Location via proxy:   [ UP ]  
[Report a bug]   [Manage cookies]                
skip to main content
10.1145/1084834.1084904acmconferencesArticle/Chapter ViewAbstractPublication PagesesweekConference Proceedingsconference-collections
Article

FlexPath NP: a network processor concept with application-driven flexible processing paths

Published: 19 September 2005 Publication History

Abstract

In this paper, we present a new architectural concept for network processors called FlexPath NP. The central idea behind FlexPath NP is to systematically map network processor (NP) application sub-functions onto both SW programmable processor (CPU) resources and (re-)configurable HW building blocks, such that different packet flows are forwarded via different, optimized processing paths through the NP. Packets with well understood, relatively simple processing requirements may even bypass the central CPU complex (AutoRoute). In consequence, CPU processing resources are more effectively used and the overall NP performance and throughput are improved compared to conventional NP architectures. We present analytical performance estimations to quantify the performance advantage of FlexPath (expressed as available CPU instructions for each packet traversing the CPUs) and introduce a platform-based System on Programmable Chip (SoPC) based architecture which implements the FlexPath NP concept.

References

[1]
Kumar, V. P., Lakshman, T.V., Stiliadis, D.: "Beyond best effort: Router architectures for the differentiated services of tomorrow's internet", IEEE Communications Magazine, vol. 36, no. 5, pp. 152--164, May 1998
[2]
Blake, Black, Carlson, Davies, Wang, Weiss: "An Architecture for Differentiated Service", RFC 2475, December 1998
[3]
Ying, Q., Zhigang, Z., Biswas, J.: "Programmable Security Devices for the Network Edge - IP Security on a Network Processor", ICACT2002, International Conference on Advanced Communications Technologies, pp. 873--880, 2002
[4]
Subbiah, B., Raivio, Y.: "Transport architecture evolution in UMTS/IMT-2000 cellular networks", International Journal of Communication Systems, Vol. 13, issue 5, pp. 371--385, August 2000
[5]
Zeadally, S., Siddiqui, F., Kubher, P.: "Voice over IP in intranet and Internet environments", IEE Proceedings Communications, vol. 151, issue 3, pp. 263-269, June 25th, 2004
[6]
Shah, N.: "Understanding Network Processors" - In: Berkeley Technical Report, September 2001
[7]
Lawton, G.: "Will Network Processor Units Live up to their Promise?", IEEE Comp. Magazine, pp. 13--15, April 2004
[8]
Kulkarni, C., Gries, M., Sauer, C., Keutzer, K.: "Programming Challenges in Network Processor Deployment", Int. Conference on Compilers, Architecture and Synthesis for Embedded Systems (CASES), October 2003
[9]
Allen Jr., J. R., et al: "IBM PowerNP network processor: Hardware, software and applications", IBM Journal of R&D, vol. 47, no. 2/3, March/May 2003
[10]
Spirent PPPoE AX/4000 Broadband (DSLAM) Test System, Press Release, http://www.spirentcom.com/news/press.cfm?id=965, Feb 18, 2003
[11]
DSL Forum Technical Report TR-092, "Broadband Remote Access Server Requirements Document", August 2004
[12]
Ramaswamy, R., Wolf, T.: "PacketBench: A Tool for Workload Characterization of Network Processing", IEEE 6th Annual Workshop on Workload Characterization (WWC-6), pp. 42-50, Austin, TX, October 2003
[13]
Jenkins, C.: "NPU Co-Processors", Presentation at Network Processor Conference, San Jose, CA, August 2000
[14]
Intel IXP1200 Network Processor Family, http://www.intel.com/design/network/prodbrf/27904001.pdf
[15]
IBM PowerPC 440 Product Brief, March 24, 2004, http://www-306.ibm.com/chips/techlib
[16]
IP Monitoring Project, http://ipmon.sprint.com, Traffic Profile gathered on February 6th, 2004 at the San Jose (sj-25) OC-48 (2.5 Gbit/s) link
[17]
ML310 Embedded Development Platform, Xilinx development boards, http://www.xilinx.com/ml310/

Cited By

View all
  • (2012)Instruction set architectural guidelines for embedded packet-processing enginesJournal of Systems Architecture: the EUROMICRO Journal10.1016/j.sysarc.2012.02.00458:3-4(112-125)Online publication date: 1-Mar-2012
  • (2011)A path switching scheme for SCTP based on round trip delaysComputers & Mathematics with Applications10.1016/j.camwa.2011.08.06662:9(3504-3523)Online publication date: 1-Nov-2011
  • (2010)FlexPath NP—Flexible, Dynamically Reconfigurable Processing Paths in Network ProcessorsDynamically Reconfigurable Systems10.1007/978-90-481-3485-4_17(355-374)Online publication date: 10-Feb-2010
  • Show More Cited By

Recommendations

Comments

Information & Contributors

Information

Published In

cover image ACM Conferences
CODES+ISSS '05: Proceedings of the 3rd IEEE/ACM/IFIP international conference on Hardware/software codesign and system synthesis
September 2005
356 pages
ISBN:1595931619
DOI:10.1145/1084834
Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

Sponsors

Publisher

Association for Computing Machinery

New York, NY, United States

Publication History

Published: 19 September 2005

Permissions

Request permissions for this article.

Check for updates

Author Tags

  1. IP networking
  2. application-specific architectures
  3. dynamically reconfigurable processors
  4. hardware accelerators
  5. network processors

Qualifiers

  • Article

Conference

CODES/ISSS05

Acceptance Rates

CODES+ISSS '05 Paper Acceptance Rate 50 of 200 submissions, 25%;
Overall Acceptance Rate 280 of 864 submissions, 32%

Contributors

Other Metrics

Bibliometrics & Citations

Bibliometrics

Article Metrics

  • Downloads (Last 12 months)4
  • Downloads (Last 6 weeks)1
Reflects downloads up to 10 Nov 2024

Other Metrics

Citations

Cited By

View all
  • (2012)Instruction set architectural guidelines for embedded packet-processing enginesJournal of Systems Architecture: the EUROMICRO Journal10.1016/j.sysarc.2012.02.00458:3-4(112-125)Online publication date: 1-Mar-2012
  • (2011)A path switching scheme for SCTP based on round trip delaysComputers & Mathematics with Applications10.1016/j.camwa.2011.08.06662:9(3504-3523)Online publication date: 1-Nov-2011
  • (2010)FlexPath NP—Flexible, Dynamically Reconfigurable Processing Paths in Network ProcessorsDynamically Reconfigurable Systems10.1007/978-90-481-3485-4_17(355-374)Online publication date: 10-Feb-2010
  • (2010)Hardware Support for Efficient Resource Utilization in Manycore Processor SystemsMultiprocessor System-on-Chip10.1007/978-1-4419-6460-1_3(57-87)Online publication date: 9-Nov-2010
  • (2009)Quantitative analysis of packet-processing applications regarding architectural guidelines for network-processing-engine developmentJournal of Systems Architecture: the EUROMICRO Journal10.1016/j.sysarc.2009.07.00155:7-9(373-386)Online publication date: 1-Jul-2009
  • (2008)A hardware packet re-sequencer unit for network processorsProceedings of the 21st international conference on Architecture of computing systems10.5555/1787770.1787782(85-97)Online publication date: 25-Feb-2008
  • (2008)A processing path dispatcher in network processor MPSoCsIEEE Transactions on Very Large Scale Integration (VLSI) Systems10.1109/TVLSI.2008.200204816:10(1335-1345)Online publication date: 1-Oct-2008
  • (2008)A Hardware Packet Re-Sequencer Unit for Network ProcessorsArchitecture of Computing Systems – ARCS 200810.1007/978-3-540-78153-0_8(85-97)Online publication date: 2008
  • (2007)Simulated and measured performance evaluation of RISC-based SoC platforms in network processing applicationsJournal of Systems Architecture: the EUROMICRO Journal10.1016/j.sysarc.2007.01.00953:10(703-718)Online publication date: 1-Oct-2007
  • (2006)Performance evaluation for system-on-chip architectures using trace-based transaction level simulationProceedings of the conference on Design, automation and test in Europe: Proceedings10.5555/1131481.1131549(248-253)Online publication date: 6-Mar-2006
  • Show More Cited By

View Options

Get Access

Login options

View options

PDF

View or Download as a PDF file.

PDF

eReader

View online with eReader.

eReader

Media

Figures

Other

Tables

Share

Share

Share this Publication link

Share on social media