[FreeBSD-Announce] DIFFUSE for FreeBSD Project Announcement

Deb Goodkin deb at freebsdfoundation.org
Fri Sep 16 14:22:06 UTC 2011


Dear FreeBSD Community,

The FreeBSD Foundation is pleased to announce that Swinburne University
of Technology's Centre for Advanced Internet Architectures (CAIA) has
been awarded a grant to implement DIFFUSE for FreeBSD.

DIFFUSE (Distributed Firewall and Flow-shaper Using Statistical
Evidence) is an extension to the FreeBSD IPFW firewall subsystem
developed by CAIA <http://www.caia.swin.edu.au>. It allows IPFW to 
classify traffic based on
statistical properties of flows being observed in realtime, and
instantiate network actions across a distributed set of "action nodes"
for particular flows if required.

This project will tidy up and integrate the existing DIFFUSE prototype 
<http://www.caia.swin.edu.au/urp/diffuse>
into FreeBSD, and incorporate a number of important new
features. Integration of DIFFUSE into FreeBSD will increase FreeBSD's
utility to designers and implementers of FreeBSD-based networking
infrastructure.

Network architects frequently require the ability to classify different
traffic types flowing across a network, typically using packet
inspection capabilities of base system tools such as ipfw and pf.
Traffic classification then enables the provision of customized service
levels to different traffic types (such as priority packet queuing and
forwarding, or allocation of specific bandwidth guarantees).

DIFFUSE uses machine learning techniques to enable robust and efficient
classification of IP traffic flows based on their unique statistical
properties in addition to traditional inspection of packet header or
payload contents. DIFFUSE also allows traffic classification to occur in
one place (e.g. in the core of a network) and trigger traffic shaping
and differentiation elsewhere (e.g. at the edges of a network). DIFFUSE
has applications in ISP, residential broadband and large corporate
network scenarios to name a few.

The project will conclude the end of October 2011.



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