FRAMEWORK OF A FLEXIBLE COMPUTER-COMMUNICATION NETWORK

With the increasing speed of computers and communication links, and th e successful convergence of both fields, computers connected by high s peed links now represent an enormously large distributed computing sys tem. At the same time, communication between man and machine is also b ecoming more diverse and personalized. Networking issues such as evolu tion of user services, seamless communication between hosts, failure r ecovery and integration of new technologies arise daily. Problem-speci fic approaches and corresponding solutions are available at considerab le cost. However, a common requirement is adaptability of the computer network to a variety of changes. In this paper, we propose Flexible C omputer Communication Networks (FN) as a uniform solution to most of t hese networking problems. The framework of Flexible Networks can be co nsidered as an intelligent shell enclosing existing networking archite ctures. An agent-oriented implementation of a flexible network is outl ined. The conversion of existing networks to flexible networks is show n to be incremental, and therefore practicable.