Creating Advanced Functions on Network Processors: Experience and Perspectives

Abstract

In this paper, we present five case studies of advanced networking functions that detail how a network processor (NP) can provide high performance and also the necessary flexibility compared with Application-Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs). We first review the basic NP system architectures, and describe the IBM PowerNP architecture from a data-plane as well as from a control-plane point of view. We introduce models for the programmer's views of NPs that facilitate a global understanding of NP software programming. Then, for each case study, we present results from prototypes as well as general considerations that apply to a wider range of system architectures. Specifically, we investigate the suitability of NPs for

• Quality of Service (active queue management and traffic engineering),
• header processing (GPRS tunneling protocol),
• intelligent forwarding (load balancing without flow disruption),
• payload processing (code interpretation and just-in-time compilation in active networks), and
• protocol stack termination (SCTP).

Documents

• PDF (14 pages, 633 kBytes)
• CiteSeer/ResearchIndex information
• An earlier and longer version appeared as IBM Research Report RZ-3460. It includes two additional figures which some of the authors regularly consult as reference when programming the IBM PowerNP.
• Part of the TERP project

BibTeX entry

@Article{haas03creating,
  Author =       {Robert Haas and Clark Jeffries and Lukas Kencl and
                  Andreas Kind and Bernard Metzler and Roman Pletka and
                  Marcel Waldvogel and Laurent {Frel\'{e}choux} and
                  Patrick Droz},
  Title =        {Creating Advanced Functions on Network Processors:
                  Experience and Perspectives},
  Journal =      {IEEE Network},
  Year =         2003,
  Month =        jul,
  Volume =       17,
  Number =       4,
  Pages =        {46-54}
}