System-level service assurance -the H∀Mcast approach to global multicast

Abstract

The Internet revolution introduced a single, adaptive abstraction layer for global communication. Today, IP interconnects millions of applications, which themselves are bound to the present IP layer via the socket API. After almost 30 years, the time has come to abandon this focus on a single, homogeneously established Internet protocol and thereby release the accumulated needs for innovation on the network layer. H∀Mcast addresses this goal by following the evolutionary approach of a hybrid multiservice network layer that decouples service and application development from infrastructure deployment. The objective of this work is a universal, robust service access that allows group applications to run everywhere, no matter what the status of regional technological deployment will be. © Institute for Computer Sciences, Social Informatics and Telecommunications Engineering 2011.