Spirent's 360-degree testing solution ensures SDN network operation security

The Cisco Visual Networking Index shows that by 2016, the number of mobile devices connected to IP networks will be three times the total global population by then. The index also shows that video traffic will account for 55% of all consumer Internet traffic that year, and video-on-demand traffic will also grow significantly, equivalent to the capacity of 4 billion DVDs per month. The study shows that network traffic will continue to grow at an extremely high rate, and the type of traffic is also undergoing profound changes. This trend has led to the evolution of emerging network deployments to virtualized and cloud environments in hyperscale data centers, which will overwhelm existing network technologies and architectures. To address this problem, the industry has introduced a new approach to networking, namely the so-called software-defined networking (SDN) and the related protocol OpenFlow, to meet these challenges.

Dan Pitt, executive president of the Open Networking Foundation, believes that SDN can effectively solve the three key challenges facing traditional networking technologies: cost, agility, and design. However, for many manufacturers, although SDN and OpenFlow have great potential, they bring challenges to many aspects of the network ecosystem, including network testing.

ToPaul, senior product manager at Spirent Communications, believes that new testing challenges facing SDN and OpenFlow include: APIs, protocols and vendor implementations must undergo comprehensive testing to ensure consistency with standards, and of course, interoperability issues between various implementations; the emergence of new SDN applications has also driven the need for more testing, because these applications will change the behavior of the network, so each new application and each new version of each application needs to be verified. In addition, other forms of testing are also crucial, such as performance, availability, security and scale testing, the so-called PASS testing.

In this regard, how will Spirent Communications cope with the new testing challenges brought by SDN? ToPaul said, "Spirent Communications has always been and will continue to be at the forefront of SDN/OpenFlow technology research and development, constantly launching the most advanced testing solutions, and playing a key role in various related tests." Spirent has currently launched a 360° solution for the SDN testing field. Its advantages include support for the latest OpenFlow 1.3 (adding support for IPv6, MPLS and other capabilities), which can improve the quality of service (QoS) of SDN deployment; at the same time, the solution fully supports performance, availability, security and scalability (PASS) testing of SDN networks and OpenFlow devices; and can verify whether OpenFlow network devices and SDN applications can achieve business goals without reducing the quality of user experience.

"Spirent focuses on the testing field. For SDN testing, we have created a variety of test equipment that can implement testing at different levels and provide complete testing solutions." To Paul introduced: "Spirent's testing solutions are closer to the actual application of the data center. For the underlying network equipment, Spirent TestCenter can perform performance tests on devices with different rates and ports (1/10/40/100G line speed); and for the network virtual layer, the Spirent TestCenter Virtual test tool can implement OpenFlow controller simulation, virtual machine live migration testing, and vSwitch/vNIC testing; in addition, based on the characteristics of Layers 4-7, Spirent Avalanche Virtual can implement comprehensive testing of virtual network devices, and can also implement application-oriented testing."

In June this year, Spirent announced that its Spirent TestCenter supports OpenFlow 1.3. With this latest release, Spirent Communications continues to work with the industry to promote the wider deployment of OpenFlow switches and controllers.

On July 8, Spirent TestCenter conducted a public demonstration of OpenFlow 1.3 interoperability testing at Interop Tokyo 2013. The interoperability demonstration fully demonstrated the readiness of OpenFlow 1.3 for commercial deployment and won the Best Show Award from the exhibition.