What is Autonomic Network Infrastructure (ANI)

This chapter presents the work of the Autonomic Networking Integrated Model and Approach (ANIMA) working group of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). It was formed to standardize protocols and procedures for an ANIMA autonomic network (AN) and first chartered to define the ANIMA secure autonomic network infrastructure (ANI). This chapter describes the technical history and goals leading to this working group. It then describes how the ANIMA approach provides an evolutionary approach to securing and automating networks and to provide a common infrastructure to evolve into future autonomic networks. Finally, this chapter compares this approach to adjacent standards technologies and discusses interesting next steps.