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TALON: Tenant Throughput Allocation Through Traffic Load-Balancing in Virtualized Software-Defined Networks

2019 International Conference on Information Networking (ICOIN), Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 2019, pp. 233-238, doi: 10.1109/ICOIN.2019.8717976.

Heesang Jin, Gyeongsik Yang, Bong-yeol Yu, Chuck Yoo

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Abstract

Virtualized software-defined networking (SDN) has been drawing increasing attention in data centers. SDN enables the creation of arbitrary and flexible virtual networks. However, given that the physical network is shared among multiple tenants, the throughput of a tenant can interfere with that of the other tenants, and the throughput requirement on each tenant cannot be met. To solve this problem, we propose TALON, a throughput allocation scheme based on traffic load-balancing. TALON allocates a throughput per tenant flow by calculating multiple paths to fulfill the traffic requirement. We design and implement TALON using an open-source network hypervisor. The evaluation results show that each tenant's throughput requirements are nearly met. In addition, the throughput increases by up to 2.29 times compared to that of a non-load-balancing network.

Paper summary

Split traffic to meet tenant throughput requests

Multiple physical paths can contribute to a tenant’s requested throughput.

TALON reconstructs the path chosen by a tenant controller, then allocates throughput using available capacity across physical links. It preserves priority for the tenant’s main path while adding subpaths.

Prioritize the main path before adding subpaths

The hypervisor reconstructs an end-to-end path from the tenant’s flow rules and checks its available capacity against the requested throughput. If the main path can carry the request, no extra splitting is needed. Otherwise, TALON can move another tenant’s subpaths to free capacity, while keeping main paths prioritized. It then calculates additional subpaths for any remaining demand and installs OpenFlow group rules to split traffic at ingress and join it at egress.

TALON’s allocation sequence for a requested tenant throughput.
StageAction
Main pathUse available capacity first
Existing subpathsReassign them when needed to free capacity
Remaining demandAdd subpaths and install split/join rules

Meet two tenants’ requests through traffic splitting

In a Mininet test with two ONOS-controlled tenants requesting 200 Mbps each, TALON brings both throughputs close to their targets; the simultaneous-start experiment reports improvements of 2.08× and 2.29×. A separate staggered-start experiment shows how traffic is redistributed when the second tenant joins, with average throughputs of 209.7 and 196.5 Mbps.

Average throughput of two tenants with TALON disabled and enabled.View full-size figure
Both tenants request 200 Mbps. With TALON enabled, their measured throughputs rise from roughly half the target to near 200 Mbps.

Key takeaways

  1. A tenant’s preferred route may not carry its requested rate alone. TALON preserves main-path priority while using additional paths to supply capacity.
  2. Multipath allocation makes the throughput request actionable. In the simultaneous-tenant test, achieved rates move toward each tenant’s 200-Mbps target.