An Effective Deployment of Controllers in Software-Defined Networks

Abstract

Network performance has become a crucial consideration in ensuring a flawless user experience in the era of data-intensive applications and cloud computing. Traditional Networks are not suitable for solving such issues, so Software-defined networking (SDN) has evolved as a game-changing technology, promising network flexibility, scalability, and centralized control. However, some challenges remain open to the research, and one of the most popularly known challenges is controller problem placement (CPP). Latency is also a major consideration in the network. However, implementing low-latency communication in SDN systems remains a difficult issue, especially as networks become more complicated. In the realm of SDN, where centralized control meets distributed data planes, minimizing latency between switches and controllers emerges as a pivotal challenge. This article delves into the critical concept of optimizing controller placement within SDN networks to minimize latency, with a primary focus on considering the switch-controller distance. The proposed work uses a Linear programming-based approach to identify the optimal controller location in the network by considering the switch-controller distance and the latency is calculated. Further, a comparison of the proposed work with a heuristic-based approach is performed which shows that the proposed work performs well in terms of latency.