Modeling and performance evaluation of an OpenFlow architecture

The OpenFlow concept of flow-based forwarding and separation of the control plane from the data plane provides a new flexibility in network innovation. While initially used solely in the research domain, OpenFlow is now finding its way into commercial applications. However, this creates new challenges, as questions of OpenFlow scalability and performance have not yet been answered. This paper is a first step towards that goal. Based on measurements of switching times of current OpenFlow hardware, we derive a basic model for the forwarding speed and blocking probability of an OpenFlow switch combined with an OpenFlow controller and validate it using a simulation. This model can be used to estimate the packet sojourn time and the probability of lost packets in such a system and can give hints to developers and researchers on questions how an OpenFlow architecture will perform given certain parameters.