Considerations for Benchmarking Network Performance in Containerized Infrastructures

Recently, the Benchmarking Methodology Working Group extended the laboratory characterization from physical network functions (PNFs) to virtual network functions (VNFs). With the ongoing shift in network function implementation from virtual machine-based to container-based approaches, system configurations and deployment scenarios for benchmarking will be partially influenced by how resource allocation and network technologies are specified for containerized network functions. This draft outlines additional considerations for benchmarking network performance when network functions are containerized and executed on general-purpose hardware.