ACTIVE Interconnects : Let ’ s have some guts !

Active networks provide on the fly user-configurability of network infrastructures. One consequence is that more of the computation/communications continuum is available to the systems designer. The design space of active networking can be dimensioned by (1) usability, (2) flexibility, (3) security, and (4) performance. Given the voracious appetite for network bandwidth now apparent, performance is a major concern in realizing the active networks concept. These concerns may be ill-founded, as they are focused on a narrow region of the design space for active network infrastructures. This (admittedly wildly speculative!) paper explores a wider set of possibilities.