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Software Defined Networking (SDN) Challenges, issues and Solution

Article  in  INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF COMPUTER SCIENCES AND ENGINEERING · January 2019

DOI: 10.26438/ijcse/v7i1.884889

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 International Journal of Computer Sciences and Engineering Open Access
Research Paper Vol.-7, Issue-1, Jan 2019 E-ISSN: 2347-2693

Software Defined Networking (SDN) Challenges, issues and Solution

Deepak Singh Rana1*, Shiv Ashish Dhondiyal2, Sushil Kumar Chamoli3

1
Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Graphic Era Hill University, Dehradun, India
2
Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Graphic Era Deemed to be University, Dehradun, India
3
Department of Computer Science, Uttarakhand Sanskrit University, Haridwar, India
*
Corresponding Author: deepakranageu@gmail.com Tel.: +91-9719924551

Available online at: www.ijcseonline.org

Accepted: 10/Dec/2018, Published: 31/Jan/2019

Abstract— IT infrastructure and its maintenance processes are changing in different organizations by the advent of cloud
computing and may be able to eliminate their existing hardware. In traditional way of configuring a switch or routers may
error-prone and cannot fully utilize the capability of existing network infrastructure. SDN is a way of providing
programmability for network application development by its distinguished features decoupling the control plane from the data
plane. In this paper we focused on the new concept in computer networking field, software defined network (SDN) and its
challenges, issues, solutions. First, we provided and cover its basic model and software used to build a computer network with
the help of software defined network mechanism then software tools used are listed, challenges and issues are described.

Keywords— SDN, OPENFLOW, Performance, Security, CDDA.

I. INTRODUCTION customers look to build new SDN infrastructure from the

ground up [2].
As the name suggest software defined networking (SDN), it SDN suggests centralizing network intelligence in one
is a computer network which implemented, manage and network component by disassociating the forwarding process
made by a software (programmatically). It is a technology of network packets (data plane) from the routing process
that implements the functionality of a computer network by (control plane).
specific software like OPEN-FLOW, CDDA etc. It is an
approach in networking era/field where network is The control plane consists of one or more controllers which
implemented, maintained programmatically with less number are considered as the brain of SDN network where the whole
of physical components to facilitate the network requirement intelligence is incorporated. However, the intelligence
of any organization. Network troubleshooting and its centralization has its own drawbacks when it comes to
performance is controlled and configured by this software security [2][5] scalability and elasticity [3] and this is the
which is defined for various purposes. Due to slow to main issue of SDN.
change, expensive, limitations and variable IT requirements
of traditional computer networks prevents many II. NEED OF SDN
organizations form innovating the full value of their IT
investments [1] software defined networking offers In traditional networking system dedicated hardware devices
numerous benefits including on-demand provisioning, like switch, router, firewall and any other devices like hub
automated load balancing, streamlined physical infrastructure are configured manually by the IT system
and the ability to scale network resources in lockstep with managers/administrators and are fully responsible for
application and data needs [2]. ensuring each device is updated with the latest configuration
settings.
Legacy network infrastructure is typically a mix of vendor
solutions, platforms and protocol solutions making the Traditional networking solutions are in steady decline
ultimate goal of an integrated network ecosystem a difficult because of new technology like cloud computing and
process for many organizations. According to Enterprise virtualization in the market, by which we can have
Networking Planet, it is feasible, though perhaps not optimal centralized data and operations to take place to give high
to implement software defined networking on existing availability and operations to end users.
physical infrastructure. Today the enterprise and large

© 2019, IJCSE All Rights Reserved 884

 International Journal of Computer Sciences and Engineering Vol.7(1), Jan 2019, E-ISSN: 2347-2693

SDN is new perspectives on how networks are managed, is forwarding planes to enable
rapidly becoming the go to solution for those who are having innovation.
2012 OPEN FLOW This is First standard interface for
trouble overcoming the limitations of traditional networking, separating the network control and
It is by decoupling hardware from software i.e. separating the data planes.
control plane (which determines where to send traffic) from 2014 ONOS Leading Open Source SDN Controller
the data plane (which carries out these decisions and for Operators.
2017 CORD Edge Cloud solution, with 70% of
forwards traffic), SDN enables the hardware to be operators planning to deploy CORD to
controlled/managed from a centralized software application transform their networks.
that is separated from the hardware itself. Following are the
three main focused need of SDN.
V. ARCHITECTURE OF SDN
 Layered architecture with standard open standard
Interface. Architecture of the SDN describes how SDN works [5] in its
 It is more efficient since software can be easily developed various levels and how it maintains the software security and
by different vendors. reliability. There are mainly three layers in software defined
 Facilitate innovation in computer Networking, More networking: Control, Data and Application.
flexibility with programmability.
1) Control plane: The powerful plane of an SDN network
III. BENEFITS OF SDN that carries signalling traffic and responsible for routing in
the network. Packets are originated and destined for a router.
1) Future ready infrastructure Centralized configuration and management are the function
Technology innovation moves fast. A flexible and scalable of control plane of SDN. It is a logical entity in software
IT platform can mean the difference between keeping pace defined network that receives commands/instructions from
and just trying to keep up. SDN has the agility to use the the application layer and transmits them to the networking
latest cloud resources effectively and provides a framework components of SDN. The task of the controller is to extract
to support data-intensive, real-time applications. useful information from the hardware devices and
communicates back to the SDN applications with an abstract
2) Reduced hardware costs view of the network, including various activities happening
SDN uses the concept of software to build a network with in the network. Usually a software solution, the SDN
minimum required hardware, it eliminates the need from controller resides here to provide centralized control of the
manual support and configuration costs by using router and switched that populates the data plane, removing
administrative efficiency and utilization of network is the control plane from the individual devices. Different types
improved by using the concept of virtualization. of routing protocols like OSPF, EIGRP, RIP and BGP are
managed by the control plane with IPv4, IPV6 and ARP.
3) Centralized networking management
SDN has the capabilities to handle entire network form a 2) Data Plane: It is like the physical layer of OSI model,
single unit called central point, simplify the management, consist of network elements like physical and virtual devices
security of a network and allows distributing security and that deals with the data traffic. It is referred as the forwarding
policy information consistently across any organization. plane of SDN and is physically responsible for forwarding
frames of packets from its ingress to egress interface using
IV. DEVELOPMENT OF SDN the protocols used by control plane.

SDN software is continuously progressing Google, CISCO 3) Application Plane: Different application which are being
and different companies are focusing on the development of used in a business to tell the network what to do based on the
the SDN architecture and implementing in their different need of the business, controller use the APIs to pass the
business locations. CISCO APIC-EM is an SDN controller commands on router SDN switches etc. to perform the
or policy-based management and security through a single required task.
controller. Table below gives the development of SDN
software based on the requirement.

Table1. Development of SDN

Year Technology Description
2011 SDN Movement to decouple control and

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 International Journal of Computer Sciences and Engineering Vol.7(1), Jan 2019, E-ISSN: 2347-2693

EXAMPLE OF SDN USING MININET

Mininet is a simulation tool/software for the software defined

networking (SDN) developed by Bob Lantz and Brian
O’Connor, use the python API for network creation and very
much suitable for designing a SDN for an organization. It is a
network emulator which creates a network of virtual hosts,
switches, controllers, and links, hosts run standard Linux
network software, and its switches support OpenFlow for
highly flexible custom routing and Software-Defined
Networking. Mininet supports research, development,
learning, prototyping, testing, debugging, and any other tasks
that could benefit from having a complete experimental
network on a laptop or other PC, provides a virtual test bed
and development environment for software-defined networks
(SDN).
Figure 1: SDN architecture Mininet mainly consist of:
a) Isolated Hosts- A group of user-level processes
moved into a network namespace that provide exclusive
VI. SOFTWARE USED IN SDN ownership of interfaces, ports and routing tables.
To monitor and implement SDN various tools and language b) Emulated Links- Linux Traffic Control (tc)
are used below the summary of software used is given. enforces the data rate of each link to shape traffic to a
Table 2. Various software tools used in SDN configured rate. Each emulated host has its own virtual
Software Type of tool Brief working Ethernet interface(s).
ONIX SDN initiatives, For distributed c) Emulated Switches- The default Linux Bridge or
forming system for flexible the Open vSwitch running in kernel mode is used to switch
platform. computer network packets across interfaces. Switches and routers can run in the
management. kernel or in the user space.
VERIFLOW Networking Discovering the Example:
debugging tool. faults in SDN.
Routeflow Routing Inspired by SDN root@mail:/home/gehumailserver#mn
architecture concept.
provide links mininet>nodes
between source
available nodes are:
and commercial
product. CONTROLLER-0 CONTROLLER-1 CONTROLLER-2
MININET Virtual emulator Poor performance
GEHU1 GEHU2 GEHU3 GEHU4 GEHU5 GEHU6 GEHU7
provides for higher level.
environment for GEHU8 GEHU9 GEHU10 GEHU11 GEHU12 GEHU13
prototyping any GEHU14 GEHU15 GEHU16 LAB1SWITCH LAB2-
SDN Idea. SWITCH LAB3-SWITCH LAB4-SWITCH SWITCH-L1
Frenetic High level Consist query SWITCH-L2 SWITCH-L3
language for language SQL
mininet> links
programming Syntax based,
open flow Stream Processing, GEHU1-eth0<->LAB1SWITCH-eth1 (OK OK)
architecture. Specification ...................................
language. GEHU5-eth0<->LAB2-SWITCH-eth1 (OK OK)
Nettle Function reactive Facilitate network ....................................
programming. management and GEHU9-eth0<->LAB3-SWITCH-eth1 (OK OK)
support event driven
networking.

© 2019, IJCSE All Rights Reserved 886

 International Journal of Computer Sciences and Engineering Vol.7(1), Jan 2019, E-ISSN: 2347-2693

Figure 2: SDN setup in Mininet

.................................... and network as service offerings, present the various

GEHU13-eth0<->LAB4-SWITCH-eth1 (OK OK) challenges facing SDN, like scalability, reliability and
.................................... security. A Comprehensive Survey: Authors in [7] present
LAB1SWITCH-eth3<->SWITCH-L1-eth3 (OK OK) comprehensive survey on SDN in which they describe things
.................................... from introduction to motivation for SDN, describe how SDN
mininet> net is differs from traditional networking and its roots. Analysis
GEHU1 GEHU1-eth0:LAB1SWITCH-eth3 of the hardware infrastructure, southbound and northbound
................................... APIs, network virtualization layers, network operating
GEHU13 GEHU13-eth0:LAB4-SWITCH-eth3 systems (SDN controllers), network programming languages,
……………............... and network applications is described in the research.
VII. RELATED WORK A Survey on Software-Defined Networking: Authors in [8]
surveys latest developments in this active research area of
State of the art research challenges: In [6] state of the art SDN, present a generally accepted definition for SDN with
research challenges are given the aim of the research is to the two-characteristic decoupling the control plane from the
describe the benefits of using SDN in a multitude of data plane and providing programmability for network
environments such as in data centres, data centre networks, application development and presents potential benefits of

© 2019, IJCSE All Rights Reserved 887

 International Journal of Computer Sciences and Engineering Vol.7(1), Jan 2019, E-ISSN: 2347-2693

SDN. A three-layer architecture, including an infrastructure Layer 3 devices, are in the end-to-end path. The traditional
layer, a control layer, and an application layer, and LAN is Scalability is an attribute that describes the ability of a
substantiate each layer with existing research efforts and its process, network, software or organization to grow and
related research areas finally suggested open research manage increased demand. An SDN controller should be able
challenges. A Network in a laptop: in this paper rapid to support a minimum of 100 switches. It must also be able to
prototyping for software defined networks is describe, mitigate the impact of network broadcast overhead and the
creation of SDN [9] is done with the help of Mininet, interact proliferation of flow table entries [3]. Scalability is the
with another network and customization of the network is capability of a system, network, or process to handle a
done. A Survey of Software-Defined Networking Past, growing amount of work, or its potential to be enlarged to
Present, and Future of Programmable Networks: Because accommodate that growth.
of the evolution of SDN it is necessary to focus on
Low level interface: The control applications of SDN for
programmable networks that simplify management of the
network management, network policy should be developed,
network and enable innovation by adding the features in
SDN framework needs to translate these developed network
network programmatically. In [10] authors provide historic
policies into low-level configurations of the switch used. The
perspective of programmable network to recent
programming interface of the framework of the SDN must
developments, discuss current alternatives for
coordinate the multiple asynchronous events at the switches
implementation and testing of SDN-based protocols and
to perform even simple tasks.
services, examine current and future SDN applications, and
explore promising research directions based on the SDN Performance and Security: Open interfaces of the SDN
paradigm. SDN may be developed with the help of software network may bring new type of network attacks that may
like MININET, Nettle with proper software development life reduce the performance of the SDN. Security in cloud
cycle, in [13] criteria and working structure of open source computing is described and different security issues and
software is presented, different advantages and disadvantages challenges are briefly discussed by the authors in [12].
are listed by the authors.
Various D-DOS attack may down the working of networks. In
VIII. SDN CHALLENGES [15] authors describe the SYN flood attack, which may down
the server of any organization by exhausting the queue of the
TCP protocol. To manage and solutions must be in SDN
Reliability: Reliability plays a major role in any software
framework should be developed for the software integrity,
development, if any failure occurs in a system, its users
remote access management, network threat detection and
should be informed, and solution must perform automatically.
mitigation, authentication and authorization of the users.
Reliability of software is the probability that it will work
properly in a specified environment and for a specific amount ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
of time. The configuration of SDN controller must intelligent
and validate the network management to increase the The authors would like to thank the reviewers for their careful
availability of the network [3] so that errors can be prevented examination of the research paper and valuable comments and
and handle. Authors in [4] studied the reliability of ONOS, a suggestions which helped to considerably improve the quality
production-grade SDN controller, find a fault reports and of the paper. We are also thankful to the Management of
found fairly consistent behaviour across the releases, in terms Graphic Era Educational Society for always being supportive
of number of bugs, fault detection and resolution time. When and for providing such a commendable research-oriented
devices fail or stop working in legacy networks, network platform to us.
traffic is routed through alternative nearby path/nodes to
maintain flow control and continuity. In SDN only central References
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© 2019, IJCSE All Rights Reserved 888

 International Journal of Computer Sciences and Engineering Vol.7(1), Jan 2019, E-ISSN: 2347-2693

Security and Communication‖, IEEE Transaction, Vol.31, Issue.4, Authors Profile

pp.123-141, 2012.
Mr. Deepak Singh Rana has done M.Tech
[6] Manar Jammala1, TaranpreetSingha, AbdallahShamia, (Computer science and Engineering), from
RasoolAsalb, and YimingLic,‖ Software-Defined Networking.
State of the Art and Research Challenges,‖ In Computer Graphic Era University Dehradun,
Networks, vol. 72, pp. 74–98, 2014. Uttarakhand, currently working as Assistant
[7] D. Kreutz, F. M. V. Ramos, P. E. Veríssimo, C. E. Rothenberg, S. Professor in Department of Computer
Azodolmolky and S. Uhlig, "Software-Defined Networking: A Science and Engineering, Graphic Era Hill
Comprehensive Survey," in Proceedings of the IEEE, vol. 103, no. University Dehradun, Uttarakhand, India.
1, pp. 14-76, Jan. 2015.R. Solanki, ―Principle of Data Mining‖,
McGraw-Hill Publication, India, pp. 386-398, 1998.
His research interest includes computer
networks, Numerical Computation, Cyber
[8] W. Xia, Y. Wen, C. H. Foh, D. Niyato and H. Xie, "A Survey on
Software-Defined Networking," in IEEE Communications Surveys Security, Malware Analysis and Design,
& Tutorials, vol. 17, no. 1, pp. 27-51, First quarter 2015.M. Open Source Technology & ICT
Mohammad, ―Performance Impact of Addressing Modes on applications in Education. He has published
Encryption Algorithms‖, In the Proceedings of the 2001 IEEE various research papers and technical reports
International Conference on Computer Design (ICCD 2001), in International and national journals, he can
Indore, USA, pp.542-545, 2001.
be reached at deepakranageu@gmail.com.
[9] Bob Lantz, Brandon Heller, Nick McKeown, ―A Network in a
Laptop: Rapid Prototyping for Software-Defined Networks,‖ in
Hotnets-IX Proceedings of the 9th ACM SIGCOMM Workshop Mr. Shiv Ashish Dhondiyal has done
on Hot Topics in Networks Article No. 19. M.Tech (Computer science and
[10] Bruno NunesAstuto, Marc Mendonça, Xuan Nam Nguyen, Katia Engineering), from Uttarakhand Technical
Obraczka, ThierryTurletti, ‖ A Survey of Software-Defined
Networking: Past, Present, and Future of Programmable
University, He is Gold madelist in Mtech
Networks,‖Communications Surveys and Tutorials, IEEE (CSE) 2016 batch. He is working as
Communications Society, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Assistant professor in Department of
Engineers, 2014, 16 (3), pp.1617 - 1634. Computer Science and Engineering,
[11] J. Ordonez-Lucena, P. Ameigeiras, D. Lopez, J. Ramos-Munoz, J. Graphic Era Deemed to be University
Lorca, and J. Folgueira, ―Network Slicing for 5G with SDN/NFV:
Concepts, Architectures, and Challenges,‖ IEEE Communications
Dehradun, Uttarakhand, India. His
Magazine, vol. 55, pp. 80-87, 2017. research interests includes computer
[12] Vishal Kadam1, Makhan Kumbhkar , Security in Cloud networks, Data Structure, Cyber Security,
Environment, International Journal of Scientific Research in and Wireless Sencor Network. He has
Computer Science and Engineering uter Science and Engineering published various research papers in
uter Science and Engineering, vol-2,issue-3, June-2014 International and national journals. He
[13] Seema Rani, Kumari. (2018). Open Source Software: A Prominent can be reached at
Requirement of Information Technology. International Journal of shivashis1234@gmail.com.
Scientific Research in Network Security and Communication. 6.
24-29. 10.26438/ijsrnsc/v6i2.2429.
[14] Ashish Dhondiyal, Shiv & Singh Rana, Deeepak. (2018). Sleeping
Mr. Sushil Kumar Chamoli has done
Mode MODLEACH Protocol for WSN. IJARCCE. 7. 112-116. M.Tech (Computer Science and
10.17148/IJARCCE.2018.7823. Engineering), Currently working as assistant
[15] Rana, Deepak & Garg, Naveen & Chamoli, Sushil. (2012). A Professor, Department of Computer Science,
Study and Detection of TCP SYN Flood Attacks with IP spoofing Uttarakhand Sanskrit University, Haridwar,
and its Mitigations. International Journal of Computer Technology Uttarakhnad India. He is UGC-NET and
and Applications. Vol 3 (4), 1476-1480 GATE Qualified in Computer Science. His
research interests are mobile adhoc network,
operating system, Cloud computing. He can
be reached at sushilchamoli@gmail.com.

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