The IESG has approved the following document: - 'Benchmarking Methodology for SDN Controller Performance' (draft-ietf-bmwg-sdn-controller-benchmark-meth-09.txt) as Informational RFC This document is the product of the Benchmarking Methodology Working Group. The IESG contact persons are Warren Kumari and Ignas Bagdonas. A URL of this Internet Draft is: https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-ietf-bmwg-sdn-controller-benchmark-meth/ Technical Summary These two documents ( draft-ietf-bmwg-sdn-controller-benchmark-term and draft-ietf-bmwg-sdn-controller-benchmark-meth) specify the terminology, benchmark definitions and methods for characterizing key performance aspects of Software Defined Network (SDN) Controllers. Considering the number of benchmarking and performance comparison studies that have been published prior to standards development, this is an important area for new specifications and tools to implement them. These memos focus on the ability of SDN controllers to learn topology, communicate with switches, and instantiate paths using both reactive and proactive techniques (including controller clusters). Further, requirements for test traffic and network emulation capabilities of the test devices are specified. The memos approach this problem in a generic way (Openflow specific procedures are included in an Appendix) for broader applicability and longevity. Working Group Summary Consensus for these drafts required several WGLC which prompted careful review and further comments. However, the process to achieve consensus was smooth, and at no time was there sustained controversy. Document Quality There are existing implementations of the methods described here, both full and partial, and many are available as Open Source tools. Tools are tied to specific versions of Northbound and Southbound protocols, but the memo avoids this dependency (and redundancy with other industry efforts) by defining benchmarks for generic SDN controller functions (as suggested in https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/bmwg/Glchqbvg6F7vOUc0ug3ACyztcNg ). The document benefits from review in the NFVRG, and from interactions with the Open Platform for Network Function Virtualization (OPNFV) "CPerf" project team (which includes members from Open Daylight Integration test team, ETSI NFV Test and Open Source WG, and other Linux Foundation and independent Open Source projects related to SDN performance). Personnel Al Morton is the Document Shepherd Warren Kumari is RAD! RFC Editor Note The documents draft-ietf-bmwg-sdn-controller-benchmark-term and draft-ietf-bmwg-sdn-controller-benchmark-meth should progress together. It would be nice if they could have sequential RFC Numbers.
