In a software-defined networking (SDN) environment, which statement best describes what the SDN controller can do when interacting with network switches?
It physically replaces switch hardware and performs all packet forwarding in software at the network edge.
It centrally and programmatically pushes flow rules and configuration changes to switches, so no per-device manual intervention is required.
It only collects monitoring data from switches; any forwarding changes must still be entered manually on each switch.
Switch ports are configured exclusively through SNMP set commands issued from an administrator's workstation rather than from the controller.
The SDN controller holds the control plane for the entire network. Through southbound APIs such as OpenFlow, NETCONF, or gRPC, it can programmatically push flow rules and other configuration changes to all managed switches. This centralized, software-driven approach removes the need for engineers to log in to each switch's CLI, speeds response to changing conditions, and supports automated security policy enforcement. By contrast, traditional networks require manual, device-by-device configuration, and SNMP set commands are typically used only for limited management tasks. The controller does not replace the physical data-plane hardware; it instructs that hardware how to forward traffic.
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