Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) with a Touch of SDN

Description
Table of Contents

Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) will drive dramatic cost reductions while also accelerating service delivery. Using NFV with SDN, network owners can provision new functions rapidly on demand, improve scalability, and leverage microservices. Benefits like these will make NFV indispensable for service providers, mobile operators, telcos, and enterprises alike.

Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) with a Touch of SDN is the first practical introduction to NFV’s fundamental concepts, techniques, and use cases. Written for wide audiences of network engineers, architects, planners, and operators, it assumes no previous knowledge of NFV architecture, deployment, or management.

The authors first explain how virtualization, VMs, containers, and related technologies establish the foundation for the NFV transformation. Next, they show how these concepts and technologies can be applied to virtualize network functions in the cloud, data centers, routing, security, and the mobile packet core.

You’ll discover new tools and techniques for managing and orchestrating virtualized network devices, and gain new clarity on how SDN and NFV interact and interrelate. By the time you’re done, you’ll be ready to assess vendor claims, evaluate architectures, and plan NFV’s role in your own networks.

Understand NFV’s key benefits and market drivers
Review how virtualization makes NFV possible
Consider key issues associated with NFV network design and deployment
Integrate NFV into existing network designs
Orchestrate, build, and deploy NFV networks and cloud services
Maximize operational efficiency by building more programmable, automated networks
Understand how NFV and SDN work together
Address security, programmability, performance, and service function chaining
Preview evolving concepts that will shape NFV’s future

Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii

Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv

About the Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvii

About the Technical Reviewers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xix

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxi

Chapter 1: The Journey to Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) Era . . .1

The Evolution of Network Architecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Traditional Network Architecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Introducing NFV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

NFV Architectural Framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Need for a Framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

ETSI Framework for NFV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Understanding the ETSI Framework . . . . . . . . . . . 10

A Closer Look at ETSI’s NFV Framework . . . . . . . . . 13

NFV Framework Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

Benefits of NFV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

Hardware Flexibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Faster Service Life Cycle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Scalability and Elasticity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Leveraging Existing Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Rapid Development and Vendor Independence . . . . . . . 29

Validation of New Solutions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Amorphous Service Offering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Operational Efficiency and Agility . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

NFV Market Drivers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Movement to Cloud . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

New Business Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

Capital Expense Savings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Operational Expense Savings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Barrier of Entry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Review Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

Chapter 2: Virtualization Concepts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .37

History and Background of Virtualization . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

Virtualization Benefits and Goals . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

Server Virtualization, Network Virtualization, and NFV . . . 41

Virtualization Techniques . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

Virtualization versus Emulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Virtual Machines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

Components of a Virtual Machine . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

Resource Allocation to the Virtual Machine . . . . . . . . 53

Network Communication . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

Packaging a Virtual Machine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Commonly Used Hypervisors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62

Linux Containers and Docker . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

Understanding Containers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

Container versus Virtual Machines . . . . . . . . . . . . 67

Application Container and OS Container . . . . . . . . . 70

Enter Docker . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72

Container Packaging–Beyond Docker . . . . . . . . . . 76

Single and Multitenant Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76

Virtualization and NFV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78

References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79

Review Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79

Chapter 3: Virtualization of Network Functions . . . . . . . . . . .83

Designing NFV Networks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83

NFV Design Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84

NFV Transformation Challenges . . . . . . . . . . . . 105

Virtualization of Network Infrastructure and Services . . . . . . . 118

NFV for Routing Infrastructure . . . . . . . . . . . . 118

Virtualization of Network Security . . . . . . . . . . . 127

Virtualization of Mobile Communication Networks . . . . 129

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133

References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134

Review Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134

Chapter 4: NFV Deployment in the Cloud . . . . . . . . . . . . .137

What’s in a Cloud? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137

Characteristics of Cloud . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139

Cloud-Based Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140

Cloud Deployment Models . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142

NFV and Cloud . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144

Revisiting ETSI Management and Orchestration Block . . . . . . 145

MANO Data Repositories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147

Orchestrating, Deploying, and Managing NFV Infrastructure . . . . 157

Hardware Virtualization Deployment Options . . . . . . . 158

Deploying Virtual Machines and Containers . . . . . . . 160

Software and Tools for NFVI Deployment . . . . . . . . 164

Introduction to OpenStack . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167

So What Is OpenStack? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167

A Brief History of OpenStack . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168

OpenStack Releases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169

OpenStack Deployment Nodes . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169

OpenStack Networking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183

OpenStack Deployment Nodes Revisited . . . . . . . . . 192

OpenStack High Availability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193

Live Migration for VNF mobility . . . . . . . . . . . . 200

Deploying OpenStack . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201

Using OpenStack as VIM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204

Life Cycle Management of VNFs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211

VNFM Software Examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213

Orchestration and Deployment of Network Services . . . . . . . 214

Cisco’s Network Service Orchestrator . . . . . . . . . . 214

Telefonica’s OpenMANO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214

Brocade VNF Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215

Nokia’s CloudBand Network Director . . . . . . . . . . 215

Ciena’s Blue Planet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215

HP’s NFV Director . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215

Ericsson Cloud Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215

OpenStack Tracker . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 216

RIFT.io’s RIFT.ware . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 216

NFV MANO and Open Source Solutions . . . . . . . . . . . . 216

Open Platform NFV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 216

Open Orchestration Project (Open-O) . . . . . . . . . . 218

Open Source MANO (OSM) . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218

Describing Network Service Descriptor . . . . . . . . . . . . 219

Juju Charms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219

HOT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219

TOSCA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222

References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222

Review Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224

Chapter 5: Software Defined Networking (SDN) . . . . . . . . . . .227

Basic Concepts of SDN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227

What is SDN? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230

Advantages of SDN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231

SDN Implementation and Protocols . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234

Introduction to SDN Controller . . . . . . . . . . . . 234

SDN Implementation Models . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235

SDN Protocols . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238

SDN Use-Cases for Different Networking Domains . . . . . . . . 251

SDN in the Data Center (SDN DC) . . . . . . . . . . . 251

SDN in Service Provider Cloud (SP SDN) . . . . . . . . . 254

SDN in Wide-Area Networks (SD WAN) . . . . . . . . . 257

Enterprise SDN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 260

Transport SDN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262

Revisiting SDN Controllers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265

Open Source SDN Controllers . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265

Commercial SDN Controllers . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269

SDN Correlation with NFV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273

CORD–An Example of NFV and SDN Working Together . . 276

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281

References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 282

Review Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283

Chapter 6: Stitching It All Together . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .285

Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285

Service Function Chaining . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287

Service Chaining in a Traditional Network . . . . . . . . 288

Service Function Chaining for Cloud Scaling . . . . . . . 289

Network Service Header (NSH) . . . . . . . . . . . . 294

Other Protocols for SFC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 302

Service Chaining Use Case . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 302

How Virtual Machines Communicate . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304

Virtual Switch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305

Single Root Input/Output Virtualization and

Sharing (SR-IOV) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 306

Direct Memory Access . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307

Enhancing vSwitch Performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 308

Data Plane Development Kit (DPDK) . . . . . . . . . . 309

Vector Packet Processing (VPP) . . . . . . . . . . . . . 310

Data Performance Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314

CPU Usage Optimization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315

Optimized Use of Memory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317

Programmability in a Virtualized Network . . . . . . . . . . . 317

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321

References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 322

Review Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 322

Appendix A: Answers to Review Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . 325

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