The Networking Grand Challenge

This talk proposes a Networking Grand Challenge: to build a self-driving network one that runs itself in all aspects, from self-discovery to configuration to mon …

This talk proposes a Networking Grand Challenge: to build a self-driving network – one that runs itself in all aspects, from self-discovery to configuration to monitoring to fault detection and remediation to real-time optimization. While there are projects to improve network management via automation, zero-touch provisioning, self-organizing networks and the like, this proposal attempts to encompass and leapfrog these efforts to get to the end goal: full autonomy. It suggests some building block technologies needed to achieve this; however, this is not expected to be a six-week or six-month effort. It also takes a stab at some of the implications of achieving full autonomy, and suggests augmentation as an alternative to autonomy. The goal is to lay out a vision for network management of the future, and to start an open discussion on what it would take from a technology point of view, and what outcomes to expect.