Why FIRE?

Many researchers around the world have identified the above mentioned emerging limitations of the current Internet architecture and agree that it is time for research to take a fresh, long-term view considering the Internet as a complex system, which cuts across layers from network connectivity to service architectures. This system-level approach calls for strategic, multidisciplinary research on new Internet concepts, including ‘clean slate’ or ‘disruptive’ ones. In order to measure, compare and validate scientific results and also to provide a realistic basis for a scientifically rigorous impact assessment at technological, economic and social levels, these new paradigms need to be tested on a large scale. Issues at stake are for example: the balance between intelligence in the core versus in the edges; network neutrality and the end-to-end principle; the integration of network, compute and services infrastructures; trust and security by design; or the use of open source and open standards.

For this kind of ‘experimentally-driven research’ related to the Future Internet, researchers need an experimental facility for validating innovative research and developments on network and service architectures and paradigms. History has shown that many occurrences are only discovered when systems are deployed in ‘real-life’ situations. For instance, experimentally-driven security research should include experimentation with intentionally and unintentionally misbehaving programs and machines in a large, heterogeneous, real world-like testbed environment, which is nevertheless isolated from the outside world. Such experiments need to be conducted in a planned,controlled, responsible and legal manner. An experimental facility on Future Internet technologies must broadly support research on networks and services, in order to compare current and future approaches. Practical experiments are needed to give credibility and raise the level of confidence in the research finding. Furthermore, the experimentation must be performed on a large scale to be  representative, convincing, and to prove the scalability of the tested solution.  Experimental facilities based on federating testbeds at different levels of maturity, from proof-of-concept to validation, are needed to test compatibility, interoperability and to derive potential migration paths for innovative technologies.