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IBN has recently suffered from “intent-washing” of products but there is a serious side to it, including IETF activities to at least standardise descriptions and definitions: https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-irtf-nmrg-ibn-concepts-definitions/

The important thing for me is to realise that it isn’t a product, but an *approach* to designing, building and operating networks. The designer translates business intent to technical requirements; the network engineer then takes this “intent” and renders or fulfills it using automation and/or orchestration techniques; then she/he uses Assurance systems (in conjunction with other operational tooling) to verify that network is performing as expected. And if not, the config is modified to suit.

This has to happen across the *whole* network and not just one domain or the other, because then you’re just introducing more complexity and tech debt, but in order to do that you need a consistent and complete view.

I think we are starting to realise the shortcomings in our current approaches to network automation: in reality we need this kind of framework around it in order to deliver holistic service improvements and to guarantee that what we build faster, at greater scale and with more consistency really meets the need of the businesses we work for!

Thanks, Daren.

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