Leveraging Net2Plan planning tool for network orchestration in OpenDaylight

TLDR

Software‑defined networking provides unprecedented agility and flexibility, with centralized controllers simplifying operations and enabling programmability through northbound APIs. The study reports preliminary work on integrating OpenDaylight’s northbound interface with the Net2Plan planning tool. Net2Plan, an open‑source network planning framework, is connected to OpenDaylight so users can orchestrate networks by defining flow routing and applying built‑in or custom algorithms. Illustrative experiments demonstrate the integration, and the authors outline future challenges.

Abstract

The software-defined networking (SDN) paradigm brings unprecedented agility and flexibility to network operators. The usage of centralized software-based controllers simplifies operation and management and enables innovation in the control plane through network programmability. Besides, a controller may be operated via third-party applications using the so-called northbound application programming interfaces (APIs). In this paper, we report our preliminary work on the interaction between the northbound interface of the open-source industry-supported OpenDaylight controller and our Net2Plan tool. Net2Plan is an open-source network planning tool that is able to execute user-made algorithms. By connecting Net2Plan to OpenDaylight, users would be able to easily orchestrate their networks, e.g. defining flow routing, making use of built-in or user-defined algorithms, implemented in the Net2Plan framework. In this paper, we present some illustrative experiments, and discuss future challenges.