When I finished my SDN workshop @ Interop Las Vegas (including a chapter on OpenFlow limitations), some attendees started wondering whether they should even consider OpenFlow in their SDN deployments. My answer: don’t blame the tool if people use it incorrectly.

Two days later, I discovered HP is one of those companies that knows how to use that tool.

Chris Young invited me to do a podcast with Craig Mills (Technical Product Manager responsible for HP’s campus SDN applications) and Craig explained in great details how the HP VAN SDN Controller uses OpenFlow to gain visibility into campus networks, and how they use OpenFlow rules as forwarding exceptions to implement campus security and dynamic QoS marking.

I can’t tell you how refreshing it was to meet someone that’s well aware of all limitations of the OpenFlow protocol and the underlying hardware implementation details, and has worked around them to create a set of products that can be used in real-life networks.

For more details, listen to the Episode 31 of Software Gone Wild.