White Papers

SD-ME provides a programmable software as a service layer for a developer to be able to program the network layer as well as the application layer for anything they want it to do. The programmable layer is easy to use through APIs, connectors and SDKs. The last thing an Enterprise developer or IT manager wants is to be locked into a system that forces them to use only network and application functions from one vendor. Instead a developer must be able to deploy best-in-breed enterprise applications in any vertical.

Alef EdgeNet is open, and supports standard interfaces, so it can be an adaptive overlay into an existing network. Alef EdgeNet, in providing Edge services, follows the model for how the market for Web services (software as a service) erupted once a programmable, open architecture was defined for the Web.

The Edge is no exception, in order for an entire class of developers to adopt the Edge and write applications to it, SD-ME must present an open architecture and provide an open framework for programmers to develop and deploy applications for pervasive consumption.

Network administrators, users, application developers want flexibility when it comes to deploying technology. Flexibility is important to these constituencies in various areas – in SD-ME deployment scenarios, supporting different cloud infrastructure frameworks such as RedHat, VMWare, Microsoft Azure etc., flexibility in signing up for SD-ME based services (software as a service), flexibility in provisioning services, flexibility in the management and reporting layer so enterprises can add metrics that matter to them, and flexibility in adding users and setting user policies on the network. SD-ME is a particularly flexible environment as it is open, programmable and easily deployed within the enterprise, at a Micro edge location or in a Metro Edge location.

Having a secure SD-ME working for you each day will make Network Administrators, CIOs, application developers and users sleep well at night. Being sandwiched between the access network and the Cloud, SD-ME inherently affords a very systemic and strong view to overall network security. In addition to secure access to connectivity and compute resources, preventing Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks and outages due to data breaches are important areas of focus in secure systems design.

SD-ME and our software as a service are no exception, and at first glance, given the distributed nature of the Edge Internet, one may be led to the conclusion that Enterprises may be opening ourselves to new points of attacks and potentially a new class of vulnerabilities. Thankfully, given the “Edge First” approach and SD-ME being a parallel connected universe to the Internet, systems security of SD-ME is simpler.

Networks and applications need to be orchestrated in order for different micro services and software as a service to be sequenced in the right manner for both network and application services to work correctly and with maximum impact. This type of orchestration of micro services typically occurs from a centralized cloud. There is another area where SD-ME orchestration occurs and this is at the user plane to orchestrate applications as users move across Private networks or from the Private to the Metro network. This application orchestration at the user level requires application state information to be maintained.