Broadcom announces Open Switch pipeline specification targeting growing SDN app ecosystem

Open Networking Summit, 2014, SANTA CLARA, USA: Broadcom Corp. announced the OpenFlow Data Plane Abstraction (OF-DPA) v1.0 specification, software and API, the industry's first openly published implementation of physical switch hardware pipeline abstraction for the Open Networking Foundation's (ONF) OpenFlow 1.3.1 Switch.

OpenFlow, one of the methods for implementing software-defined networking (SDN), enables a standardized way of delivering a centralized, programmable network that can dynamically address changing application requirements.

The OF-DPA v1.0 specification, software and API can be used to implement popular use cases such as network virtualization, multi-tenant networks and traffic engineering with higher scale and performance. For more details, view Broadcom's white paper, "Engineered Elephant Flows for Boosting Application Performance in Large Scale CLOS Networks."

"The openly published OF-DPA specification, software and API exposes OpenFlow compliant programming constructs over Broadcom's StrataXGS Ethernet Switch Series," said Ram Velaga, Broadcom senior VP and GM, Network Switch. "By mapping the OpenFlow 1.3.1 pipeline to high bandwidth and high density switch silicon like the StrataXGS Trident Series, we are enabling SDN applications to achieve high performance and scale."

The OpenFlow Switch in the ONF 1.3.1 specification defines a pipeline that contains multiple tables, each table containing multiple flow entries. The OpenFlow pipeline processing defines how packets interact with these tables. The OF-DPA v1.0 physical switch hardware pipeline abstraction is an implementation of the OpenFlow 1.3.1 Switch optimized for Broadcom StrataXGS Ethernet Switch devices.

The OF-DPA v1.0 software and API enables OpenFlow 1.3.1 agents and controllers to access multiple tables implemented in Broadcom switch devices. The intent is to facilitate general availability of production-quality OpenFlow 1.3.1 switches from OEM and ODM vendors as well as provide a reference platform for use by end users and in academic and industrial research networks.