SOFTWARE DEFINED NETWORK

CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION
Software-Defined Networking (SDN) is an emerging architecture that is
dynamic, manageable, cost-effective, and adaptable, making it ideal for the high-
bandwidth, dynamic nature of today’s applications. The architecture of SDN
decouples the network control and forwarding functions enabling the network control
to become directly programmable and the underlying infrastructure to be abstracted
for applications and network services. The OpenFlow protocol is a foundational
element for building SDN solutions.

Enterprises, carriers, and service providers are being surrounded by a number of

competing forces. The monumental growth in multimedia content, the explosion
of cloud computing, the impact of increasing mobile usage and continuing
business pressures to reduce costs while revenues remain flat are all converging
to wreak havoc on traditional business models.

To keep pace, many of these players are turning to SDN technology to

revolutionize network design and operations.

SDN enables the programming of network behavior in a centrally controlled

manner through software applications using open APIs. By opening up
traditionally closed network platforms and implementing a common SDN control
layer, operators can manage the entire network and its devices consistently,
regardless of the complexity of the underlying network technology. Software-
defined networking seeks to reduce the complexity of statically defined networks,
automate network functions, speed the deployment of applications and services, and
simplify the provisioning and management of network resources.

Network and security services refer to functionality that enables business applications
to perform efficiently and securely. Possibilities include a wide range of L4-L7
functionality including ADCs, WOCs, and security capabilities such as firewalls,
IDS/IPS and DDoS protection.

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Pure SDN switch

In a pure SDN switch, all of the control functions of a traditional switch (such
as routing protocols that are used to build forwarding information bases) are run in
the central controller. The functionality in the switch is restricted entirely to the data
plane.

Hybrid switch
In a hybrid switch, SDN technologies and traditional switching protocols run
simultaneously. A network manager can configure the SDN controller to discover and
control certain traffic flows while traditional, distributed networking protocols
continue to direct the rest of the traffic on the network.

Hybrid network
A hybrid network is a network in which traditional switches and SDN
switches, whether they are pure SDN switches or hybrid switches, operate in the same
environment.

Northbound API
The northbound API enables communications between the control layer and
the business application layer. There is currently not a standards-based northbound
API.

Southbound API
The southbound API enables communications between the control and
infrastructure layers. Protocols that can enable this communication include
OpenFlow, the extensible messaging and presence protocol (XMPP), and the network
configuration protocol.

SDN supports the dynamic movement, replication, and allocation of virtual resources
and also ease the administrative burden of the configuration and provisioning of
functionality such as QoS and security.

It easily deploys and scale network functionality and performs traffic engineering
with an end-to-end view of the network. It helps in better utilize network resources
and reduce OPEX

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SDN has network functionality to evolve more rapidly based on a software

development lifecycle and enable applications to dynamically request services from
the network and also Implement more effective security functionality with reducing
complexity.

SDN represents significant architectural change over traditional networking

infrastructure. However, the technology doesn’t require organizations to disrupt their
existing network and replace it with entirely new hardware and software resources
that constitute SDN. In fact, organization can begin with specific SDN use cases such
as optimizing the network by monitoring and identifying account affinities, access
control limits or orchestrating specific workloads as they adopt the technology at
scale. In essence, SDN doesn’t replace traditional networking devices or only apply to
switches through automation. Instead, SDN only reshapes the architecture to enable
centralized control with multiple levels of automation across the network.

The ONF three main parts of the SDN: Application layer; Control layer and
Infrastructure layer. The major architectural difference between SDN and traditional
network infrastructure are identified within the Control and Infrastructure layers.
However, it’s the SDN programs within the Application layer that define the new
approach of data communication between controllers and services that run over the
network.
Therefore, the Controller and centralized Control Plane define how SDN is different
from traditional network architecture and technologies at the Application layer are
responsible for realizing those difference into performance improvements that
translate into tangible business results.

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CHAPTER 2
SDN HISTORY AND EVOLUTION
While the term programmable is used to generalize the concept of the simplified
network management and reconfiguration, it is important to understand that in reality
it encapsulates a wide number of ideas proposed over time, each having a different
focus (e.g., control- or data-plane programmability) and different means of achieving
their goals. This section reviews the history of programmable networks right from its
early stages, when the need for network programmability first emerged, up to the
present with the dominant paradigm of SDN. Along these lines, the key ideas that
formed SDN will be discussed along with other alternatives that were proposed and
affected SDN's evolution but which were not met with the same widespread success.

Early History of Programmable Networks

As already mentioned, the concept of programmable networks dates its origins back
in the mid-90s, right when the Internet was starting to experience widespread success.
Until that moment the usage of computer networks was limited to a small number of
services like e-mail and file transfers. The fast growth of the Internet outside of
research facilities led to the formation of large networks, turning the interest of
researchers and developers in deploying and experimenting with new ideas for
network services. However, it quickly became apparent that a major obstacle towards
this direction was the high complexity of managing the network infrastructure.
Network devices were used as black boxes designed to support specific protocols
essential for the operation of the network, without even guaranteeing vendor
interoperability. Therefore, modifying the control logic of such devices was not an
option, severely restricting network evolution. To remedy this situation, various
efforts focused on finding novel solutions for creating more open, extensible and
programmable networks.
The emergence of software defined networking:
In the second half of the 2000s, funding agencies and researchers started showing
interest in the idea of network experimentation at scale. This interest was mainly
motivated by the need to deploy new protocols and services, targeting better

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performance and QoS in large enterprise networks and the Internet, and was further
strengthened by the success of experimental infrastructures like Planetlab and by the
emergence of various initiatives like the US National Science Foundation’s GENI
(Global Environment for Networking Innovations). Until then, large scale
experimentation was not an easy task to perform; researchers were mostly limited in
using simulation environments for evaluation, which, despite their value, could not
always capture all the important network-related parameters in the same manner as a
realistic testbed would. One important requirement of such infrastructure-based
efforts was the need for network programmability, which would simplify network
management and network services deployment and would allow multiple experiments
to be run simultaneously at the same infrastructure, each using a different set of
forwarding rules. Motivated by this idea a group of researchers at Stanford created the
Clean Slate Program. In the context of this project, which had as a mission to
“reinvent the Internet”, the OpenFlow protocol was proposed as a means for
researchers to run experimental protocols in everyday networking environments.
Similarly, to previous approaches like ForCES, OpenFlow followed the principle of
decoupling the control and forwarding plane, and standardized the information
exchanges between the two using a simple communication protocol. The solution
proposed by OpenFlow, which provided architectural support for programming the
network, led to the creation of the term SDN to encapsulate all the networks
following similar architectural principles. The fundamental idea behind SDNs
compared to the conventional networking paradigm is the creation of horizontally
integrated systems through the separation of the control and the data plane while
providing an increasingly sophisticated set of abstractions. Looking back at all the
milestones and important programmable network projects presented in this section we
can conclude that the road to SDN was indeed a long one with various ideas being
proposed, tested and evaluated, driving research in this field even further. SDN was
not so much of a new idea, as it was the promising result of the distilled knowledge
and experience obtained through many of the ideas presented in this section. What
SDN managed to do differently compared to these ideas is that it integrated the most
important network programmability concepts into an architecture that emerged at the
right time and had compelling use cases for a great number of interested parties. Even

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though it remains to be seen whether SDN will be the next major paradigm shift in
networking, the promise it demonstrates is undeniably very high.

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CHAPTER 3

OBJECTIVES
SDN aims to make network agile and flexible and the main goal of SDN is to
improve network control by enabling enterprises and service providers to respond
quickly to changing business requirements.

Motivation:
Software defined networking (SDN) aims to simplify network management by
removing the control plane from switches and running custom control applications at
a logically central controller. Unfortunately, writing control applications that always
maintain a set of network invariants (e.g., the network does not contain forwarding
loops or blackholes) is a challenging task. SDN facilitate innovation in the network
and provides flexibility with the network.

Scope:
• SDN provides zero-threat protection.

• SDN technology adjusts dynamically to meet real-time traffic needs.

• Helps in better control and monitoring.

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CHAPTER 4

SDN ARCHITECTURE

This chapter describes the architecture in two ways. Section 4.1 is a high-level
descriptive overview, while clause 4.2 describes the essentials of the architecture as
concisely as possible.

4.1 Descriptive overview:

The aim of SDN is to provide open interfaces that enable the development of
software that can control the connectivity provided by a set of network resources and
the flow of network traffic though them, along with possible inspection and
modification of traffic that may be performed in the network. These primitive
functions may be abstracted into arbitrary network services, some of which may not
be presently apparent.

Figure 4.1 Basic SDN components

Figure 4.1 shows the basic SDN components. The initial view is comprised of
infrastructure, control and application layers (red text), which are designated in this
architecture document as data, controller, and application planes (black text). The
infrastructure layer (data plane, note) comprises network elements, which expose

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their capabilities toward the control layer (controller plane) via interfaces southbound
from the controller. The SDN applications exist in the application layer (plane), and
communicate their network requirements toward the controller plane via northbound
interfaces, often called NBIs. In the middle, the SDN controller translates the
applications’ requirements and exerts low-level control over the network elements,
while providing relevant information up to the SDN applications. An SDN controller
may orchestrate competing application demands for limited network resources
according to policy.

This view requires further development and precision if it is to provide a rigorous

technical SDN architecture that can inform technically versed network architects
inside and outside of ONF. This architecture document therefore defines functions,
interfaces and components, explains their relations and guides the development of
information models, while not over-specifying. Terminology modifications reflect the
fact that some aspects of control inevitably reside in all layers, but the interface of
interest is that between an SDN controller and its adjacent entities. The major
horizontal groupings are called planes to avoid confusion with the term layer, which
is used in the sense of layer networks, for example when packets are mapped to
MPLS, further into Ethernet, and further into wavelengths.

With that in mind, figure 4.2 adopts the revised terminology and adds the
management function, which is often omitted from simplified SDN representations.
Although many traditional management functions may be bypassed by the direct
application-controller plane interface (ACPI), certain management functions are still
essential. In the data plane, management is at least required for initially setting up the
network elements, assigning the SDN-controlled parts and configuring their SDN
controller. In the controller plane, management needs to configure the policies
defining the scope of control given to the SDN application and to monitor the
performance of the system. In the application plane, management typically configures
the contracts and service level agreements (SLAs). In all planes, management
configures the security associations that allow distributed functions to safely
intercommunicate.

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Figure 4.2 – SDN components with management

Figure 4.2 summarizes the SDN architecture, with the terminology and reference
points used throughout the sequel. It shows distinct application, controller and data
planes, with controller plane interfaces (CPIs) designated as reference points between
the SDN controller and the application plane (A-CPI) and between the SDN
controller and the data plane (D-CPI). The information exchanged across these
interfaces should be modeled as an instance of a protocol neutral information model.

While customer systems have historically interfaced the network indirectly, by way of
the provider’s business or operations support systems (BSS/OSS), SDN envisions that
customer applications may have dynamic and granular control of network resources
through direct access to an SDN controller. Recognizing the likelihood of a business
boundary between provider and customer, it is therefore essential that the architecture
recognize a business or organizational boundary between the SDN controller plane
and the applications that use it. Provider and customer exist in different trust domains.
This architecture document uses colors as a visual aid to emphasize trust domains.
Blue is the default, and may be thought of as a network provider, while other colors,
such as green and red, indicate customers, tenants, or even distinct organizational or
application entities within the overall Blue trust domain. Figure 4.2 thus shows only a
single trust domain. Figure 4.3 extends the idea to show multiple trust domains. Each
trust domain is understood to have its own management functionality. Trust domains

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may logically extend into components of other trust domains, as exemplified by the
green and red agents in the blue SDN controller.

Figure 4.3 SDN overview, with physical data plane

Figure 4.3 also shows agents and coordinators in the SDN controller and the network
elements. The agents support the concept of sharing or virtualizing the underlying
resources, for example, which network element ports are SDN-controlled (as opposed
to hybrid or legacy ports), or the details of the virtual network that are exposed to the
SDN applications, while isolating one SDN Architecture customer’s service from
another’s. In the SDN controller, different agents may expose control over the
network at different levels of abstraction (latitudes) or function sets (longitudes). It is
the SDN control logic’s task to map and arbitrate between the networking
requirements from all SDN applications and translate them into instructions for the
network element (NE) resources exposed through the NE agents. The coordinators in
both the network element and the SDN controller install customer-specific resources
and policies received from management. Multiple agents may exist at the same time

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in any one network element and SDN controller, but there is only one logical
management interface, and therefore only one coordinator per network element or
SDN controller

4.2 Concise statement of architectural essentials:

Figure 4.4 shows the major components and interfaces of the SDN architecture. The
architecture makes no statement about the physical realization of the components.

Figure 4.4 Major components and interfaces of the SDN architecture

Data plane: The data plane comprises a set of one or more network elements, each of
which contains a set of traffic forwarding or traffic processing resources. Resources
are always abstractions of underlying physical capabilities or entities.

Controller plane: The controller plane comprises a set of SDN controllers, each of
which has exclusive control over a set of resources exposed by one or more network
elements in the data plane (its span of control). Additional interfaces to SDN
controllers are not precluded. The minimum functionality of the SDN controller is to
faithfully execute the requests of the applications it supports, while isolating each
application from all others. To perform this function, an SDN controller may
communicate with peer SDN controllers, subordinate SDN controllers, or non-SDN

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environments, as necessary. A common but non-essential function of an SDN

controller is to act as the control element in a feedback loop, responding to network
events to recover from failure, reoptimize resource allocations, or otherwise.

Application plane: The application plane comprises one or more applications, each
of which has exclusive control of a set of resources exposed by one or more SDN
controllers. Additional interfaces to applications are not precluded. An application
may invoke or collaborate with other applications. An application may act as an SDN
controller in its own right.

Management: Each application, SDN controller and network element has a

functional interface to a manager. The minimum functionality of the manager is to
allocate resources from a resource pool in the lower plane to a particular client entity
in the higher plane, and to establish reachability information that permits the lower
and higher plane entities to mutually communicate. Additional management
functionality is not precluded, subject to the constraint that the application, SDN
controller, or NE have exclusive control over any given resource.

Administration: Each entity in a north-south progression through the planes may

belong to a different administrative domain. The manager is understood to reside in
the same administrative domain as the entity it manages.

4.3 How Software Defined Networking Works?

SDN encompasses several types of technologies, including functional

separation, network virtualization, and automation through programmability.

Originally, SDN technology focused solely on the separation of the network control
plane from the data plane. While the control plane makes decisions about how
packets should flow through the network, the data plane actually moves packets from
place to place.

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In a classic SDN scenario, a packet arrives at a network switch, and rules built into
the switch's proprietary firmware tell the switch where to forward the packet. These
packet-handling rules are sent to the switch from the centralized controller.

The switch -- also known as a data plane device -- queries the controller for guidance
as needed, and it provides the controller with information about the traffic it handles.
The switch sends every packet going to the same destination along the same path and
treats all the packets the exact same way.

Software-defined networking uses an operation mode that is sometimes called

adaptive or dynamic, in which a switch issues a route request to a controller for a
packet that does not have a specific route. This process is separate from adaptive
routing, which issues route requests through routers and algorithms based on the
network topology, not through a controller. The following diagram depicts the
scenario of how SDN works. In the traditional approach, the control plane is pre-
programmed to follow specific rules. The switch has inbuilt rules in its firmware
that dictates where to forward the data packets received by it. SDN allows the
administrator to control this process. Implementing SDN makes the switch send
a query to the SDN controller for guidance and using the controller the
administrator can set up the rules regarding the forwarding of data. The
comparison between traditional network and SDN is shown in figure 4.5.

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Figure 4.5: Traditional Network Vs SDN

4.4 Limitations of Existing System:

Meeting current market requirements is virtually impossible with traditional

network architectures. Faced with flat or reduced budgets, enterprise IT departments
are trying to squeeze the most from their networks using device-level management
tools and manual processes. Carriers face similar challenges as demand for mobility
and bandwidth explodes; profits are being eroded by escalating capital equipment
costs and flat or declining revenue. Existing network architectures were not designed
to meet the requirements of today’s users, enterprises, and carriers; rather network
designers are constrained by the limitations of current networks, which include:

Complexity that leads to stasis: Networking technology to date has consisted

largely of discrete sets of protocols designed to connect hosts reliably over arbitrary
distances, link speeds, and topologies. To meet business and technical needs over the
last few decades, the industry has evolved networking protocols to deliver higher
performance and reliability, broader connectivity, and more stringent security.

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Protocols tend to be defined in isolation, however, with each solving a specific

problem and without the benefit of any fundamental abstractions. This has resulted in
one of the primary limitations of today’s networks: complexity. For example, to add
or move any device, IT must touch multiple switches, routers, firewalls, Web
authentication portals, etc. and update ACLs, VLANs, quality of services (QoS), and
other protocol-based mechanisms using device-level management tools. In addition,
network topology, vendor switch model, and software version all must be taken into
account. Due to this complexity, today’s networks are relatively static as IT seeks to
minimize the risk of service disruption. The static nature of networks is in stark
contrast to the dynamic nature of today’s server environment, where server
virtualization has greatly increased the number of hosts requiring network
connectivity and fundamentally altered assumptions about the physical location of
hosts. Prior to virtualization, applications resided on a single server and primarily
exchanged traffic with select clients. Today, applications are distributed across
multiple virtual machines (VMs), which exchange traffic flows with each other. VMs
migrate to optimize and rebalance server workloads, causing the physical endpoints
of existing flows to change (sometimes rapidly) over time. VM migration challenges
many aspects of traditional networking, from addressing schemes and namespaces to
the basic notion of segmented, routing-based design. In addition to adopting
virtualization technologies, many enterprises today operate an IP converged network
for voice, data, and video traffic. While existing networks can provide differentiated
QoS levels for different applications, the provisioning of those resources is highly
manual. IT must configure each vendor’s equipment separately, and adjust parameters
such as network bandwidth and QoS on a per-session, per-application basis. Because
of its static nature, the network cannot dynamically adapt to changing traffic,
application, and user demands.

Inconsistent policies: To implement a network-wide policy, IT may have to

configure thousands of devices and mechanisms. For example, every time a new
virtual machine is brought up, it can take hours, in some cases days, for IT to
reconfigure ACLs across the entire network. The complexity of today’s networks
makes it very difficult for IT to apply a consistent set of access, security, QoS, and

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other policies to increasingly mobile users, which leaves the enterprise vulnerable to
security breaches, noncompliance with regulations, and other negative consequences.

Inability to scale: As demands on the data center rapidly grow, so too must the
network grow. However, the network becomes vastly more complex with the addition
of hundreds or thousands of network devices that must be configured and managed.
IT has also relied on link oversubscription to scale the network, based on predictable
traffic patterns; however, in today’s virtualized data centers, traffic patterns are
incredibly dynamic and therefore unpredictable. Mega-operators, such as Google,
Yahoo!, and Facebook, face even more daunting scalability challenges. These service
providers employ largescale parallel processing algorithms and associated datasets
across their entire computing pool. As the scope of end-user applications increases
(for example, crawling and indexing the entire world wide web to instantly return
search results to users), the number of computing elements explodes and data-set
exchanges among compute nodes can reach petabytes. These companies need so-
called hyperscale networks that can provide high-performance, low-cost connectivity
among hundreds of thousands— potentially millions—of physical servers. Such
scaling cannot be done with manual configuration. To stay competitive, carriers must
deliver ever-higher value, better-differentiated services to customers. Multi-tenancy
further complicates their task, as the network must serve groups of users with
different applications and different performance needs. Key operations that appear
relatively straightforward, such as steering a customer's traffic flow to provide
customized performance control or on-demand delivery, are very complex to
implement with existing networks, especially at carrier scale. They require
specialized devices at the network edge, thus increasing capital and operational
expenditure as well as time-to-market to introduce new services.

Vendor dependence: Carriers and enterprises seek to deploy new capabilities and
services in rapid response to changing business needs or user demands. However,
their ability to respond is hindered by vendors’ equipment product cycles, which can
range to three years or more. Lack of standard, open interfaces limits the ability of
network operators to tailor the network to their individual environments. This
mismatch between market requirements and network capabilities has brought the

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industry to a tipping point. In response, the industry has created the Software-Defined
Networking (SDN) architecture and is developing associated standards.

4.5 SDN Architecture is:

 DIRECTLY PROGRAMMABLE: Network control is directly

programmable because it is decoupled from forwarding functions.

 AGILE: Abstracting control from forwarding lets administrators

dynamically adjust network-wide traffic flow to meet changing needs.

 CENTRALLY MANAGED: Network intelligence is (logically)

centralized in software-based SDN controllers that maintain a global view of
the network, which appears to applications and policy engines as a single,
logical switch.

 PROGRAMMATICALLY CONFIGURED: SDN lets network

managers configure, manage, secure, and optimize network resources very
quickly via dynamic, automated SDN programs, which they can write
themselves because the programs do not depend on proprietary software.

 OPEN STANDARDS-BASED AND VENDOR-NEUTRAL:

When implemented through open standards, SDN simplifies network design
and operation because instructions are provided by SDN controllers instead of
multiple, vendor-specific devices and protocols.

4.6 Trends that are driving the shift towards need for an easily
manageable and programmable network infrastructure:

1. Changing traffic patterns: The change in the traffic patterns across

the enterprise data centre is becoming increasingly challenging now. The
Internet is expanding its reach more than ever now and more people are
getting connected to it every day. This necessitates all businesses to have

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robust and flexible traffic management set up in place, with which they
can easily control the flow of traffic and provide for better user
experience.

2. Increasing demand for cloud services by users: Cloud-based

services are in great demand all over the world. Businesses now want to
provide for this increasing demand for cloud services and get over the
limitations of accessing geographically separated data centres and
servers.

3. IT Consumerization: Another important reason that vouches for the need

of a software-defined network is the emergence of IT consumerization. The
use of devices and applications for both personal and business use is quite
common today and it’s on a hike. Businesses today are driven by a workforce
that supports the use of personal devices for business purposes. Only a
flexible and secure network can be able to accommodate emerging trends like
“Bring Your Own Device” (BYOD) and ‘Work from Home’.

4. Challenge of handling ‘Big Data’: When so much of change

happens, the data being generated will also be BIG. To be able to cope
with such exponential size of data that gets created every hour, an easily
scalable bandwidth is required. This is another factor that calls for a
software-defined network.

5. Continued dependence on vendors for scalability and

optimization: When it comes to adding features, the traditional
networks force you to depend on the vendors and sometimes it is even
impossible to scale up unless you purchase new upgrades. This leads to
wastage of time and resources, as you’ll have to wait on the upgradation
process according to the vendor’s timeline.

4.7 How does SDN support edge computing, IoT and remote
access?

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A variety of networking trends have played into the central idea of SDN.
Distributing computing power to remote sites, moving data center functions to
the edge, adopting cloud computing, and supporting the Internet of Things
environments – each of these efforts can be made easier and more cost efficient via a
properly configured SDN environment.

Typically, in an SDN environment, customers can see all of their devices and TCP
flows, which means they can slice up the network from the data or management plane
to support a variety of applications and configurations. So, users can more easily
segment an IoT application from the production world if they want, for example.

Some SDN controllers have the smarts to see that the network is getting congested
and, in response, pump up bandwidth or processing to make sure remote and edge
components don’t suffer latency.

SDN technologies also help in distributed locations that have few IT personnel on
site, such as an enterprise branch office or service provider central office, said
Michael Bushong, vice president of enterprise and cloud marketing at Juniper
Networks.

"Naturally these places require remote and centralized delivery of connectivity,

visibility, and security. SDN solutions that centralize and abstract control and
automate workflows across many places in the network, and their devices, improve
operational reliability, speed, and experience," Bushong said.

4.8 How does SDN help customers with security?

SDN enables a variety of security benefits. A customer can split up a network

connection between an end user and the data center and have different security
settings for the various types of network traffic. A network could have one public-
facing, low-security network that does not touch any sensitive information. Another
segment could have much more fine-grained remote access control with software-
based firewall and encryption policies on it, which allow sensitive data to traverse
over it.

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For example, if a customer has an IoT group it doesn’t feel is all that mature with
regards to security, via the SDN controller you can segment that group off away from
the critical high-value corporate traffic. SDN users can roll out security policies
across the network from the data center to the edge and if you do all of this on top of
white boxes, deployments can be 30 – 60 percent cheaper than traditional gear. The
ability to look at a set of workloads and see if they match a given security policy is a
key benefit of SDN, especially as data is distributed. A growing number of SDN
platforms now support micro-segmentation. In fact, micro-segmentation has
developed as a notable use case for SDN. As SDN platforms are extended to support
multi-cloud environments, they will be used to mitigate the inherent complexity of
establishing and maintaining consistent network and security policies across hybrid
IT landscapes.

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CHAPTER 5

LITERATURE SURVEY

[1] Casado M., Koponen T., Shenker S., & Tootoonchian A. (2012). A
retrospective on evolving SDN

This paper begins by describing traditional network designs, and the

need for a new paradigm, which is: (a) simple, (b) vendor-neutral, (c) future-
proof, and (d) flexible. According to the authors, these elements are not
satisfied in today’s network infrastructure. It goes on to address the emergence
of multi-protocol label switching (MPLS), as a major step in the right
direction to following this new paradigm but is lacking in certain key areas. In
the area of network design, three relevant interfaces are identified: (a) host—
network, (b) operator—network, and (c) packet—switch. The host- --network
interface is how a host, such as a server, informs the network of its
requirements. The operator—network interface is how operators, or network
managers, inform the network of their requirements, through manual
configuration or SDN. The packet—switch interface is how a packet, the
actual network traffic, identifies itself to the network switch. From here the
techniques by which the original Internet, MPLS and software-defined
networking implement these interfaces are compared, with emphasis on how
the later overcomes the deficiencies of the first two.

[2] Mohammad Mousa, Ayman Bahaa-Eldin, and Mohamed Sobh-Software

Defined Networking concepts and challenges.

Software Defined Networking (SDN) is an emerging networking paradigm

that greatly simplifies network management tasks. In addition, it opens the
door for network innovation through a programmable flexible interface
controlling the behaviour of the entire network. In the opposite side, for
decades traditional IP networks were very hard to manage, error-prone and
hard to introduce new functionalities. In this paper, we introduce the concepts

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& applications of SDN with a focus on the open research challenges in this
new technology.

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CHAPTER 6

A UNIFIED FRAMEWORK FOR SOFTWARE

DEFINED SENSING, TRANSMISSION AND
COMPUTING
Railway sensing applications can dedicate acquiring, transmitting, and computing
data for their own. The architecture makes control and manages the physical
infrastructure flexible, at the same time simplifies the application development
process.

The in-cessation trend of railways ramification calls for railway sensing on an urgent
basis. Railway sense is required to keep suspecting potential danger in large scope
and provide a safe transportation environment. The fundamental infrastructure to
realize railway sensing comprises of space and terrestrial integrated networks (STIN)
nodes, such as high-speed railway, trackside equipment, unmanned aerial vehicle,
airship, and remote sensing satellite. This architecture needs to support diverse
applications flexible and ensure efficient infrastructure management. Inspired by the
philosophy of software-defined network, which attempts to give more flexibility to
networks, a software-defined sensing and integrated architecture for such network is
proposed. Railway sensing application from the physical infrastructure is decoupled.
Besides, centralized controllers to manage physical facilities and supply APIs of data
processing, include acquisition, transmission, computation, and storage is designed.
Various applications can share a common infrastructure with such properties, and
each of this application can customize its data acquisition, transmission, and
computing by requesting APIs of controllers.

The below figure comprises of three layers including layers of physical infrastructure,
control, and application:

Physical Infrastructure Layer: This layer includes three types of physical

entities such as sensor platforms, network nodes, computer & storage nodes. The
sensor platform includes a terrestrial sensor platform, a train sensing platform, and an

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air sensing platform. The network nodes include UAV, airship, remote sensing
satellites, terrestrial stations, and switches/routers. Computing and storage nodes
include locomotive, onboard, and standard servers. With the basic functions and
resources, these types of equipment can sense the environment of the rail
transmission network, transfer data between nodes, and extract the information in
need for processing. Whereas they do not decide the action, instead, they receive
decisions from the control layer through the southbound interface.

Control Layer: The control layer connects both of the two layers: infrastructure
and application. It manages physical devices through southbound interfaces and
provides the application with various services through northbound. Besides, it can
furnish applications the services of data acquisition, transmission, and processing.

Application layer: Developers use the provided APIs to build railway sensing
programs. For example, they can pre-set the process of data collection, transmission,
calculation, and storage without changing the configuration in the physical device,
which greatly reduces the developing period of a new application. In addition,
CAPEX will be greatly reduced by sharing physical infrastructure.

Figure 6.1: Architecture of software-defined sensing, transmission, and computing.

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SOFTWARE DEFINED NETWORK

. The in-cessation trend of railways ramification calls for railway sensing on an urgent
basis. Railway sense is required to keep suspecting potential danger in large scope
and provide a safe transportation environment. The fundamental infrastructure to
realize railway sensing comprises of space and terrestrial integrated networks (STIN)
nodes, such as high-speed railway, trackside equipment, unmanned aerial vehicle,
airship, and remote sensing satellite. This architecture needs to support diverse
applications flexible and ensure efficient infrastructure management. Inspired by the
philosophy of software-defined network, which attempts to give more flexibility to
networks, a software-defined sensing and integrated architecture for such network is
proposed. Railway sensing application from the physical infrastructure is decoupled.
Besides, centralized controllers to manage physical facilities and supply APIs of data
processing, include acquisition, transmission, computation, and storage is designed.
Various applications can share a common infrastructure with such properties, and
each of these applications can customize its data acquisition, transmission, and
computing by requesting APIs of controllers.

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CHAPTER 7

SDN APPLICATION IN VARIOUS FIELD

Internet of Things: The merging of SDN and IOT bring exciting platforms. SDN
has the capacity to beautifully distribute the traffic and handle the zillions of data
emerging from the device that is being linked to the IOT7. SDN follows the
segmentation process to handle the data arising from the network. It divides the
complete IOT network into small segments and each part can be controlled by
different controller so as to make the network function run smoothly. SDN linked
IOT network serves better for security concerns as it has the global view of the
network.

Cloud computing: The number of data released by the network is too big to
handle. It gives rise to the concept of cloud; networks create a cloud. Due to the large
space needed for storing applications, these applications may need to modify before
storing in the cloud. SDN makes it possible by the help of a centralized controller,
that is configured by software related protocols.

Wireless and mobile network: The contribution of SDN in the wireless

network is known as SDWN i.e. software defined the wireless network. The
researchers have studied the Open-flow proposed by the whitepaper. Open-flow is
based on the Ethernet switch, consist of flow table with the capacity of adding or
removing flow entries. Deployment of SDN in the wireless network provides
seamless handover between different wireless technologies by the embedding of
Open-road. SDN supports the flow centric model that helps in resolving the problem
of node migration by implementing functions and making it configurable at higher
layer10. The SDN architecture is open and sharable between different service
providers and employs test-bed using Open-flow such as Wifi and WiMAX.

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CHAPTER 8

SOFTWARE DEFINED NETWORKING USE

CASES
Software-Defined Networking offers several benefits for businesses trying to
move into a virtual environment. There is a multitude of use cases for different
organizations, including carrier and service providers, cloud computing and data
centers, as well as enterprise campuses.

For carrier and service providers, Software-Defined Networking offers bandwidth-on-

demand, which gives controls on carrier links to request additional bandwidth when
necessary, as well as WAN optimization and bandwidth calendaring. For cloud
computing and data centers, network virtualization for multi-tenants is an important
use case as it offers better utilization of resources and faster turnaround times for
creating a segregated network. Enterprise campuses experience network access
control and network monitoring when using Software-Defined Networking policies.

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CHAPTER 9

BENEFITS OF SDN

With SDN, an administrator can change any network switch's rules when necessary --
prioritizing, deprioritizing or even blocking specific types of packets with a granular
level of control and security. This is especially helpful in a cloud computing multi-
tenant architecture because it enables the administrator to manage traffic loads in a
flexible and more efficient manner. Essentially, this enables the administrator to use
less expensive commodity switches and have more control over network traffic flow
than ever before.

Other benefits of SDN are network management and end-to-end visibility. A network
administrator needs only deal with one centralized controller to distribute policies to
the connected switches, instead of configuring multiple individual devices. This
capability is also a security advantage because the controller can monitor traffic and
deploy security policies. If the controller deems traffic suspicious, for example, it can
reroute or drop the packets.

SDN also virtualizes hardware and services that were previously carried out by
dedicated hardware, resulting in the touted benefits of a reduced hardware footprint
and lower operational costs.

Additionally, software-defined networking contributed to the emergence of software-

defined wide area network technology. SD-WAN employs the virtual overlay aspect
of SDN technology, abstracting an organization's connectivity links throughout its
WAN and creating a virtual network that can use whichever connection the controller
deems fit to send traffic.

There’s a reason IDC estimates that the worldwide data centre SDN market will be
worth more than $12 billion in 2022. Compared to the advancements in computer and
storage virtualization, traditional networking has fallen behind in fully realizing the
promise of enterprise cloud computing. The dynamic nature of cloud services requires

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a new level of flexibility and scalability, which goes beyond the capabilities of
today's data centre networks.

Transitioning to software-defined networking (SDN) incorporates programmability

and agility into your network, enabling it to keep pace with business demands.

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CHAPTER 10

CHALLENGES WITH SDN

Security is both a benefit and a concern with SDN technology. The centralized SDN
controller presents a single point of failure and, if targeted by an attacker, can prove
detrimental to the network.

Ironically, another challenge with SDN is there's really no established definition

of software-defined networking in the networking industry. Different vendors offer
various approaches to SDN, ranging from hardware-centric models and virtualization
platforms to hyper-converged networking designs and controllerless methods.

Some networking initiatives are often mistaken for SDN, including white box
networking, network disaggregation, network automation, and programmable
networking. While SDN can benefit and work with these technologies and processes,
it remains a separate technology.

SDN technology emerged with a lot of hype around 2011 when it was introduced
alongside the OpenFlow protocol. Since then, adoption has been relatively slow,
especially among enterprises that have smaller networks and fewer resources. Also,
many enterprises cite the cost of SDN deployment to be a deterring factor.

Main adopters of SDN include service providers, network operators, telecoms and
carriers, along with large companies, like Facebook and Google, all of which have the
resources to tackle and contribute to emerging technology.

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CHAPTER 11

FUTURE OF SDN
Previous attempts for redesigning the network architecture have shown that very
promising technologies can fail due to lack of the proper conditions, while success
depends on a number of factors from finding compelling use cases for the emerging
technology to managing its adoption not only by the research community but by the
industry as well. The way that SDN deals with these matters makes it a very
promising candidate for being the next major disruption in the networking field. The
benefits of applying the SDN principles in different types of networks, the unification
of heterogeneous environments and the wide number of applications that this
paradigm offers demonstrate its very high potential to become a major driving force
commercially in the very near future especially for cloud-service providers, network
operators and mobile carriers. It remains to be seen whether these predictions will be
confirmed and to what extent SDN will deliver its promises.

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CHAPTER 12

CONCLUSION
SDN has gained significant momentum in both the research community and in
the industry. It is going to become the new approach for networking. Although SDN
has its own limitations and challenges, it offers other significant benefits and cost
savings such as its programmability, providing a global view of the whole network,
providing more flexibility & control to researchers & network administrators,
network equipment vendor independence and eliminating middleboxes. Future work
can involve improving the security of SDN and enhancing the controller design for
scalability, resilience, and robustness.
In the future, networking will rely more on software to pick up the pace the
innovations in networks.

SDN can transform today's static networks into more flexible, programmable
platforms to provide scalability to support large data centres. It will also provide
virtualization that is needed to support an automated, dynamic and secure cloud
environment.

The Open Networking Foundation has fostered a vibrant ecosystem around SDN that
spans infrastructure vendors large and small, including application developers,
software companies, systems, and semiconductor manufacturers, and computer
companies, plus various kinds of end users. OpenFlow switching is already being
incorporated into a number of infrastructure designs, both physical and virtual, as
well as SDN controller software. Network services and business applications already
interface with SDN controllers, providing better integration and coordination between
them. The future of networking will rely more and more on software, which will
accelerate the pace of innovation for networks as it has in the computing and storage
domains. SDN promises to transform today’s static networks into flexible,
programmable platforms with the intelligence to allocate resources dynamically, the
scale to support enormous data centres and the virtualization needed to support
dynamic, highly automated, and secure cloud environments. With its many

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advantages and astonishing industry momentum, SDN is on the way to becoming the
new norm for networks.

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