SDViNet: A Software Defined Virtual Network Management Platform in IaaS Cloud

A possible approach to address the ossification of the Internet is to set up multiple virtual networks on top of a single shared physical substrate, and each virtual network can be customized to some specific purposes. However, the current realization of virtualized infrastructure, more specifically, the IaaS cloud and network testbed, suffer from the limited programmability or high cost. To overcome these drawbacks, we propose SDViNet, a solution combining the network virtualization concept applied in IaaS cloud and SDN (Software Defined Network)-based networking testbed. It aims to achieve flexible programmable virtual network abstraction, extend the system at scale and underlying technology easily, and utilize the existing cloud platforms and commercial devices at low-cost. SDViNet is comprised of a centralized server, a set of distributed agents and a central OpenFlow controller, which communicates with the underlying packet delivery fabric. Our prototype implementation and case study show that it is feasible to provide a programmable virtual network in the IaaS cloud, while utilizing the virtualized infrastructure in an extensible and lost cost way.