Modeling and performance analysis of the multiple controllers' approach in software defined networking

Abstract

We model the multiple controllers' approach of SDN and analyze the performance of the model by using the queuing theory. Extensive experiments are conducted and the simulation results are compatible with the theoretical analysis which validates the correctness of the simulation. Through the analysis, we find that multiple controllers' approach is an effective way to increase the control plane's scalability of SDN, but it also results to longer sojourn time. In this point of view, the multiple controllers' approach can be regarded as a tradeoff between the scalability and the sojourn time.