POFM: Profit-Oriented Flow Management in SDN-Based Data Center Networks

In a data center network (DCN), there are numerous hosts connected by well-organized switches, usually involving a large amount of data transmission to offer cloud services. How to manage flows in a DCN by deciding packet routes is critical. This paper applies the software-defined networking (SDN) technique to flow management in fat-tree DCNs. Unlike previous studies, we consider that flows have different values and associate flows with profits to reflect their values. The practical profit acquired from each flow will depend on the proportion of successfully sent packets. The paper proposes a profit-oriented flow management (POFM) scheme to maximize the profit obtained while reducing packet loss in flows. In POFM, once a link becomes congested, some flows on that link may be rerouted to other paths. When no alternative path can be found, POFM adjusts the data rates of flows on the congested link based on multiple factors, including their demanded rates, profits, and transmission durations. With simulations, we show that POFM can effectively raise the overall profit and decrease the packet loss rate in the DCN.