Service-level agreement

About: Service-level agreement is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 4358 publications have been published within this topic receiving 75333 citations. The topic is also known as: SLA.

Platform-as-a-Service Architecture for Real-Time Quality of Service Management in Clouds

Abstract: Cloud computing offers the potential to dramatically reduce the cost of software services through the commoditization of information technology assets and on-demand usage patterns. However, the complexity of determining resource provision policies for applications in such complex environments introduces significant inefficiencies and has driven the emergence of a new class of infrastructure called Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS). In this paper, we present a novel PaaS architecture being developed in the EU IST IRMOS project targeting real-time Quality of Service (QoS) guarantees for online interactive multimedia applications. The architecture considers the full service lifecycle including service engineering, service level agreement design, provisioning and monitoring. QoS parameters at both application and infrastructure levels are given specific attention as the basis for provisioning policies in the context of temporal constraints. The generic applicability of the architecture is being verified and validated through implemented scenarios from three important application sectors (film post-production, virtual augmented reality for engineering design, collaborative e-Learning in virtual worlds).

Multi-tier service level agreement method and system

Abstract: A method for managing multi-tier SLA relationships. The method can include first computing costs of utilizing edge server resources in a CDN, costs of dedicating content host resources in a content host in lieu of the utilization, and prospective revenues which can be generated by the content host providing services based on the resources to content consumers. Minimum QoS levels can be identified which must be maintained when providing the services to the content consumers according to QoS terms in established SLAs between the content host and individual ones of the content consumers. Finally, a new SLA can be established between the content host and the CDN. Importantly, the new SLA can include QoS terms for selectively allocating resources in the CDN. Moreover, the QoS terms can optimize revenues generated by the content host providing services based on the selective allocation of resources and the computed costs.

Method and apparatus for network distribution and provisioning of applications across multiple domains

Abstract: Techniques are disclosed for network distribution and provisioning of applications, such as transactional applications and parallel applications, across multiple administrative domains that ensure compliance with service level agreements. For example, a method of provisioning one or more resources in a distributed computing network to ensure compliance with a service level agreement associated with a computer application includes the following steps. Network performance is monitored between a local domain and one or more cooperating domains connected to the local domain by network paths. A present or predicted violation of the service level agreement is identified based on at least a portion of results of the monitoring step. One or more cooperating domains are selected that can effect compliance with the service level agreement by instantiating one or more network resources within at least one of the selected cooperating domains in response to a request from the local domain. Reconfiguration of the local domain is effectuated to allow the computer application to make use of the one or more newly instantiated network resources within the selected cooperating domain.

Pricing, provisioning and peering: dynamic markets for differentiated Internet services and implications for network interconnections

Abstract: This paper presents a decentralized auction-based approach to pricing of edge-allocated bandwidth in a differentiated services Internet. The players in our network economy model are one raw-capacity seller per network, one broker per service per network, and users, to play the roles of whole-sellers, retailers, and end-buyers, respectively, in a two-tier wholeseller/retailer market, which is best interpreted as a "sender-pay" model. With the progressive second price auction mechanism as the basic building block, we conduct a game theoretic analysis, deriving optimal strategies for buyers and brokers, and show the existence of networkwide market equilibria. In addition to pricing, another key consideration in building differentiated network services is the feasibility of maintaining stable and consistent service level agreements across multiple networks where demand-driven dynamic allocations are made only at the edges. Based on the proposed game-theoretic model, we are able to construct an explicit necessary and sufficient condition for the stability of the game, which determines the sustainability of any set of service level agreement configurations between Internet service providers. These analytical results are validated with simulations of user and broker dynamics, using the distributed progressive second price auction as the spot market mechanism in a scenario with three interconnected networks, and two services based on the proposed standard expedited forwarding and assured forwarding per-hop behavior.