SDN Orchestration for Next Generation Inter-Networking: A Multipath Forwarding Approach

Increasing trend of peering at Internet exchange points (IXPs) provides a topological and network management advantage to the Internet service providers (ISPs) that is otherwise not possible through individual peering arrangements with their neighboring domains. ISPs keep analyzing potential advantages to peer at geographically diversified IXPs. Increasing degree of multihoming in ISPs requires extensive coordination among ISPs in different roles (access and transit), for mutual benefit. We propose a novel approach to build a conducive inter-networking ambiance for future data centric applications. Our approach exploits edge multiplicity of transit ISPs present across different IXPs to leverage a cross layer coordination between network stack at access ISP subscribers and the network infrastructure. Software defined networking provides a useful apparatus to control IXP fabric and also empowers our multipath forwarding strategy for an optimal network resource utilization in the inter-domain configuration. Contributions of this paper include the derivation of abstracted overlay graph from an IXP centric inter-domain connectivity model. This graph is used to provide multipath forwarding for increased reliability and throughput over abstracted graph. Adaptive cross layer coordination increases the efficiency of the proposed framework and provides an online mechanism of forwarding the traffic across the domains. We have observed as high as 54% increase in throughput using proposed scheme as compared with single path routing and forwarding strategy currently employed at the Internet backbone.