Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Towards Internet Innovation:
Software Defined Data Plane
Gaofeng Lv
, Zhigang Sun, Yijiao Chen, and Tao Li
School of Computer, National University of Defense Technology,
Changsha, Hunan, China 410073
{lvever,sunzhigang,yijiaochen,taoli}@nudt.edu.cn
Abstract.
In order to support new network architectures, Openflow im-
plements flows forwarding based on multiple tables via pipelines, which
increases the diculty of the implementation. With the advent of multi-
core CPU, a software defined data plane, LabelCast, is proposed, which
characterizes the ability of forwarding operations and processing ser-
vices through the Label table and Cast table. Forwarding layer lookups
based on fixed-length labels and schedules packets processing, including
light-semantics action instructions of general process, which is easy to
be realized and is denoted by the Label table, and protocol semantics
or status-related service of special process, which could be enriched via
opening resources within network devices and is arranged by the Cast
table. LabelCast supplies a reliable and programmable data plane, and
could load multiple network architectures, so as to facilitate Internet
innovation.
Keywords:
Processing in networks, network experiments, Labelcast.
1 Introduction
To promote network evolution, Stanford proposed Openflow protocol[1]. Open-
flow abstracts data-plane of networks, makes the control-plane programmable,
and supports isolating experiment trac from production trac, which offers
a powerful support for a new network protocol to be experimented in a real
network environment. Openflow makes a compromise between academia and in-
dustry by abstracting the data-plane and opening the interface, so that it allows
researchers to develop new protocols based on the unified interface. Openflow
has been the de facto abstract layer of data-plane in the SDN (Software Defined
Network)[2], and being applied to the WAN, like tra
c optimization in Google's
global data center and infrastructure construction of Internet2 etc.
Satisfying the vendor's demand for device closure and user's demand for
isolation of packets promoted Openflow, which also placed restrictions on the
Openflow's support for new network architectures. There are some network ar-
chitectures which cannot run well based on the Openflow, especially which needs
The work is supported by 863 project(2013AA013505) and NSFC project(61202485).
