NEC Corporation has announced the development of technology that improves the OpenFlow communication efficiency of virtualised servers that accommodate virtual machines (VM).
OpenFlow defines “flow” as a unit of communication in a network. By controlling communication in flow granularity, OpenFlow enables fine-grained routing and quality control. OpenFlow is a new generation networking technology that enables control of IT and networking by separating network control processes from switches to control servers and flexibly implementing them in software.
The technology is provided as software that directs flow to the most appropriate virtual machines on a virtual server by using Solarflare SFN5122F Dual-Port SFP+ 10 Gigabit Ethernet (10GbE) server adapters that support communications in flow granularity. The new technology accelerates communications by using “cut-through,” a technique for switching VM communication paths from the software forwarding path to a direct access path between VMs and NICs, and eliminating the software forwarding process when possible. Greater acceleration and improved efficiency were both achieved by combining this technology with Solarflare’s flow compatible NIC.
NEC has promoted both the acceleration and improved efficiency of servers that use OpenFlow in order to support the larger scale and advanced cloud infrastructure of the future. Additionally, this technology contributes to improving the efficiency of networks that support cloud services.
“We are proud of our contributions to this software development and technology demonstration through our work with NEC as an 10GbE server adapter vendor. Solarflare’s support for OpenFlow will increase the throughput of switched traffic between virtual machines two to three fold. We look forward to promoting new development and providing high-performance server adapters that enable OpenFlow and flow controlling technologies,” said Bruce Tolley, VP- solution marketing, Solarflare.