Locating resources in a programmable networking environment

Programmable networking is a technology that has been demonstrated to enable the rapid deployment of novel network services. This is achieved through the use of open interfaces that can be used to extend the functionality of a device by third-party service components. Some forms of programmable network allow such components to be deployed out-of-band on a suitable configuration of elements, but do not define mechanisms to determine the configuration.We present a mechanism to resolve arbitrary service-specific deployment constraints into a suitable node configuration. To focus constraint resolution, we arrange programmable elements into an overlay, and use this to interpolate/extrapolate more favourable locations. Programmable service components are used to evaluate the suitability of individual nodes.