UCLPv2: a network virtualization framework built on web services [web services in telecommunications, part II]

User controlled LightPaths version 2 provides a network virtualization framework upon which communities of users can build their own services or applications without dealing with the complexities of the underlying network technologies and still can maintain the functionality that the network provides. The system has been designed as a service-oriented architecture where Web services and Web services workflows are the basic building blocks. Articulated private networks are presented as the first services built upon the UCLPv2 network virtualization middleware. APNs can be considered as a next generation VPN where a user can create a complex, multi-domain network topology by binding together network resources, computers, time slices, and virtual or real routing and/or switching nodes. A first implementation of the UCLPv2 software was deployed on CAnet 4, Canada's research and education network, and currently, it is being used by Environment Canada, a federal government department, to enable an APN that links its research facilities across the country.