ACINO first characterized the requirements of multiple network business applications, then identified the multi-layer network operations needed to support them, the required technology and reference network. The use cases validating the project also stemmed from this study.
Then, the requirements and architecture of the multi-layer network orchestrator were defined (a simplified schema is provided n Figure 2). The project defined a grammar to enable applications to abstractly describe the service they need, implemented in a controller-agnostic intent-based interface called DISMI.
To translate such intents into configuration, ACINO developed a multi-layer application-centric algorithmic framework in Net2Plan, an open-source optimization tool. ACINO’s policies operate on many parameters (latency, availability, security, etc.) and include online (in-operation) planning functionalities.
The ACINO orchestrator was built on top of ONOS, an open-source network controller, which was modified to expose a disaggregated multi-layer network model, cooperate with Net2Plan, and support the operations defined in the project. New southbound drivers, based on existing and emerging standards (e.g. the ONF Transport-API) were implemented manage the IP and optical layers, and also introduced by ACINO industrial partners in their products. Extensive interoperability tests and demonstrations of the developed technologies were carried in collaboration with major international vendors and operators.
3 testbeds (1 emulated, 2 physical), were setup to demonstrate the project’s 5 use cases plus 3 additional demonstrations.
These showcased the qualitative benefits of the ACINO orchestrator, including the capability to provide on-the-fly secure services at different network layers (IPSec, MACSec or Optical Sec) while also respecting other service requirements (latency, throughput and payload overhead) and accounting for the network’s state, and the capability to opportunistically provide the most suitable reactive (slow) or proactive (fast) survivability option for services with different availability requirements.
ACINO’s application-aware concept was evaluated by means of techno-economic analyses. It was demonstrated to outperform application-unaware ones in terms of density of satisfiable services, admitting slightly less services but ensuring their requirements are met, but also requiring slightly more interfaces. The CAPEX impact, however, is mitigated by the opportunistic optimization of resources at both IP and optical layers. A cost study showed that to achieve the same performance using typical offline planning and optimization algorithms, operators would need to significantly overprovision their networks, leading to higher costs compared to ACINO’s.
The consortium also described and evolution path from current OSS to the ACINO solution, and some new business model enabled by allowing external player to provide programs for the configuration of the network by means of an App-Store.
The project outcomes were disseminated by means of multiple channels, with more than 80 dissemination activities (articles, presentations, tutorials, etc.). Moreover, the consortium was very active in the standardization bodies (IETF and ONF) and in contributing to open source communities (ONOS).
