High Availability in Software-Defined Networking using Cluster Controller: A Simulation Approach

Conventional static networks have begun to be replaced with dynamic systems that are programmable. Software-Defined Network (SDN) is one example of the development of dynamic networks that are programmable with a new paradigm to provide convenience to users in designing, building, and managing computer networks. A software-defined network provides a centralized network distribution to facilitate network services to be more efficient. In SDN, the controller holds control of the control plane of the device while the data plane is distributed through the OpenFlow Switch. A centralized control plane on the controller can cause overhead when the number of users increasing in the network. Overhead on the controller results in service interruptions or even the controller fails to provide services on the net. The availability of a controller is essential to guarantee the availability of network services. High availability on the controller is achieved through the cluster controller. This paper discusses the performance of networks that implement high availability solutions on SDN. As a comparison in the experiment comparing the performance of using a cluster-controller with a multi-controller. The results are based on QoS parameters, and the average CPU load performance of the cluster controller is better than using a multi-controller.