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In this article we'll using freeRouter setup deployed in #002 and replace the pcapInt providing freeRouter native software dataplane with P4Lang's dataplane. Actually the effective dataplane is ensured P4lang virtual simple_switch_grpc running RARE P4 program called: router.p4.
Diagram
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#003 ] - Cookbook
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In our example we will use the same debian stable image (buster) installed as a VirtualBox VM as in #002.
and we add a bridge network interface to or laptop RJ45 connection.
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- had a demonstration of how to integrate freeRouter into a local area network (Similar to article #002)
- However instead of using pcapInt you are now using a software P4 dataplane from P4lang project: bmv2
- communication between freeRouter control plane and bmv2 is ensured by pcapInt via veth pair [ veth250 - veth251 ]
- This communication is possible via RARE forwarder.py based on GRPC P4Lang P4Runtime python binding
- In this example the bmv2 P4 switch has only 1 dataplane interface that is bound to enp0s9 VM interface expose to the local network as a bridged interface
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This essential paradigm is used to ensure communication between freeRouter and BMv2 P4 dataplane. It is ensured by pcapInt binary from freeRouter net-tools that will bind freeRouter socket (veth251@locathost:22710) to a virtual network interface (veth250@localhost:22709) connected to CPU_PORT 64.
forwarder.py is a simple python script based on GRPC P4Runtime pythonl library.
freeRouter is doing all the control plane route computation and write/modify/remove message entry via P4Runtime so that P4 entries are created/modified/removed accordingly from P4 tables
While BMv2 target is a very good choice for packet processing algorithm validation, it is not an ideal target for production use. We will see in next articles how we can reach a higher rate throughput related required by the use cases defined by network operators. |
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