SDNetkit: A testbed for experimenting SDN in multi-domain networks

摘要

Mininet is the de-facto standard simulation environment for experimenting with SDN enabled networks based on the OpenFlow protocol. Although Mininet is powerful and not resource hungry, it has a strong limitation: it is not possible to use it for networks in which both OpenFlow and standard distributed routing protocols (e.g. Open Short Path First, OSPF) simultaneously run. In this paper we present SDNetkit, an enhanced release of the widely used Netkit network emulator that overcomes the limitation imposed by Mininet. We improved Netkit by adding all needed software to run OpenFlow based networks (e.g. OpenVSwitch and the Ryu framework). We show two use cases in which OpenFlow and standard protocols coexist. In particular, we address interoperability problems by presenting one use case in which OpenFlow nodes interact with standard ones (e.g. OSPF routers) in multi-domain networks, as well as one use case in which the OpenFlow protocol and OSPF run on the same machine, discussing some problems related to specific configurations. We believe that having the possibility to experiment SDN also in presence of interoperability scenarios results in opening to new research perspectives.