A roadmap for SDN-based network management: Al-Zaytoonah University of Jordan case

Due to technological blast in hardware, software and communications systems, computing devices in multi forms (laptops, cell phones, tablets...) and vendors are spreading all over the globe connecting billions of users, and communicating massive amount of data daily, through the underlining networking infrastructures. University campus is no exception. Typical users of an educational campus network are students, faculty members, and the administrative staff. The increase number of mobile users, BYOD, social media applications, real-time video and audio communications, and mobile based services are some of the major challenges that put huge pressure and stress on the university campus network operators to manage and satisfy their customers. In this paper a software defined network (SDN) based design is proposed for managing Al-Zaytoonah University of Jordan (ZUJ) network to overcome the emerging networking challenges. Current ZUJ network service is focusing on provisioning best effort connectivity. Our approach is this paper is to explore the primary challenges faced by the ZUJ network administrators, examine the limitations of the current solutions, and then propose an SDN design that will overcome the limitations of the current deployed network.