SD-RAN Interactive Management Using In-band Network Telemetry in IEEE 802.11 Networks

Abstract

Future digital factories are becoming more and more softwarized. This introduces flexibility, but the industry also demands robustness and Quality of Service (QoS) support. While 5G envisions to enable real-time applications with strict performance requirements, IEEE 802.11 networks continue to be a viable option for indoor scenarios. However, IEEE 802.11 networks currently cannot be programmed fine-grained enough to fully support and ensure QoS. Besides, due to the unknown or coarse-grained monitoring information over the wireless links, detecting performance degradation is still challenging. In this paper, we propose a Software-Defined Radio Access Network (SD-RAN) interactive management approach assisted by In-band Network Telemetry (INT) in IEEE 802.11 networks. We design a system-level architecture that includes the network administrator in the management loop through monitoring, visualization, and configuration activities. To demonstrate the feasibility of our approach, we developed a prototype and evaluated its flexibility in a real-world testbed. We argue that, with the fine-grained network information from INT and the benefits of the Software-Defined Networking (SDN) paradigm, an SDN-tailored system can assist in troubleshooting and assess enhanced QoS delivery.