Software Defined Networking: an emerging paradigm to computer networking

Software Defined Networking (SDN) is an emerging paradigm in networking technology that enables innovation on how network systems are managed and designed. SDN plays a huge role in the effort to make computer networks programmable. This thesis discusses the history and efforts to programmable and active networks, the early practicesm towards separating the control plane and data plane. Highlighting the architectural concepts in networking that software defined networks emanated as well as the history and evolution of software defined networking. The thesis further discusses how SDN simplifies the complexity of managing large and distributed network system. It also examines the technologies that support software defined networking such as Network Virtualization and OpenFlow. The thesis reviews the components of software defined network architecture: the data plane layer, the controller plane layer, and application layer. Furthermore, it reports the practical implementation of SDN in network functions virtualization. Finally, it depicts the notion of software defined networking, whose Application Programming Interface may be implemented by OpenFlow. The practical aspect of this thesis shows a simple emulation of software-defined network architecture using Mininet network emulation tool. Hopefully, this work aims to benefit those who intend to learn about the fundamental principles of Software Defined Networking