A Survey on software-defined networking in vehicular ad hoc networks: Challenges, applications and use cases

As the concept of smart cities is evolving, the need for automation and effective delivery of services is essential. Over the last few decades, need for safety and security of travelers on the road has been a major concern. Vehicular Ad Hoc Networks (VANETs) can play an influential role in recognizing and implementing such concept, by supporting safety, comfort and infotainment services. However, the complex and inflexible architecture of VANETs faced a set of challenges such as high mobility, intermittent connectivity, heterogeneity of applications. In this context, Software-defined networking (SDN) has emerged as a programmable and flexible network, which has recently gained attention from research communities, businesses, and industries, in both wired network management and heterogeneous wireless communication. This paper aims at examining and classifying a number of related SDN-based research works on wireless networks specially VANETs. Firstly, a brief on the requirements of SDN over traditional networking is provided, followed by an elaboration on basic architecture and its layers. Thereafter, SDN applications in various wireless network areas such as mobile network and VANETs are described along with a focus on analyzing and comparing the current SDN-related research on different parameters. Furthermore, the paper presents a review of current research initiatives to solve challenges of vehicular environment. The impact of SDN paradigm along with implementation issues in vehicular communication and explore likely use cases based on SDN paradigm.