Sending the first K packets to the SDN controller

Question

I'm trying to send the first K packets of each newly arrival flow to the SDN controller, e.g. pox or ryu. Currently, the packet-in method seems to be triggered at the moment of a new flow arrives to an OpenFlow switch, however, it can only send the first packet to the controller.

Is there any solution that makes the packet-in able to send the first K packets from each new flow to the network controller?

Any suggestion will be highly appreciated.

Answer 1

I ignore if there is any way of programming this into the switch. However, if you are willing to program applications for the controller you could do the following thing.

1. Start your network as usual
2. Let the first packet be sent to the controller
3. Store at the SDN controller: L3 Src/DSt Ips, L3 Protocol and L4 Src/Dst Ports
4. Install a rule that defines that a packet with these 5 features must eb sent to the controller and count anytime a packet is sent.
5. After n packets, install a rule that the rest of the packets must be sent to an X port as expected.
6. There is a chance that between the moment you decide that enough packets have been sent to the SDN controller, remove the rule and install a new one, more packets might be sent to the controller.

I can imagine that this can be done better but this is the first idea that comes to mind.

Cheers,