EmuCloud: An extension to build SDN test environment on IaaS cloud

In this paper, we propose a platform named EmuCloud, aiming to provide a test environment for SDN with high fidelity and low cost. EmuCloud is based on IaaS cloud, and the key idea of the platform is to extend the abstract networking resources to provide virtual openflow switch, and combine this new abstraction with existing service (such as computing, storage, authentication, etc.) seamlessly. Compared to the lightweight SDN emulator, EmuCloud provide more fidelity, extensibility and flexibility, while keeping the low-cost feature. Our prototype implementation and test case show that it is possible to build a network composed of virtual machines and fully controlled virtual openflow switches for testing SDN applications on IaaS Cloud, and the network can be adjusted dynamically to adapt to users' requests.