An Approach for Service Function Chain Routing and Virtual Function Network Instance Migration in Network Function Virtualization Architectures

Abstract

Network function virtualization foresees the virtualization of service functions and their execution on virtual machines. Any service is represented by a service function chain (SFC) that is a set of VNFs to be executed according to a given order. The running of VNFs needs the instantiation of VNF Instances (VNFIs) that in general are software modules executed on virtual machines. The virtualization challenges include: 1) where to instantiate VNFIs; ii) how many resources to allocate to each VNFI; iii) how to route SFC requests to the appropriate VNFIs in the right sequence; and iv) when and how to migrate VNFIs in response to changes to SFC request intensity and location. We develop an approach that uses three algorithms that are used back-to-back resulting in VNFI placement, SFC routing, and VNFI migration in response to changing workload. The objective is to first minimize the rejection of SFC bandwidth and second to consolidate VNFIs in as few servers as possible so as to reduce the energy consumed. The proposed consolidation algorithm is based on a migration policy of VNFIs that considers the revenue loss due to QoS degradation that a user suffers due to information loss occurring during the migrations. The objective is to minimize the total cost given by the energy consumption and the revenue loss due to QoS degradation. We evaluate our suite of algorithms on a test network and show performance gains that can be achieved over using other alternative naive algorithms

Network service chains deployment across multiple SDN domains

“…[12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25] In Wang et al, 12 a model on dynamic function composition problem for NSC was proposed to adapt to the increasingly diverse service requirements. [12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25] In Wang et al, 12 a model on dynamic function composition problem for NSC was proposed to adapt to the increasingly diverse service requirements.…”

“…In the past few years, the network service function chain deployment has been a hot topic in industry and academia, and a large number of research works have been carried out. [12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25] In Wang et al, 12 a model on dynamic function composition problem for NSC was proposed to adapt to the increasingly diverse service requirements. The dynamic service function composition problem was defined as a multidimension multichoice problem and solved by using the Markov approximation algorithm.…”

“…In addition, Eramo et al 24 studied the problem of SFC routing and VNF instance migration. In particular, they regarded the maximization of the amount of data can be processed within the network at peak traffic as the optimization objective of considered routing and VNF placement problem.…”

SDN/NFV‐enabled performance estimation framework for SFC optimization

“…Most of them mainly focus on designing specific strategies and algorithms for SFC optimization. For example, Eramo et al first propose a VNF placement and chaining algorithm for SFC deployment, and then, they proposes a VNF migration policy to optimize the service performance. Nevertheless, the migration policy works in response to changes to SFC requests, whereas our proposed framework focuses on serving the deployed SFCs.…”

A Robust Optimization Based Energy-Aware Virtual Network Function Placement Proposal for Small Cell 5G Networks with Mobile Edge Computing Capabilities

“…For this reason, the problem of VNF placement has been attracting increasing attention during the last years [11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25]. Nonetheless, the optimal placement of virtual elements to physical resources aimed at minimizing power consumption with service performance constraints for the 5G scenario under study is a complex issue.…”