Towards Reliable and Safe Networked Applications

Exploring the multifaceted realm of Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN) within modern technology landscapes, this paper addresses various communication challenges across sectors like automotive and industrial domains. TSN enables Ethernet to act as an operational technology (OT) network by complying with its real-time conditions. Networks using Software Defined Networking (SDN), on the other hand, are state of the art for information technology (IT) networks due to its capabilities to configure and reconfigure networks with minimal effort. To combine these two technologies and only use one physical transmission medium, this paper addresses diverse challenges to enable a convergence IT and OT network with autonomous network adaptation, enhanced reliability, and streamlined maintenance promises transformative shifts, leading to more efficient and robust systems. Outlining the challenges at extending the classic SDN controller to also monitor TSN mechanisms of the network and being able to react to changes, balance the workload of the worker with distributing tasks to different hosts and reacting to safety or security faults to guarantee robust and reliable communication.