Open vSwitch 2014 Fall Conference: OpenFlow-based Traffic Engineering for Mobile Devices

presented by: Radhika M. Hirannaiah, individual researcher

Expansion in mobile devices has led to rapid growth in data traffic. Currently, networks are complex and difficult to manage. The exponential increase in audio/video streaming and continuous demand for network connectivity has necessitated the need for traffic steering and path management. Improving seamless network connectivity with reduced power consumption has been a constant goal in the development of mobile devices. The ability to configure quality of service (QoS) levels for applications on mobile devices is primarily driven by service providers and other players such as users and enterprises who have little or no way of configuring QoS. In the OpenFlow networking approach, having a separate control and data plane offers different levels of service.
This research presents an architectural model to integrate the OpenFlow switch on a mobile device with a goal to enable better traffic engineering and enhanced services. The concept revolves around hiding all the mobile device radios on the WAN side and applications on the switch port side. We further exploit the OpenFlow standard that enables the switch to connect to multiple controllers. User, Enterprise and Service Provider represent the multiple controllers programming the OpenFlow switch on the device in a mutually exclusive way.
By incorporating flows related to network services instead of individual network-related programs on a mobile device, this model may reduce the number of components and thereby power consumption. With the proposed methods, it satisfies an infrastructural need that benefits mobile devices across different players in the process.