Supporting nomadic users within virtual private networks

Virtual private networks (VPNs) are communication environments for groups deployed within a public network but are actually not taking care of mobility. Nomadic VPN users have special requirements relating to resource adaptation and customization. This paper discusses how mobile agent technology applied to DPE-based VPN provides seamless access, service capabilities to nomadic users within the visiting network environment. Taking into account the structuring mechanisms enabled by standard mobile-agents platforms, such as regions, agencies grouped within regions, and places belonging to agencies, we have to apply these structural principles to our target mobile communications environment. Currently service providers do not have access to nodes' control environments, algorithms and states. Within programmable DPE based VPNs, agents traverse the network and configure the nodes in order to achieve the best of the network's behavior during a particular task/application data flow between VPN users.