Master-Seminar Connected and Mobile Systems

Data Plane Programming is the practice of directly programming the packet processing logic within network devices, allowing greater flexibility in handling and forwarding data. It enables dynamic adaptation of network functions by leveraging specialized languages, such as P4, to define the behavior of the data plane in switches and routers.

Introduce the concept of Data Plane Programming. Begin with the motivation for Data Plane Programming, discussing the limitations of traditional networking and the advantages of making the data plane programmable. Include an overview of the basic principles of Data Plane Programming, explaining how it relates to Software-Defined Networking. Discuss the role of the P4 language and examine the architecture and platforms that support Data Plane Programming, such as programmable switches, hardware, and simulation tools. Finally, address current research questions and challenges, including security, performance optimization, and scalability issues.

• A survey on data plane programming with P4: Fundamentals, advances, and applied research
• A Survey on Data Plane Flexibility and Programmability in Software-Defined Networking

Usage of blockchains becomes more and more prevalent, as they allow for trusted, decentralized data storage. Nevertheless, next to just storing the data, efficient data retrieval is an equally important task. Users might wish, though, to delegate the data retrieval to an potentially untrusted external service, instead of having to store the entire blockchain itself. This raises the additional requirement for the queries to be not just efficient, but also verifyable.

For this task, students are expected to look into different techniques for verifiable data queries in the context of blockchains, and to compare different approaches.

• veffChain: Enabling Freshness Authentication of Rich Queries Over Blockchain Databases
• Pinocchio: nearly practical verifiable computation

Satellite networks are attempting to offer faster data transmission and reduced latency compared to traditional wired infrastructure on Earth. Radio frequency (RF) or Free-Space Optical (FSO) communication technologies are used in these systems based on the communication environment. Since both technologies have their own challenges, sometimes, the utilization of a hybrid RF/FSO system promises better connectivity. 

Your task is to firstly provide an overview of RF based and FSO based communication systems. Then discuss in detail at least three hybrid RF/FSO approaches which improve one or the other communication characteristics like reliability, latency, etc. Finally compare the approaches with each other and draw your conclusions on the merits and demerits of each approach.

• Hybrid FSO/RF networks: A review of practical constraints, applications and challenges
• A Weather-Dependent Hybrid RF/FSO Satellite Communication for Improved Power Efficiency

Burleight et la. have published the seventh version of the Bundle Protocol in 2022 as RFC9171. The Bundle Protocol implements a delay-tolerant networking architecture to provide communication in highly stressed environments. One of the main features is the ability to handle cases where the sender and receiver are not present in the same network at the same time.

Your task is to present the Protocol described in RFC9171 and highlight possible use cases as well as background infromation on the presented definitions. The starting point for your literature research is:

• RFC9171