical network, which in turn contains:

-              Network devices, links, frequencies, ...

*              Management components, which in turn contain:

-              NMS/OSS, NTP server, AAA server, SDN controller, ...

*              The network administration, which in turn contains:

-              Human admins, organisational structures

*              ??? Network users, which in turn contains: (should this be considered?)

-              "customers" (and their hardware?)

We had some initial discussion, but need to continue here.

What do people think about a general section, plus a section that defines our scope in this way? It's not sufficient, but would be a starting point.

Other suggestions? Ideas?

Michael