Fog Computing

16Insights into Software-Defined Networking and Applications in Fog Computing

Osman Khalid, Imran Ali Khan, and Assad Abbas

Department of Computer Sciences, COMSATS University Islamabad, Abbottabad, Pakistan

16.1 Introduction

Software-defined networking (SDN) is an emerging implementation model for wired networking that decouples the data plane (system that forwards data to destination) from control plane (system that makes decision about where to send data). The aim of SDN is to simplify the network management. In traditional networks, the control and data planes are merged into the same networking device due to which the flexibility to accommodate new services is reduced. Moreover, devices manufactured by one vendor could not interoperate with the devices of other vendors. As a result the businesses were locked to a particular vendor specific hardware tool. SDN decouples data plane and control plane. With this separation the networking companies can use equipment from various vendors and can apply policies on the entire network. The switches are only used to forward data while the centralized SDN controller is used to implement control logic [1]. SDN provides multiple opportunities to traditional networks. The management of the network becomes efficient and easy with centralized control. These frameworks are well suited for end-to-end communication across different wireless technologies.

The Open Network Foundation (ONF) has defined architecture for SDN as illustrated in ...