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SoftFG: a dynamic load balancer for soft reconfiguration of wireless data centers

SoftFG: a dynamic load balancer for soft reconfiguration of wireless data centers
SoftFG: a dynamic load balancer for soft reconfiguration of wireless data centers

In this paper, we investigate the soft-reconfiguration of optical wireless data centers (WDCs). In the considered physical topology, edge top-of-rack (ToR) switches in the leaf layer are inter-connected with core switches in the spine layer via wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) based free-space optical (FSO) links. We propose an agile load balancing (LB) solution, namely SoftFG, to cope with the dynamically changing link load variations and the low-utilization time intervals within the wireless data centers (DCs). SoftFG executes flow grooming (FG) and soft reconfigurations on the virtual topology depending upon the fine-grain network statistics. Unlike the long-term LBs, SoftFG offloads large flows of congested paths onto underutilized links without making any hardware reconfiguration on path capacity and routes. Flows can be offloaded to other wavelengths within the same FSO link (i.e., intra-link), to other FSO links (i.e., inter-link), or within/across topologies (i.e., intra/inter topology). To do so, SoftFG ensures clear visibility on network paths, early congestion detection, and fast-accurate reaction to reroute offloaded flows onto underutilized wavelengths or links. Therefore, SoftFG is designed as a kernel module installed on the virtual switches/hypervisor. The module collects flow statistics based on a source-destination collaborative scheme and records them in flow and path information tables. SoftFG accordingly makes quick decisions on offloading and reroutes flows with high accuracy. Emulation results show that SoftFG delivers about 12 and 17 faster flow completion time (FCT) than LetFlow and CONGA LBs, respectively.

Adaptive probing, Flow Detection, Flow Grooming, Load balancing
1525-3511
IEEE
Alghadhban, Amer
b5789d22-f27e-4307-9483-2d5bdcd540d5
Celik, Abdulkadir
f8e72266-763c-4849-b38e-2ea2f50a69d0
Shihada, Basem
3aad5038-5b7e-4a97-9f22-7e310ea68a27
Alouini, Mohamed Slim
3ccd5915-318e-4f4b-b47a-48257ab4c0eb
Alghadhban, Amer
b5789d22-f27e-4307-9483-2d5bdcd540d5
Celik, Abdulkadir
f8e72266-763c-4849-b38e-2ea2f50a69d0
Shihada, Basem
3aad5038-5b7e-4a97-9f22-7e310ea68a27
Alouini, Mohamed Slim
3ccd5915-318e-4f4b-b47a-48257ab4c0eb

Alghadhban, Amer, Celik, Abdulkadir, Shihada, Basem and Alouini, Mohamed Slim (2020) SoftFG: a dynamic load balancer for soft reconfiguration of wireless data centers. In 2020 IEEE Wireless Communications and Networking Conference, WCNC 2020 - Proceedings. vol. 2020-May, IEEE.. (doi:10.1109/WCNC45663.2020.9120539).

Record type: Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)

Abstract

In this paper, we investigate the soft-reconfiguration of optical wireless data centers (WDCs). In the considered physical topology, edge top-of-rack (ToR) switches in the leaf layer are inter-connected with core switches in the spine layer via wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) based free-space optical (FSO) links. We propose an agile load balancing (LB) solution, namely SoftFG, to cope with the dynamically changing link load variations and the low-utilization time intervals within the wireless data centers (DCs). SoftFG executes flow grooming (FG) and soft reconfigurations on the virtual topology depending upon the fine-grain network statistics. Unlike the long-term LBs, SoftFG offloads large flows of congested paths onto underutilized links without making any hardware reconfiguration on path capacity and routes. Flows can be offloaded to other wavelengths within the same FSO link (i.e., intra-link), to other FSO links (i.e., inter-link), or within/across topologies (i.e., intra/inter topology). To do so, SoftFG ensures clear visibility on network paths, early congestion detection, and fast-accurate reaction to reroute offloaded flows onto underutilized wavelengths or links. Therefore, SoftFG is designed as a kernel module installed on the virtual switches/hypervisor. The module collects flow statistics based on a source-destination collaborative scheme and records them in flow and path information tables. SoftFG accordingly makes quick decisions on offloading and reroutes flows with high accuracy. Emulation results show that SoftFG delivers about 12 and 17 faster flow completion time (FCT) than LetFlow and CONGA LBs, respectively.

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More information

Published date: May 2020
Additional Information: Publisher Copyright: © 2020 IEEE.
Venue - Dates: 2020 IEEE Wireless Communications and Networking Conference, WCNC 2020, , Seoul, Korea, Republic of, 2020-05-25 - 2020-05-28
Keywords: Adaptive probing, Flow Detection, Flow Grooming, Load balancing

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 504479
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/504479
ISSN: 1525-3511
PURE UUID: b52a66d1-8ef7-4242-8112-197ace9bc6c1
ORCID for Abdulkadir Celik: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0001-9007-9979

Catalogue record

Date deposited: 09 Sep 2025 20:11
Last modified: 10 Sep 2025 13:50

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Contributors

Author: Amer Alghadhban
Author: Abdulkadir Celik ORCID iD
Author: Basem Shihada
Author: Mohamed Slim Alouini

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