A resource delegation framework for software defined networks

In this paper we address the problem of multi-domain multi-provider SDN-based networks and propose an architecture for controlling them using a collection of agents responsible for ownership and use of SDN resources. Instead of posing the problem in terms of controller coordination for the purpose of establishing connections across the network, we propose to treat it as a resource-management problem with explicit delegations of consumable resources by domains to the users of those resources. The advantage of our approach is in explicitly exposing the resource delegation abstraction. It exposes the control of network elements in different domains by different controllers and permits generalizing several existing multi-domain architectures, making the selection of which one to apply a deployment choice, rather than an architectural principle. We propose a rigorous algebraic formulation for the SDN resource delegation problem and describe the prototyping work in implementing this framework and some of its applications.