B-Cache: A Behavior-Level Caching Framework for the Programmable Data Plane

Abstract

By enabling operators to program behaviors of the packet processing pipeline, P4, a domain-specific language, unleashes new opportunities for offloading network functions onto the programmable data plane (PDP) and enhancing network performance. However, recent research shows that as P4 programs and the corresponding packet processing pipeline grow in size and complexity, the performance of the PDP will decrease significantly, which compromises the programmability and flexibility brought by P4. To overcome this performance degradation, we propose B-Cache, a general behavior-level caching framework for both stateful and stateless behaviors on the PDP. The basic idea of B-Cache is to compile packet processing behaviors that were once distributed across multiple tables into one synthetic cache table, thus guarantee the performance on various P4 targets. Our experiment results indicate that B-Cache comparably yields significant performance benefits including a 49% delay decrease and a 200% throughput increase on the software target, and a 60% throughput increase on the hardware target.