Abstract
The network functions virtualization (NFV) paradigm promises higher flexibility, vendor-independence, and higher cost-efficiency for network operators. Its key concept consists of virtualizing the functions of specialized hardware-based middleboxes like load balancers or firewalls and running them on commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) hardware.
This work aims at investigating the performance implications that result from migrating from a middlebox-based hardware deployment to a NFV-based software solution. Such analyses pave the way towards deriving guidelines that help determining in which network environments NFV poses a viable alternative to today’s middlebox-heavy architectures. To this end, a firewall is chosen as an exemplary network function and a performance comparison between a dedicated hardware device and a commercially distributed virtualized solution by the same vendor is drawn. This comparison focuses on the packet delay, while varying the load level that is applied to the network function under test. Based on traffic measurements of a university campus network, conclusions regarding possible fields of application are drawn.
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Acknowledgment
This work has been performed in the framework of the SARDINE project and is partly funded by the BMBF (Project ID 16KIS0261). The authors alone are responsible for the content of the paper.
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© 2017 ICST Institute for Computer Sciences, Social Informatics and Telecommunications Engineering
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Gebert, S., Müssig, A., Lange, S., Zinner, T., Gray, N., Tran-Gia, P. (2017). Processing Time Comparison of a Hardware-Based Firewall and Its Virtualized Counterpart. In: Agüero, R., Zaki, Y., Wenning, BL., Förster, A., Timm-Giel, A. (eds) Mobile Networks and Management. MONAMI 2016. Lecture Notes of the Institute for Computer Sciences, Social Informatics and Telecommunications Engineering, vol 191. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-52712-3_16
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-52712-3_16
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