What, Where, and When: Software Fault Localization for SDN

Robert Colin Scott, Andreas Wundsam, Kyriakos Zarifis and Scott Shenker

EECS Department
University of California, Berkeley
Technical Report No. UCB/EECS-2012-178
July 13, 2012

http://www2.eecs.berkeley.edu/Pubs/TechRpts/2012/EECS-2012-178.pdf

In this paper we leverage the structure of the SDN software stack to automate the process of troubleshooting networks. We present two techniques for programmatically localizing the root cause of network problems: cross-layer correspondence checking infers what problems exist in the network, and where in the control software the problem first developed; and simulation-based causal inference infers when the triggering event(s) occurred. We evaluated our tools on three popular SDN platforms---Frenetic, Floodlight and POX---and found or reproduced three bugs: isolation breaches and faulty failover logic between replicated controllers.


BibTeX citation:

@techreport{Scott:EECS-2012-178,
    Author = {Scott, Robert Colin and Wundsam, Andreas and Zarifis, Kyriakos and Shenker, Scott},
    Title = {What, Where, and When: Software Fault Localization for SDN},
    Institution = {EECS Department, University of California, Berkeley},
    Year = {2012},
    Month = {Jul},
    URL = {http://www2.eecs.berkeley.edu/Pubs/TechRpts/2012/EECS-2012-178.html},
    Number = {UCB/EECS-2012-178},
    Abstract = {In this paper we leverage the
structure of the SDN software stack to automate the process of troubleshooting
networks. We present two techniques for programmatically localizing the root cause of network problems:
cross-layer correspondence checking infers what problems exist in the network,
and where in the control software the problem first developed; and
simulation-based causal inference infers when the triggering event(s) occurred. We evaluated
our tools on
three popular SDN platforms---Frenetic, Floodlight and POX---and found or reproduced three bugs:
isolation breaches and faulty failover logic between replicated controllers.}
}

EndNote citation:

%0 Report
%A Scott, Robert Colin
%A Wundsam, Andreas
%A Zarifis, Kyriakos
%A Shenker, Scott
%T What, Where, and When: Software Fault Localization for SDN
%I EECS Department, University of California, Berkeley
%D 2012
%8 July 13
%@ UCB/EECS-2012-178
%U http://www2.eecs.berkeley.edu/Pubs/TechRpts/2012/EECS-2012-178.html
%F Scott:EECS-2012-178