PythonRepo: Persistent In-Network Storage for Named Data Networking

Named Data Networking (NDN) takes a data-centric design approach to data delivery, which intrinsically enables asynchronous communication. That is, communicating entities can exchange data effectively even when they are not directly connected or online at the same time, as long as everyone can receive all its requested data. NDN makes data available through persistent in-network data repository, or repo for short, which is an integral component in the NDN architecture. In this paper, we first articulate the important role repos play in an NDN network, and then present the design of a simple repo protocol, PythonRepo, which has been used in several NDN applications. We also identify remaining work to be done to make PythonRepofullfil the needs of future NDN applications.