Estimating the Flow Rule Installation Time of SDN Switches When Facing Control Plane Delay

The software defined networking (SDN) paradigm has numerous benefits for network operators, including cost aspects, flexibility, and programmability. Using the SDN approach of a separated control and data plane, the controller can order the installation of flow rules in the switches it manages, e.g., via FlowMod messages in case of the OpenFlow protocol. Since the processing time of these messages has a direct impact on the reaction time of the network, it is a key performance indicator for switches and quantifying it in a reliable manner is required for ensuring state consistency between the control and the data plane. Furthermore, real world deployments not only consist of different data plane hardware, but may feature varying control plane delays.