OpenWeb: Seamless Proxy Interconnection at the Switching Layer

Abstract

In recent years, the amount of Internet traffic has been growing beyond the enhancement of its capacity. Moreover the amount of published information is also growing at an exponential rate. Consequently, there are the demands on performance, robustness, and low latency for a worldwide Internet population. To solve these problems, traditional solutions have led to web proxy cache systems. However, to use such systems, administrators and/or clients are required to do some tedious and error-prone operations because cache systems generally need to be accessed through layer 4-7 scripts and commands, such as the route command on Posix systems, and usually, manual configuration or JavaScript code for a web proxy. If cache systems work at the switching layer (layer-2), administrators can introduce the system just by inserting it into the network and clients can use the system transparently. This paper describes OpenWeb, a layer-2 redirection engine implemented as an application of the OpenFlow switch architecture. New open protocols at the switching layer now enable far more robust and seamless packet redirection, without user configuration or unreliable scripts. In addition, performance evaluations compared with traditional systems and simulations run in random networks show that OpenWeb is clearly beneficial.