Measuring and Modeling of Open vSwitch Performance : Implementation in KVM environment

Abstract: Network virtualization has become an important aspect of the Telecom industry. The need for efficient, scalable and reliable virtualized network functions is paramount to modern networking. Open vSwitch is a virtual switch that attempts to extend the usage of virtual switches to industry grade performance levels on heterogeneous platforms.The aim of the thesis is to give an insight into the working of Open vSwitch. To evaluate the performance of Open vSwitch in various virtualization scenarios such as KVM and Docker (from second companion thesis)[1]. To investigate different scheduling techniques offered by the Open vSwitch software and supported by the Linux kernel such as FIFO, SFQ, CODEL, FQCODEL, HTB and HFSC. To differentiate the performance of Open vSwitch in these scenarios and scheduling capacities and determine the best scenario for optimum performance.The methodology of the thesis involved a physical model of the system used for real-time experimentation as well as quantitative analysis. Quantitative analysis of obtained results paved the way for unbiased conclusions. Experimental analysis was required to measure metrics such as throughput, latency and jitter in order to grade the performance of Open vSwitch in the particular virtualization scenario.The result of this thesis must be considered in context with a second companion thesis[1]. Both the theses aim at measuring and modeling performance of Open vSwitch in NFV. However, the results of this thesis outline the performance of Open vSwitch and Linux bridge in KVM virtualization scenario. Various scheduling techniques were measured for network performance metrics and it was observed that Docker performed better in terms of throughput, latency and jitter. In the KVM scenario, from the throughput test it was observed that all algorithms perform similarly in terms of throughput, for both Open vSwitch and Linux bridges. In the round trip latency tests, it was seen that FIFO has the least round trip latency, CODEL and FQCODEL had the highest latencies. HTB and HFSC perform similarly in the latency test. In the jitter tests, it was seen that HTB and HFSC had highest average jitter measurements in UDP Stream test. CODEL and FQCODEL had the least jitter results for both Open vSwitch and Linux bridges.The conclusion of the thesis is that the virtualization layer on which Open vSwitch operates is one of the main factors in determining the switching performance. Docker performs better than KVM for both bridges. In the KVM scenario, irrespective of the scheduling algorithm considered, Open vSwitch performed better than Linux bridge. HTB had highest throughput and FIFO had least round trip latency. CODEL and FQCODEL are efficient scheduling algorithms with low jitter measurements.