SOFTWARE-DEFINED NETWORKING (SDN)

The flexibility and general programmability offered by the Software Defined Networking (SDN) technology has
supposed a disruption in the evolution of the network. It offers enormous benefits to network control and
opens new ways of communication by defining powerful but simple switching elements (forwarders) that can
use any single field of a packet or message to determine the outgoing port to which it will be forwarded. Such
benefits can be applied to the Internet of Things (IoT) and thus resolve some of the main challenges it exposes,
such as the ability to let devices connected to heterogeneous networks to communicate each other.

The spread of the Internet of Things (IoT) concept has imposed new complex requirements to both networking
and internetworking schemes in current and future networks, specially the Internet. To make it real, networks
must welcome heterogeneity, not just in devices but also in networking behaviour and underlying protocols.
This is because each IoT object (device or thing) has been configured, or even designed, to accomplish specific
objectives. Moreover, the entire environment where some objects are deployed is usually designed with a
specific objective. At the end, IoT implies the broad interconnection of several heterogeneous networks, the
objects that compose them, the environments where they are running, the upper and lower layer protocols they
are using, and even the disparate objectives they have.

Proposed Approach

The first step in the design of the integration of SDN and IoT is to gather and analyze the different types of
workloads that IoT elements will push to the network. This is the key aspect of the design and will determine
the structure and modularity level of the IoT Controller. This is a high level controller that is connected to the
SDN controller to interact with it and thus model the underlying network behavior and response to IoT
operations.

The general view of the integration of SDN and IoT , as shown in Figure 1, includes a minimum set of functional
blocks, differentiated by the actor and plane to which they pertain, that is object or network, data or control
plane. Thus, two objects connected to an SDN-enabled network will be able to interact with the IoT controller
by using their internal IoT agents. The objective is to provide context information to the controller for it to take
the necessary decisions and reflect them into the underlying network. Although the IoT controller is depicted
as just one functional block, it is internally modular so new functionality can be added to the IoT overlay
without affecting other elements, neither needing to establish new relations with the SDN controller.

In current network architectures and protocols, a normal communication begins when a network object, the
requester, asks the network to send a data packet or message of some type to another network object, the
responder. Before this can take place, the requester has to know the identifier or address of the responder, and
it has to be specified into the transaction. This model applicable to most protocols, including IoT protocols.

For such communication, the network establishes a path from the requester to the responder. Such path may be
logical (establishing a persistent connection or circuit) or virtual (merely following routing tables). Here is
where SDN enters into the game to allow objects relying on different (and thus heterogeneous) protocols to
talk to each other. Thus, SDN mechanisms can be used to establish a path that connects both endpoints. Here it
is called a forwarding path and it is achieved by setting up the necessary forwarding rules into all forwarding
elements found in such path.

At this point is where the IoT controller finds its role. It has to receive the communication interest
from the requester, find the responder in the network graph, calculate the path using some routing
algorithm, build the forwarding rules depending on the nature of the protocols used by the objects,
and finally communicating such rules to the SDN controller for it to set them into the forwarders.
With the immense increase in IoT devices huge amount of data is generated and collected which impede
monitoring, management, controlling and securing IoT devices in a heterogeneous network and become a
critical issue for researchers and developers. Traditional network does not completely support heterogeneity,
which limits IoT benefits full realisation. In addition, the services demand and customers require fast
development and deployment that is still an issue in a traditional network. The innovation in the legacy
network is very slow due to the proprietary nature of devices. Therefore, a change in the traditional network
infrastructure and devices is mandatory to realise full benefits of IoTs. IoT can leverage full benefits from the
integrated architecture of such technologies.

In a traditional network, the devices and the equipment are usually proprietary entities, are physically
distributed and control function is hard-coded. The network operator has to do configuration of the individual
network device as per service layer agreements (SLAs) and cannot be programmed otherwise. The complexity
increases due to the vertical integration of network architecture. The control plane and the data plane are
bundled inside the networking devices, reducing flexibility and hindering innovation and evolution of the
networking infrastructure. Any change in the network is expensive in term of time, and cost.

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. This architecture
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.

BASIC CONCEPT OF SDN

1. separate the control logic from the hardware switches

2. Define the control logic in a centralized manner. So, the everyday all this control functions are going to
be centralized.
3. Control the inter network including the individual switches in a centralized manner.
4. Communication between the application the control and the data plans are done through different
APIs..
 The 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.
Software-defined networking (SDN) is an umbrella term encompassing several kinds of network technology
aimed at making the network as agile and flexible as the virtualized server and storage infrastructure of the
modern data center. The goal of SDN is to allow network engineers and administrators to respond quickly to
changing business requirements. In a software-defined network, a network administrator can traffic from a
centralized control console without having to touch individual switches, and can deliver services to wherever
they are needed in the network, without regard to what specific devices a server or
other hardware components are connected to. The key technologies for SDN implementation are functional
separation, network virtualization and automation through programmability.
In SDN, the control plane is decoupled from forwarding plane and communication between two planes is done
through using Southbound and Northbound APIs. SDN is basically layer architecture consists of three layers

1). Device layer or data plane

2). Control plane

3). Application layer.

The customer needs are abstracted over application layer which is communicated to the controller via
Northbound APIs e.g., RESTfull API. The control layer or controller is centralised part of the SDN network and
act as a brain of the network. The controller manages the whole network and possesses a global view of the
network. All applications/programs run above the controller. Many controllers are in the market from its
inception such as ONOS, Open daylight, Floodlight, NOX [3], POX, Trema etc. SDN controller define rule for the
incoming flows from the data plane.

SDN do not increase the performance of the network rather it provides flexibility in network configuration and
resource management. On the contrary, SDN can lead to performance degradation in case of providing high
level of abstraction.

SDN ARCHITECTURE

SDN is a layered architecture, consisting of three basic layers;

 application/services layer,
 controller layer (control plane),
 data plane layer called forwarding layer consisting of forwarding devices.
These SDN layers communicate with each other via open APIs

SDN architectural components

Application layer (AP): The application plane also called management plane consist of applications that
leverage the functions offered to implement network control and operation logic. Essentially, a management
application defines the policies, which are ultimately translated to southbound-specific instructions that
program the behaviour of the forwarding devices.

Control Plane (CP): Control plane is the decoupled entity from the distributed forwarding devices and logically
centralised on a server. CP programs the forwarding devices through southbound interfaces. CP defines
rules/instruction set for forwarding devices hence control plane is the network brain and all control logic rests
in the applications and controllers, which form the control plane.
Data Plane (DP)/Forwarding Plane: Forwarding devices (routers, switches, gateways etc.) are interconnected
through a physical medium such as wireless radio channels or wired cables. And defined a physical
interconnection within a network

The basis of SDN is virtualization, which in its most simplistic form allows software to run separately from the
underlying hardware. Virtualization has made cloud computing possible and now allows data enters to
dynamically provision IT resources exactly where they are needed, on the fly. To keep up with the speed and
complexity of all this split-second processing, the network must also adapt, becoming more flexible and
automatically responsive. We can apply the idea of virtualization to the network as well, separating the function
of traffic control from the network hardware, resulting in SDN.
Basic SDN architecture
An SDN architecture consists of three layers. At the top is the application layer, which includes applications
that deliver services, such as switch/network virtualization, firewalls, and flow balancers. These are abstracted
from the bottom layer, which is the underlying physical network layer. In between lies the SDN controller,
the most critical element of SDN. The controller removes the control plane from the network hardware and
runs it as software, but must integrate with all the physical and virtual devices in the network. In this way, the
controller facilitates automated network management and makes it easier to integrate and administer business
applications.

What is Openflow?

OpenFlow is a Layer 2 communications protocol that gives access to the forwarding plane of a network
switch or router over the network