Composable Active Network Elements
			     Ken Calvert
			 College of Computing
			     Georgia Tech

Active networks represent a significant step in the evolution of
packet-switched networks: they provide meta-level interfaces that
expose the resources and mechanisms of the network and thus enable
dynamic, on-the-fly programmability of the network's behavior.  Such
control is potentially useful on several levels.  For example, users
might tailor various aspects of the network service to their specific
applications.  The architecture of the active network defines the
abstractions and interfaces that provide this "programmability".  The
CANEs project is exploring both architecture and applications for
active networks, using an approach that emphasizes independent
customization of different aspects of packet processing.  This talk
will motivate and describe our vision of active networks and present
some experiences with application-specific network processing
---specifically, congestion control.