Rethinking Virtual Network Embedding: Substrate Support for Path Splitting and Migration

Network virtualization is a powerful way to run multiple architectures or experiments simultaneously on a shared infrastructure. However, making efficient use of the underlying resources requires effective techniques for virtual network embedding - mapping each virtual network to specific nodes and links in the substrate network. Since the general embedding problem is computationally intractable, past research restricted the problem space to allow efficient solutions, or focused on designing heuristic algorithms. This paper advocates a different approach: rethinking the design of the substrate network to enable simpler embedding algorithms and more efficient use of resources, without restricting the problem space.