A Performance Evaluation for Software Defined Networks with P4
The exponential growth in the number of devices connected via the internet has led to the need to achieve granular programmability for increased performance, resilience, reduced latency, and jitter. Software Defined Networking (SDN) and Programming Protocol independent Packet Processing (P4) are des...
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MDPI AG
2025-06-01
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| Series: | Network |
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| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2673-8732/5/2/21 |
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| author | Omesh A. Fernando Hannan Xiao Joseph Spring Xianhui Che |
| author_facet | Omesh A. Fernando Hannan Xiao Joseph Spring Xianhui Che |
| author_sort | Omesh A. Fernando |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | The exponential growth in the number of devices connected via the internet has led to the need to achieve granular programmability for increased performance, resilience, reduced latency, and jitter. Software Defined Networking (SDN) and Programming Protocol independent Packet Processing (P4) are designed to introduce programmability into the control and data plane of networks, respectively. Despite their individual potential and capabilities, the performance of combining SDN and P4 remains underexplored. This study presents a comprehensive evaluation of SDN with data plane programmability using P4 (<i>SDN</i>+<i>P4</i>) against traditional SDN with Open vSwitch (<i>SDN</i>+<i>OvS</i>), aimed at answering the hypothesis that combining SDN and P4 strengthens the control and data plane programmability and offers improved management and adaptability, which would provide a platform with faster packet processing with reduced jitter, loss, and processing overhead. Mininet was employed to emulate three distinct topologies: multi-path, grid, and transit-stub. Various traffic types were transmitted to assess performance metrics across the three topologies. Our results demonstrate that <i>SDN</i>+<i>P4</i> outperform <i>SDN</i>+<i>OvS</i> significantly due to parallel processing, flexible parsing, and reduced overhead. The evaluation demonstrates the potential of <i>SDN</i>+<i>P4</i> to provide a more resilient and stringent service with improved network performance for the future internet and its heterogeneity of applications. |
| format | Article |
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| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 2673-8732 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-06-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
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| series | Network |
| spelling | doaj-art-cd7a1c8d7e40480dbf5fd623a15f0b0f2025-08-20T03:27:21ZengMDPI AGNetwork2673-87322025-06-01522110.3390/network5020021A Performance Evaluation for Software Defined Networks with P4Omesh A. Fernando0Hannan Xiao1Joseph Spring2Xianhui Che3Department of Computer Science, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield AL10 9AB, UKDepartment of Informatics, King’s College London, London WC2R 2LS, UKDepartment of Computer Science, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield AL10 9AB, UKSchool of Electronic Engineering and Computer Science, Queen Mary University of London, London E1 4NS, UKThe exponential growth in the number of devices connected via the internet has led to the need to achieve granular programmability for increased performance, resilience, reduced latency, and jitter. Software Defined Networking (SDN) and Programming Protocol independent Packet Processing (P4) are designed to introduce programmability into the control and data plane of networks, respectively. Despite their individual potential and capabilities, the performance of combining SDN and P4 remains underexplored. This study presents a comprehensive evaluation of SDN with data plane programmability using P4 (<i>SDN</i>+<i>P4</i>) against traditional SDN with Open vSwitch (<i>SDN</i>+<i>OvS</i>), aimed at answering the hypothesis that combining SDN and P4 strengthens the control and data plane programmability and offers improved management and adaptability, which would provide a platform with faster packet processing with reduced jitter, loss, and processing overhead. Mininet was employed to emulate three distinct topologies: multi-path, grid, and transit-stub. Various traffic types were transmitted to assess performance metrics across the three topologies. Our results demonstrate that <i>SDN</i>+<i>P4</i> outperform <i>SDN</i>+<i>OvS</i> significantly due to parallel processing, flexible parsing, and reduced overhead. The evaluation demonstrates the potential of <i>SDN</i>+<i>P4</i> to provide a more resilient and stringent service with improved network performance for the future internet and its heterogeneity of applications.https://www.mdpi.com/2673-8732/5/2/21Software Defined Networking (SDN)Programming Protocol Independent Packet Processing (P4)ONOSMininetinternet topologiesperformance evaluation |
| spellingShingle | Omesh A. Fernando Hannan Xiao Joseph Spring Xianhui Che A Performance Evaluation for Software Defined Networks with P4 Network Software Defined Networking (SDN) Programming Protocol Independent Packet Processing (P4) ONOS Mininet internet topologies performance evaluation |
| title | A Performance Evaluation for Software Defined Networks with P4 |
| title_full | A Performance Evaluation for Software Defined Networks with P4 |
| title_fullStr | A Performance Evaluation for Software Defined Networks with P4 |
| title_full_unstemmed | A Performance Evaluation for Software Defined Networks with P4 |
| title_short | A Performance Evaluation for Software Defined Networks with P4 |
| title_sort | performance evaluation for software defined networks with p4 |
| topic | Software Defined Networking (SDN) Programming Protocol Independent Packet Processing (P4) ONOS Mininet internet topologies performance evaluation |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2673-8732/5/2/21 |
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