Providing CCN functionalities over OpenFlow switches

Content-Centric Networking (CCN) and Software-Defined Networking (SDN) are gathering special attention from academia and industry and are perceived as a potential future of networking. Providing CCN functionalities over SDN devices is an important requirement to enable the innovation and optimization of network resources. However, current SDN devices like OpenFlow switches do not support CCN functionalities such as name forwarding and caching. In this paper, we propose an approach to provide CCN functionalities over OpenFlow switches without having to change OpenFlow, by adding an abstraction layer, called the Wrapper, between OpenFlow and CCN. The preliminary results performed with CCNx, the reference CCN implementation, show the feasibility and the low overhead of this approach

Efficient caching through stateful SDN in named data networking

Named data networking (NDN) is an innovative paradigm to provide content-based services in future networks. As compared with legacy networks, naming of network packets and in-network caching of content make NDN more feasible for content dissemination. However, the implementation of NDN requires drastic changes to the existing network infrastructure. One feasible approach is to use software-defined networking (SDN), according to which the control of the network is delegated to a centralized controller, which configures the forwarding data plane. This approach leads to large signaling overhead and large end-to-end delays. In order to overcome these issues, we propose to enable NDN using a stateful data plane in the SDN network. In particular, we realize the functionality of an NDN node using a stateful SDN switch attached with a local cache for content storage and use OpenState to implement such an approach. In our solution, no involvement of the controller is required once the OpenState switch has been configured. We benchmark the performance of our solution against the traditional SDN approach considering several relevant metrics. Experimental results highlight the benefits of a stateful approach and of our implementation, which avoids signaling overhead and significantly reduces end-to-end delays.This work is partially supported by the H2020 5G-TRANSFORMER project (grant no. 761536) and the H2020 HIGHTS project (grant no. 636537). EURECOM acknowledges the support of its industrial members, namely, BMW Group, IABG, Monaco Telecom, Orange, SAP, ST Microelectronics, and Symantec

Network Mobility Management Challenges, Directions, and Solutions: An Architectural Perspective

Efficient mobility management solutions are essential to provide users with seamless connectivity and session continuity during movement. However, user mobility was not envisaged as one of the early Internet’s use cases due to the early adoption of destination based routing and the assumption that end-nodes are static. This has become a critical hinder for providing efficient mobility support. This paper presents the challenges, drivers, and solutions that aim to overcome the drawbacks of current mobility management approaches. Furthermore, it introduces a promising solution that builds on emerging path-based forwarding architectures that identify network links rather than end nodes. Delivery path information is stored inside the packet while forwarding is achieved by performing a simple set membership test rather than the current destination-based routing approach. Mobility management in these architectures simply requires partial recomputation of the delivery path allowing for efficient mobility support over an optimal path. Evaluation results show significant cost savings in terms of delivery paths and end-to-end packet delay when using a path forwarding architecture

Network Mobility Management Challenges, Directions, and Solutions: An Architectural Perspective

Efficient mobility management solutions are essential to provide users with seamless connectivity and session continuity during movement. However, user mobility was not envisaged as one of the early Internet's use cases due to the early adoption of destination based routing and the assumption that end-nodes are static. This has become a critical hinder for providing efficient mobility support. This paper presents the challenges, drivers, and solutions that aim to overcome the drawbacks of current mobility management approaches. Furthermore, it introduces a promising solution that builds on emerging path-based forwarding architectures that identify network links rather than end nodes. Delivery path information is stored inside the packet while forwarding is achieved by performing a simple set membership test rather than the current destination-based routing approach. Mobility management in these architectures simply requires partial recomputation of the delivery path allowing for efficient mobility support over an optimal path. Evaluation results show significant cost savings in terms of delivery paths and end-to-end packet delay when using a path forwarding architecture

Network Mobility Management Challenges, Directions, and Solutions: An Architectural Perspective

Efficient mobility management solutions are essential to provide users with seamless connectivity and session continuity during movement. However, user mobility was not envisaged as one of the early Internet’s use cases due to the early adoption of destination based routing and the assumption that end-nodes are static. This has become a critical hinder for providing efficient mobility support. This paper presents the challenges, drivers, and solutions that aim to overcome the drawbacks of current mobility management approaches. Furthermore, it introduces a promising solution that builds on emerging path-based forwarding architectures that identify network links rather than end nodes. Delivery path information is stored inside the packet while forwarding is achieved by performing a simple set membership test rather than the current destination-based routing approach. Mobility management in these architectures simply requires partial recomputation of the delivery path allowing for efficient mobility support over an optimal path. Evaluation results show significant cost savings in terms of delivery paths and end-to-end packet delay when using a path forwarding architecture

Simulating and prototyping software defined networking (SDN) using Mininet approach to optimise host communication in realistic programmable networking environment

In this project, two tests were performed. On the first test, Mininet-WiFi was used to simulate a Software Defined Network to demonstrate Mininet-WiFi’ s ability to be used as the Software Defined Network emulator which can also be integrated to the existing network using a Network Virtualized Function (NVF). A typical organization’s computer network was simulated which consisted of a website hosted on the LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP) virtual machine, and an F5 application delivery controller (ADC) which provided load balancing of requests sent to the web applications. A website page request was sent from the virtual stations inside Mininet-WiFi. The request was received by the application delivery controller, which then used round robin technique to send the request to one of the web servers on the LAMP virtual machine. The web server then returned the requested website to the requesting virtual stations using the simulated virtual network. The significance of these results is that it presents Mininet-WiFi as an emulator, which can be integrated into a real programmable networking environment offering a portable, cost effective and easily deployable testing network, which can be run on a single computer. These results are also beneficial to modern network deployments as the live network devices can also communicate with the testing environment for the data center, cloud and mobile provides. On the second test, a Software Defined Network was created in Mininet using python script. An external interface was added to enable communication with the network outside of Mininet. The amazon web services elastic computing cloud was used to host an OpenDaylight controller. This controller is used as a control plane device for the virtual switch within Mininet. In order to test the network, a webserver hosted on the Emulated Virtual Environment – Next Generation (EVENG) software is connected to Mininet. EVE-NG is the Emulated Virtual Environment for networking. It provides tools to be able to model virtual devices and interconnect them with other virtual or physical devices. The OpenDaylight controller was able to create the flows to facilitate communication between the hosts in Mininet and the webserver in the real-life network.Electrical and Mining EngineeringM. Tech. (Electrical Engineering

Caching Techniques in Next Generation Cellular Networks

Content caching will be an essential feature in the next generations of cellular networks. Indeed, a network equipped with caching capabilities allows users to retrieve content with reduced access delays and consequently reduces the traffic passing through the network backhaul. However, the deployment of the caching nodes in the network is hindered by the following two challenges. First, the storage space of a cache is limited as well as expensive. So, it is not possible to store in the cache every content that can be possibly requested by the user. This calls for efficient techniques to determine the contents that must be stored in the cache. Second, efficient ways are needed to implement and control the caching node. In this thesis, we investigate caching techniques focussing to address the above-mentioned challenges, so that the overall system performance is increased. In order to tackle the challenge of the limited storage capacity, smart proactive caching strategies are needed. In the context of vehicular users served by edge nodes, we believe a caching strategy should be adapted to the mobility characteristics of the cars. In this regard, we propose a scheme called RICH (RoadsIde CacHe), which optimally caches content at the edge nodes where connected vehicles require it most. In particular, our scheme is designed to ensure in-order delivery of content chunks to end users. Unlike blind popularity decisions, the probabilistic caching used by RICH considers vehicular trajectory predictions as well as content service time by edge nodes. We evaluate our approach on realistic mobility datasets against a popularity-based edge approach called POP, and a mobility-aware caching strategy known as netPredict. In terms of content availability, our RICH edge caching scheme provides an enhancement of up to 33% and 190% when compared with netPredict and POP respectively. At the same time, the backhaul penalty bandwidth is reduced by a factor ranging between 57% and 70%. Caching node is an also a key component in Named Data Networking (NDN) that is an innovative paradigm to provide content based services in future networks. As compared to legacy networks, naming of network packets and in-network caching of content make NDN more feasible for content dissemination. However, the implementation of NDN requires drastic changes to the existing network infrastructure. One feasible approach is to use Software Defined Networking (SDN), according to which the control of the network is delegated to a centralized controller, which configures the forwarding data plane. This approach leads to large signaling overhead as well as large end-to-end (e2e) delays. In order to overcome these issues, in this work, we provide an efficient way to implement and control the NDN node. We propose to enable NDN using a stateful data plane in the SDN network. In particular, we realize the functionality of an NDN node using a stateful SDN switch attached with a local cache for content storage, and use OpenState to implement such an approach. In our solution, no involvement of the controller is required once the OpenState switch has been configured. We benchmark the performance of our solution against the traditional SDN approach considering several relevant metrics. Experimental results highlight the benefits of a stateful approach and of our implementation, which avoids signaling overhead and significantly reduces e2e delays

A Survey of Software-Defined Networking: Past, Present, and Future of Programmable Networks

accepted in IEEE Communications Surveys & TutorialsInternational audienceThe idea of programmable networks has recently re-gained considerable momentum due to the emergence of the Software-Defined Networking (SDN) paradigm. SDN, often referred to as a ''radical new idea in networking'', promises to dramatically simplify network management and enable innovation through network programmability. This paper surveys the state-of-the-art in programmable networks with an emphasis on SDN. We provide a historic perspective of programmable networks from early ideas to recent developments. Then we present the SDN architecture and the OpenFlow standard in particular, discuss current alternatives for implementation and testing of SDN-based protocols and services, examine current and future SDN applications, and explore promising research directions based on the SDN paradigm