Chapter 1. Introducing OpenDaylight

OpenDaylight is a multi-protocol, modular, and extensible platform. The SDN controller approach is suitable for organizations with networking as the main business driver.

OpenDaylight offers a model-driven approach to networking, which is based on public APIs, YANG modeling frameworks, and protocols such as RESTCONF and NETCONF.

OpenDaylight is a key component for customers who want to deploy a fully open-source solution and avoid possible vendor lock-in.

OpenDaylight provides support for common OpenStack network virtualization requirements, and also ensures multi-tenancy, security, and isolation. The following features are some of the highlights of OpenDaylight:

This version of Red Hat OpenDaylight within the Red Hat OpenStack Platform is still limited to virtual (overlay) network management only. Future versions will add support for physical (underlay) network control and management. This can provide customers with more capabilities, as well as with enhanced monitoring and troubleshooting tools across the end-to-end network path, virtual or physical.

Cloud Service Providers (CSPs) that deploy NFV seek a robust and open-source SDN solution as part of the Network Functions Virtualization Infrastructure (NFVi) layer. Red Hat OpenDaylight, with Red Hat OpenStack Platform, lays the foundation for NFV, with native support for OVS-DPDK, as well as co-existence with SR-IOV networking.