Rational view of SDN technology in data center

SDN (software-defined network software tabbed receptacle) is the hottest technology in a new generation of data centers. All major network equipment manufacturers have issued their own SDN strategy, imagine in this new field of competition. However, according to IDC's latest research results: In 2013, the entire enterprise network industry market value of 42 billion U.S. dollars, of which nearly half from the 2~3 layer Network Switch Market, SDN market only 168 million U.S. dollars, and by 2016 SDN market can reach 2 billion U.S. dollars. Judging from the whole network industry, SDN still very far. Such a small market space, why these network equipment Giants still enjoy this sdn rendering?

Throughout the field of network equipment manufacturing, the basic hardware manufacturers, with the white-hot competition, the profit has been getting lower. But if can provide the difference application from the software aspect, often can obtain the very high profit, therefore the SDN technology has emerged. SDN Technology does have creative ideas, it will change the implementation of the local area network, change the network equipment industry chain, change the relationship between the network and applications. SDN technology is produced in Silicon Valley, the U.S. Silicon Valley is a world IT industry vane, leading the world of information development trend. A technology produced in Silicon Valley is generally followed by several processes: the incubation of innovative ideas, the start-up companies involved in VCs, the hype of the media, the involvement of more clients and the participation of more companies, which are difficult to achieve. Even if SDN technology is put forward in other places, it will not create much influence, this is the huge gap brought about by different origins, innovative technology coupled with gorgeous, exaggerated packaging so many data center managers will be in front of a bright, like it.

But in new things just sprout, never lack of doubt, also at the peak of speculation, we also do not lack of blind followers. All the innovations in Silicon Valley, although there are some technical questions at the outset, it's all about winning, and it's the Silicon Valley. If you want to make SDN technology widely accepted and used, there is no harm to these network equipment manufacturers, but it will add new market opportunities. Cisco has invested 100 million of dollars in the company's Insieme,insieme Focus on SDN product development. Google has deployed all the Operflow within the data center, giving the shocking commercial regulations that a large number of ISPs and ICP will follow. It is clear that many companies want SDN technology to get more companies to participate and use, only in this way can SDN technology to the extreme, so that the network equipment manufacturers, VC companies continue to create profits.

Large-scale data center and large Enterprise network is the primary application place of SDN technology, the other is the operator's access network. SDN technology does not really solve the network problem, it simply provides network technology personnel with tools to solve their own problems, when it involves configuration, choreography and troubleshooting, provide a new set of APIs like a screwdriver to him, and want him to build his own car, When you try to solve all the problems that arise in a traditional network, you need a real solution. Obviously SDN technology is just one way to improve the efficiency of data center management, and don't think of it as a network of data centers. SDN technology is still in the initial stage, its function in the laboratory to achieve at least a few years to enter the actual production environment, SDN technology hype function is still far away from the enterprise. In particular, the data centers of small and medium-sized enterprises, these data center personnel do not have the ability to use SDN technology, so not to mention universal application. So the use of SDN technology is still limited, this is only the result of the hype of the manufacturers. Data center managers need to be rational to see Sdn technology, their own data centers need to SDN technology, must be carefully evaluated and treated with caution.

One of the biggest unknowns of SDN is the level of network functionality being ported to the application tier, and we often hear that fully configurable applications can create a network environment to meet their specific needs, but sometimes applications have too much "power". In the domain of supercomputers, applications are given too much control over the environment, which can easily crash the application. Moreover, too many smart applications can interfere with each other's capabilities, and resource competition will become very intense. SDN Technology makes data center networks more intelligent, and can also cause data center networks to crash.

SDN Technology is a multi-vendor network control, the lack of full equipment control standards. Now in the concrete implementation of SDN technology still exist a variety of differences, SDN protocol standards are also constantly developing and improving, in the implementation of the details of a number of aspects of the controversy still exist, which has prevented the rapid development of SDN technology.

It sounds like we're pouring cold water on SDN technology, but it's not. SDN Technology is truly innovative and in line with the development of future data centers, we will see these promising promises will slowly turn into reality. A complete software-defined data center is certainly in the offing, but it doesn't fit all the networks. The Enterprise Data Center Network has a vast base of application and service installation, and moving these applications and services to software definition servers, storage, and network architectures will require considerable recoding, or even a full redeployment of the updated version, which requires operational costs. IPV6 technology for so many years, but still wool, IPV4 is still the absolute mainstream IP protocol, can be seen to change the inherent realization of the way is a very difficult thing, even at present various IPV4 and IPV6 protocol coexistence technology is also emerging, SDN technology is also facing such problems. The fact that data center managers are willing to deploy SDN in their existing data centers is a real problem. For new data centers, SDN technology has access, but there are still many controversial SDN, how people feel at ease to use it. So over the past two years, while internet vendors have trumpeted the benefits of SDN to data centers, they have been able to deploy very little in the data center.

The birth of SDN technology is very important for the future development of data center network, whether it is the change of the network architecture, simplification or the control of the two or three-layer network, all have very big meaning, completely break the idea of the original network architecture. But SDN itself also has a variety of defects, need continuous development and improvement, data center managers need to rationally view SDN technology, not by the surrounding SDN technology publicity, choose the most suitable for their own data center technology, is the best.