Explore the emerging definitions, protocols, and standards for SDN—software-defined, software-driven, programmable networks—with this comprehensive guide. Two senior network engineers show you what required for building networks that use software for bi-directional communication between applications and the underlying network infrastructure. This vendor-agnostic book also presents several SDN use cases, including bandwidth scheduling and manipulation, input traffic and triggered actions, as well as some interesting use cases around big data, data center overlays, and network-function virtualization. Discover how enterprises and service providers alike are pursuing SDN as it continues to evolve. Explore the current state of the OpenFlow model and centralized network control Delve into distributed and central control, including data plane generation Examine the structure and capabilities of commercial and open source controllers Survey the available technologies for network programmability Trace the modern data center from desktop-centric to highly distributed models Discover new ways to connect instances of network-function virtualization and service chaining Get detailed information on constructing and maintaining an SDN network topology Examine an idealized SDN framework for controllers, applications, and ecosystems