Internet DRAFT - draft-fan-deep-performance-visualization

draft-fan-deep-performance-visualization







Network Working Group                                             P. Fan
Internet-Draft                                                    Z. Cao
Intended status: Informational                              China Mobile
Expires: August 18, 2014                               February 14, 2014


 Deep Performance Visualization: Use Cases, Requirements and Framework
              draft-fan-deep-performance-visualization-00

Abstract

   Providing deep performance information by the networks is expected in
   many use cases.  This document intends to discuss a unified
   presentation of performance, by investigating use cases that benefit
   from performance information, describing relevant requirements, and
   proposing a framework of how the components work together to enable
   deep performance visualization.

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   This Internet-Draft will expire on August 18, 2014.

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   the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as
   described in the Simplified BSD License.

Table of Contents

   1.  Introduction  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2
   2.  Use Cases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2
   3.  Requirements  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
   4.  Framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
   5.  Potential Work  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   6
   6.  Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   6
   7.  IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
   8.  References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
     8.1.  Normative References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
     8.2.  Informative References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
   Authors' Addresses  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7

1.  Introduction

   There are many applications today expecting a certain level of
   knowledge about the network, e.g. topology.  Knowing network related
   information will be helpful to better make decisions and change
   behaviors accordingly.  Network performance is a valuable kind of the
   information as it dynamically reflects how the network is performing
   and how traffic will be likely to experience.  Currently, network
   performance information is generated and maintained by different
   elements or systems for purposes like network monitoring, and there
   is rather limited way for applications to get a deep and instant view
   of the status of the whole or part of the network.  This document
   intends to discuss a service provided by the network to give a
   unified presentation of network performance, by investigating use
   cases that benefit from performance knowledge, describing
   requirements for performance visualization ability, and proposing a
   framework of how the components work together to enable deep
   performance visualization.

2.  Use Cases

   This section gives a non-exhaustive list of uses cases that benefit
   from obtaining a picture of deep network performance.

   Network traffic optimization:

         Traditional path selection for data traffic in a network is
         based on static and per-link metrics (e.g. link bandwidth).
         This approach may not be optimal without a picture of
         performance of the entire network.  For example, in a delay
         sensitive financial network, end-to-end and per-hop latency



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         performance is critical to traffic optimization.  A detailed
         per-flow performance will be even helpful as network elements
         can then handle the traffic in a smarter way.

   Load balancing in data centers:

         Data centers utilize load balancers to distribute workload
         across multiple servers, network links or other resources, to
         achieve optimal resource utilization, maximize throughput,
         minimize response time, and avoid overload.  A load balancer
         uses a health monitoring function to detect whether the servers
         can provide services, and distributes service traffic to
         different resources according to a scheduling algorithm or
         strategy.  For workload that is better served by network
         support, load balancing will be improved if real-time network
         performance is taken into account.  For example, it will be
         less likely to distribute a file downloading request to a
         server to which the network has a limited available bandwidth.

   Application aware network provisioning:

         Enabling information exchange between applications and the
         network will provide ways for them to better accommodate each
         other.  An application may have certain expectations for the
         network quality, and having an idea of how the network is
         performing will help the application adjust its behavior
         accordingly; a network may have its own policies on
         applications in addition to the information provided by an
         application, and network elements are then able to adjust
         forwarding behavior to differentiate application performance.

3.  Requirements

   This section describes requirements on an architecture providing deep
   network performance visualization service.

   o  An API interface with other systems (regarded as applications)
      must be provided.  Applications utilize the interface to query for
      desired performance information and get the response.

   o  An ability of real-time network performance query must be provided
      for the applications that request current performance data.  The
      data can be derived from

      *  Results obtained from instant performance measurements/tests.






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      *  Status information gathered from network elements; the
         information gathering is often performed on a periodic or
         routine basis.

   o  An ability of querying historical performance data within a
      certain period of time should be provided for the applications
      that request past data.  If this ability is provided, then the
      length of the period must be configurable.

   o  In the absence of real-time performance data for a certain metric,
      e.g. the current IP packet loss rate on the path A-B-C of TCP
      flows with a TOS field being 0, an ability of responding with
      other close performance data for informational reference should be
      provided.  With this ability current performance can be
      anticipated to some extent.  Informational data provided can be

      *  Historic performance data of that metric.

      *  Current performance data of related metrics, e.g. current IP
         packet loss rate on the path A-B-C of IP flows with a TOS field
         being 0.

   o  An ability of reporting performance data associated with network
      topology information should be provided.  Traditional metrics
      focus more on end-to-end performance, while detailed network
      structure and performance between endpoints are left out.
      Performance gathered in this way may not be accurate enough, as
      traffic may go through different paths.  This is especially a
      problem in certain situations, e.g. link aggregation, resource
      pooling, etc.

   o  An ability of reporting flow based performance should be provided.
      A traffic flow can be identified by a set of match fields, e.g.
      the 5-tuples.

4.  Framework

   The following picture depicts a framework providing deep performance
   visualization service.












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    +------+ +------+ +------+ +------+ +------+ +------+ +------+
    | ALTO | | PCE  | | Load | |Traff.| | Web  | | Net  | |Other |
    |      | |      | | ball.| |engi. | | app. | |admin | |apps..|
    +------+ +------+ +------+ +------+ +------+ +------+ +------+
                          /\             /\
                         /||\    API    /||\
                ,--------------------------------------.
               |     Performance Synthetic Analyzer     |
                \______________________________________/
                   :  :             :      :         :
                   :  :             :      :         :
         *---------:--:-------------:------:---------:---------*
        / +------,-.+ :             :      : +------,-.+      /
       /  |Ter- ( R ) :             :      : |Web  ( R )     /
      /   |minal `-'| :             :      : |server`-'|    /
     /    +---------+ :             :      : +---------+   /---*
    *-----------------:-------------:------:--------------*   /
         /            :    +--------:+     :                 /
        /    +--------:+   |Fwd.   ,-.    ,-.-------+       /
       /     |Test  ,-.|   |device( R )  ( R ) NMS  |      /
      /      |agent( R )   +-------`-'    `-'       |     /
     /       +------`-'+                  +---------+    /R:Performance
    *---------------------------------------------------*   Reporter

   Components contained in the framework include:

   o  Performance reporter.  A performance reporter obtains raw
      performance information at a certain location of the network.  The
      carrier of a reporter can be a forwarding device, a test agent
      that runs measurement, a web server, a mobile device, the NMS
      (Network Management System), etc.  Performance metrics covered by
      different reporters may be varied, e.g. a reporter on a forwarding
      device gets packet drop counts and another reporter on a web
      server gets CPU utilization ratio.  Performance information
      obtained by a reporter is not modified, but directly sent to the
      performance synthetic analyzer.

   o  Performance synthetic analyzer.  A performance synthetic analyzer
      receives performance information sent by the performance
      reporters, and processes the information into performance records
      to associate data, reduce duplication, and unify format.  Records
      are stored in the database of the analyzer.  The analyzer receives
      query request from applications, and comprehend requested
      performance metrics.  The analyzer comes up with requested
      performance value by seeking among the records and probable
      computations using relevant records, and responds the application
      with the exact values, informational values as described in the
      requirements, or a message indicating value providing failure.



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   o  Applications.  Applications utilize this framework to get
      information about network performance.  An application can be a
      system/protocol/function that intends to rely on some knowledge of
      the network to be better performed.  To an application the
      analyzer acts as an infrastructure representing a global view of
      performance, while the details of the network are hidden under the
      infrastructure.

   As depicted in the picture, the framework incorporates two
   interfaces:

   o  The analyzer-to-reporter interface is used to report raw
      performance information from reporter to analyzer.

   o  The analyzer-to-application interface is used to request for
      performance information from application to analyzer, and respond
      with corresponding values from analyzer to application.

5.  Potential Work

   This section gives a list of work items that needs to sort through.

   o  The architecture of the framework is to be defined, including
      specification of components and interfaces.

   o  Method of report between reporter and analyzer is to be specified,
      including an information model and a reporting protocol.  Existing
      information models and protocols (e.g. IPFIX, Syslog, SNMP, etc.)
      can be considered as candidates, and possible extensions are to be
      developed in relevant working groups.

   o  API interface provided by the analyzer toward applications is to
      be defined.  How applications call the API to get the information
      concerned has to be specified.

   o  Performance metrics that better evaluate network state for
      different purposes will have to be extended in relevant working
      groups.

6.  Security Considerations

   Certain authentication, authorization, or encryption mechanism is
   expected to be developed to deal with potential problems of attack,
   privacy or security.  Security consideration is to be further
   discussed.






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7.  IANA Considerations

   This memo includes no request to IANA.

8.  References

8.1.  Normative References

   [RFC2119]  Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
              Requirement Levels", RFC 2119, March 1997.

8.2.  Informative References

   [I-D.ietf-alto-protocol]
              Alimi, R., Penno, R., and Y. Yang, "ALTO Protocol", draft-
              ietf-alto-protocol-25 (Work in Progress), January 2014.

   [RFC2578]  McCloghrie, K., Perkins, D., and J. Schoenwaelder,
              "Structure of Management Information Version 2 (SMIv2)",
              RFC 2578, April 1999.

   [RFC4655]  Farrel, A., Vasseur, J., and J. Ash, "A Path Computation
              Element (PCE)-Based Architecture", RFC 4655, August 2006.

   [RFC5424]  Gerhards, R., "The Syslog Protocol", RFC 5424, March 2009.

   [RFC7011]  Claise, B., Trammell, B., and P. Aitken, "Specification of
              the IP Flow Information Export (IPFIX) Protocol for the
              Exchange of Flow Information", RFC 7011, September 2013.

Authors' Addresses

   Peng Fan
   China Mobile
   32 Xuanwumen West Street, Xicheng District
   Beijing  100053
   P.R. China

   Email: fanpeng@chinamobile.com


   Zhen Cao
   China Mobile
   32 Xuanwumen West Street, Xicheng District
   Beijing  100053
   P.R. China

   Email: caozhen@chinamobile.com



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