[Planetlab-devel] opening up GetSliceTicket()

[David E. Eisenstat]

Hi all,

I've recently become interested in using slice tickets to accelerate 
updates to PLC-instantiated slices. All of the system functionality I need 
has already been built, but there are two restrictions on the PLC API call 
GetSliceTicket() that are preventing me from using slice tickets in this 
way.

First, a bit of background. Delegated slice instantiation has been 
supported for a while now, but with v4, we switched to a model that 
requires all slices to be registered with PLC and implemented a "ticket" 
mechanism that allows users to move updates from PLC to the nodes without 
waiting for NodeManager to poll. I put ticket in quotes because a v4 
ticket is NOT a capability; it is just a piece of state from PLC that has 
signed to let others distribute it. While Emulab, the primary user of 
tickets, also happens to use slices with delegated instantiation, these 
two features are not otherwise connected.

The two restrictions that I would like removed are the following:


* 1. It should be possible to invoke GetSliceTicket() for slice with 
instantiations other than "delegated".

I can't see any downsides to this---NodeManager will do the right thing 
without modification---and I don't expect it will be controversial.


* 2. The current rules on who can call GetSliceTicket() (users can call it 
on only on their slices, anonymous can't call it at all) should be 
relaxed.

My preferred solution would be to let anyone call GetSliceTicket() on any 
slice: v4 tickets are not at all valuable, and they do not allow the 
bearer to do anything they couldn't otherwise do. We had this information 
public for a long time (slices.xml), and no one complained as far as I can 
tell.


Thoughts?

-David