The application plane is centralized on an SDN network.

The application plane is centralized on an SDN network.

• A. False
• B. True
• C. Not specified
• D. Depends on architecture

Answer: (A)

In SDN, the control plane that makes forwarding decisions is centralized in a controller (or a controller cluster), while the application plane consists of the software applications that use the controller’s northbound APIs to request network behavior. The application logic is not inherently centralized; it is commonly distributed or replicated across multiple hosts or processes to scale, stand up features, and isolate faults. The controller acts as the single point of interaction for these apps, but the apps themselves can run in different locations and form a distributed ecosystem. Therefore, saying the application plane is centralized isn’t accurate by default.

In SDN, the control plane that makes forwarding decisions is centralized in a controller (or a controller cluster), while the application plane consists of the software applications that use the controller’s northbound APIs to request network behavior. The application logic is not inherently centralized; it is commonly distributed or replicated across multiple hosts or processes to scale, stand up features, and isolate faults. The controller acts as the single point of interaction for these apps, but the apps themselves can run in different locations and form a distributed ecosystem. Therefore, saying the application plane is centralized isn’t accurate by default.