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SDN Controller Integration

This page explains how ENP can use data from external SDN controllers as an input for simulation and analysis workflows.

Why This Matters

The Network Digital Twin does not need to be created only from manually entered topology data. In deployments where the corresponding functionality is enabled, ENP can import or refresh part of the design from external controllers and then run simulations on top of that model.

This is useful when you want simulation results to reflect an operational view of the network instead of a purely manual design snapshot.

Supported Integration Model

ENP can integrate with existing SDN controllers through supported northbound interfaces.

Typical supported cases include:

  • standard topology interfaces such as IETF:networks (RFC 8345) This type of model is useful to represent networks, nodes, termination points, and links in a vendor-neutral way that ENP can ingest as topology input.
  • transport-oriented interfaces such as Transport API (TAPI) for optical environments TAPI is especially relevant when the external controller exposes optical or transport-layer inventory and connectivity information that ENP can reuse for multi-layer analysis.
  • commercial SDN controllers that implement one of the supported interfaces

The exact set of available integrations depends on the deployment and product configuration.

What ENP Uses From The Controller

Depending on the controller and interface, ENP may ingest information such as:

  • discovered topology objects
  • node and link relationships
  • transport-layer structures
  • service-relevant attributes needed to build the analytical model

The goal is to make that imported information available inside the design so the Digital Twin can analyze it together with the rest of the network data.

Relationship With Simulations

Once the controller data has been imported into the design, ENP can use it as the basis for analyses such as:

  • routing behavior studies
  • resilience and failure impact analysis
  • traffic and capacity studies
  • cross-layer IP and transport evaluation

In other words, controller integration is not a separate analytical engine. It is an input path into the same Network Digital Twin used by the rest of the simulation features.

Network Planner Module Requirement

This functionality should be treated as a dedicated module in Network Planner.

If the module is not enabled in the deployment, users should not expect controller-backed discovery and synchronization workflows to be available, even if the rest of the simulation features are present.

Typical Workflow

  1. Enable the controller integration module in Network Planner.
  2. Create the controller definition in ENP.
  3. Run topology discovery or the relevant import workflow.
  4. Verify that the imported data is present in the design.
  5. Run the required simulation or analysis on the resulting model.