Book Image

Building Modern Networks

By : Steven Noble
Book Image

Building Modern Networks

By: Steven Noble

Overview of this book

<p>As IT infrastructures become more software-defined, networking operations tend to be more automated with falling levels of manual configuration at the hardware level. Building Modern Networks will brush up your knowledge on the modern networking concepts and help you apply them to your software-defined infrastructure.</p> <p>In this book you'll gain the knowledge necessary to evaluate, choose, and deploy a next generation network design. We will cover open and closed network operating systems (NOS) along with the protocols used to control them such as OpenFlow, Thrift, Opflex, and REST. You will also learn about traffic engineering and security concepts for NGNs. You will also find out how to fine-tune your network using QoS and QoE.</p> <p>By the end of the book, you'll be well versed in simplifying the way you design, build, operate, and troubleshoot your network.</p>
Table of Contents (20 chapters)
Title Page
Credits
About the Author
About the Reviewer
www.PacktPub.com
Customer Feedback
Preface
2
Networking Hardware and Software
4
Using REST and Thrift APIs to Manage Switches
9
Where to Start When Building a Next Generation Network

Internal workings of OpenFlow


The OpenFlow protocol is divided into four components:

  • Configuration (language and utility)
  • State machine
  • Message layer
  • System interface

Configuration

Configuration is divided into two parts, the configuration language and the configuration utility. The configuration language is designed with a straightforward interface to configure OpenFlow switches and OpenFlow controllers. The structure of the language is based on the types of information the switch or controller can handle.

For example, the configuration language for an OpenFlow 1.3 switch will contain type definitions for the supported internet protocols, IPv4 and IPv6. Type definitions can be combined to create stages. Examples of stages are initialization, authentication, and authorization.

State machine

The state machine defines the lower level behavior of the protocol such as capabilities, flow control, and negotiation. Capabilities are a list of features that the OpenFlow switch supports such as packet reassembly...