APPARATUS FOR A HIGH PERFORMANCE AND HIGHLY AVAILABLE MULTI-CONTROLLERS IN A SINGLE SDN/OPENFLOW NETWORK

A method for distributing routing instructions to a plurality of nodes within an OpenFlow Software Defined Network (SDN) using a logically centralized multi-controller that comprises a plurality of controllers, wherein the method comprises receiving a plurality of incoming data packets, storing a plurality of current flow tables, queuing the incoming data packets, wherein the incoming data packets are queued based on the order received, processing the incoming data packets based on the order the incoming data packets were queued, wherein the incoming data packets that are first to be queued are the first to be processed, generating a plurality of flow tables by processing the incoming data packets, and transmitting the flow tables to the plurality of nodes when the flow tables have not been previously generated.