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Google wants to make switching hardware a commodity product. Right now most switching software does not interoperate, at least not on a level Google wants.

Because of this if you want the latest and greatest features from Cisco you have to run all Cisco. Or Juniper. You can't just buy 10 Cisco switches and 10 Juniper switches and all run the same operating system. Compare this to PC hardware where I could buy any combination and install any OS I want.

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The hardware is commodity, but you've centralized the software/logic. Is this really a net win on a global scale? (It's obviously a net win at the micro level, or else Google wouldn't use it)

The protocol doesn't force this centralization to be physical, just logical -- Hyperflow[1] is one example of how a physically distributed control plane can be created.

[1] http://static.usenix.org/event/inm10/tech/full_papers/Tootoo...

It is in many enterprise environments. I dealt with one place where the security regime had their way with a large network.

End result is that nearly a decade later, physically installing more than 3 servers at any given time is a project that takes many weeks. In one instance, installation of a small cluster took over 3 years.

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