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RESOURCES DESCRIPTION

The user can request the following concepts to serve its needs:

Virtual Infrastructure (VI): a VI is a specific set of Virtual Resources with selected control capabilities. The user can request a VI consisting of selected resources and the capabilities it should offer.
Virtual Resource (VR): an abstraction of a physical network resource (PR), which forms part of the Virtual Infrastructure. From the user’s point of view a VR appears to function as a physical resource. A VR can represent a single partition of a physical resource (a slice), or a collection of physical resources (cluster). The following concepts are all examples of Virtual Resources: Virtual Links, Virtual Nodes, Virtual Switches, Virtual LAN.
Virtual Link (V-Link): an abstraction of one or more physical links, seen by the user as a single link between two Virtual Resources. The user can request specific demands to these links, such as required bandwidth, loss probability, etc.
Virtual Node (V-Node): one or more partitions of a physical node, which can be seen from the user’s point of view as a single network node. In other words, this is a Virtual Machine, with the specified user image.
Virtual Switch (VS): a partition of a physical switch, which the user can configure and use as if it were a physical switch. From the user’s point of view, the VS is seen as a physical switch, offering the same functionalities as a physical switch.
Virtual Local Area Network (VLAN): a specific set of Virtual Resources that can be configured so that they appear to be a single network or domain. A VLAN can be configured with specific characteristics; this will be described later in this document. A VLAN can be offered as a Virtual Resource, if requested by the user, but can also be implemented as a Virtual Service, when implemented by the user on the offered Virtual Infrastructure.

Along with the Virtual Resources, the Virtual Infrastructure also offers Virtual Network Services. A Virtual Network Service (VNS) is a service that can be implemented by the user on top of the Virtual Infrastructure. An example is the implementation of a VLAN. The concept of virtual services will be described later in this document.

Layer 2 virtual resources

The user can request a virtual infrastructure (VI) at L2 of different complexity, where a virtual network service (VNS) can be deployed. The requested VI will be composed by different virtual resources (VR). The user can request for the following VRs at L2:

Virtual switch (VS)
Virtual link (V-link)
Virtual node (V-node)
Virtual LAN (VLAN): The user can ask for one level of preconfigured VLANs.
Class of service specifications (CoS): The user can request for some CoS specifications related to some virtual resources:

Specified bandwidth.
Burst size.
Priorities.
Loss probability.
Schedulers.
Congestion management mechanisms.

Once the user disposes of the virtual infrastructure, he can configure the following parameters:

One level of VLAN.
V-nodes behavior.
Class of service specifications (CoS): The user should be able to configure some CoS specifications, inside the limits of the requested configuration:

Specified bandwidth.
Burst size.
Priorities.
Loss probability.
Schedulers.
Congestion management mechanisms.