SWIFT: Semantic Web Intent Framework for Intent Translation

Intent-based networking (IBN) has emerged as a promising paradigm to simplify the management of network infrastructures. At the heart of IBN systems lies the intent handler, a management entity that transforms declarative network goals into imperative network configuration that meets specific policy and optimization requirements. Practical research has produced a number of intent handler implementations, that exhibit specialized use-cases with limited extensibility. This paper presents SWIFT, a framework to simplify the development of custom intent scenarios. To support this capability, SWIFT delivers two main contributions. Firstly, it employs an ontology to abstract several standardized and open network data models (3GPP Core Configuration, ETSI NFV-MANO, ONOS NBI) and support the translation of slice delivery intents, modelled using the TMForum common intent model, into effective infrastructure configurations. Secondly, SWIFT offers a reasoning framework for network operators to implement custom intent handling logic using logical programming. The reasoner can use the rich information of the ontology both to automate the translation of intent requirements, and validate intent goals based on the current network state. Our proof-of-concept SWIFT implementation can automate and optimize the delivery of private 5G network slices. Furthermore, we demonstrate the optimal planning and delivery of mobile slice intents in a real mobile network topology with minimal processing overheads.