OpenDataPlane

On October 29, 2013 Linaro announced that it was collaborating with members of the Linaro Networking interest Group to develop and host an open standard application programming interface for data plane applications.{{cite web|author=Linaro Limited |url=http://www.linaro.org/news/linaro-launches-opendataplane-odp-project-deliver-open-source-cross-platform-interoperability-networking-platforms/|title= Linaro launches OpenDataPlane™ (ODP) project to deliver open-source, cross-platform interoperability for networking platforms |publisher=Linaro.org |date=2013-10-29 |accessdate=2013-10-29}} Initially defined by members of the Linaro Networking Group, this project is open to contributions from all individuals and companies who share an interest in promoting a standard set of APIs to be used across the full range of network processor architectures available.

File:ODP diagram.jpg ODP consists of an API specification and a set of reference implementations that realize these APIs on different platforms.{{cite web |url=https://www.ietf.org/proceedings/90/slides/slides-90-forces-6.pdf |title=Controlling the Data Path: Acceleration Behaviors using ForCES |author=Zhen Cao |date= |website=IETF}} Implementations range from pure software to those that deeply exploit the various hardware acceleration and offload features found on modern networking System-on-Chip (SoC) processors.

ODP's goal is to allow implementers of the API great flexibility to exploit and optimize the implementation. This is intended to enable easy platform portability such that an application written to the API can pick up performance gains without needing significant platform knowledge when ported.

ODP is currently being used to develop reference platform implementations of Open Platform for NFV (OPNFV) {{cite web|author=Enea|url=http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20150505006472/en/Enea-AB-ARM-Enea-Demonstrate-Reference-Platform#.VUop8nU4l4s |title= Enea AB: ARM and Enea Demonstrate Reference Platform of Open Platform for Network Function Virtualization|publisher=Businesswire.com |date=2015-05-05 |accessdate=2015-05-05}} and is being promoted {{cite web|author=ARM Connected Community|url=http://community.arm.com/docs/DOC-10220|title= The Emergence of the OpenDataPlane Standard|publisher=ARM.com |date=2015-05-18 |accessdate=2015-05-18}}{{cite web|author=Marvell|url=http://www.marvell.com/company/news/pressDetail.do?releaseID=7816|title= Marvell Expands its 32-bit and 64-bit ARMADA SoC Family of Embedded Processors with Robust Ecosystem of Software Solutions and Partners for a Variety of Applications|publisher=Marvell.com |date=2016-02-23 |accessdate=2016-02-23}} by companies as part of their data plane support initiatives.

Products were announced by companies such as Kalray with many acronyms.{{cite web|author=Kalrayinc|url=http://www.kalrayinc.com/kalray-to-launch-high-speed-io-processors/|title= Kalray To Launch High Speed I/O Processors|publisher=kalrayinc.com |date=2016-02-09 |accessdate=2016-02-09}} The OpenDataPlane run to completion execution models and framework are also being used by FastPath applications to leverage OpenFastPath functionality. DPDK is supported in the OpenFastPath release through the ODP-DPDK layer. The intent of OpenFastPath is to enable accelerated routing/forwarding for IPv4 and IPv6, tunneling and termination for a variety of protocols.{{cite web|author=OpenFastPath|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6qM98_xtjQ|title= OpenFastPath-An Open Source Accelerated IP Fast Path|publisher=openfastpath.org |date=2016-03-15 |accessdate=2016-03-15}}

There is a Linux based reference software implementation of the ODP API, intended to be a functional model to establish the API behavior. In conjunction with a validation suite, this gives a base for accelerated implementations to extend.

Current ODP implementations exist for several processors, with varying degrees of hardware offload:

The following lists the different OpenDatePlane releases:

The following organizations currently sponsor the development of ODP.

• ARM
• Broadcom{{cite web|author=Broadcom|url=http://www.broadcom.com/press/release.php?id=s827048|title=Broadcom Announces Open Network Function Virtualization Platform|publisher=broadcom.com |date=2014-02-20 |accessdate=2014-02-20}}
• Cavium{{cite web|author=Cavium|url=http://www.cavium.com/newsevents-Linaro-Announces-First-LTS-Monarch-Release-of-OpenDataPlane.html|title=Linaro Announces First LTS Monarch Release of OpenDataPlane|publisher=cavium.com |date=2016-08-19 |accessdate=2016-08-19}}
• Cisco
• ENEA AB{{cite web|author=Enea|url=http://www.enea.com/Corporate/Press/Press-releases/Press-release/?item=853938|title=Enea Demonstrates Open Event Machine Implementation on Broadcom XLP Architecture at MWC|publisher=enea.com |date=2015-02-13 |accessdate=2015-02-13}}
• Ericsson
• HiSilicon
• Linaro
• MontaVista
• Nokia
• NXP
• Texas Instruments
• Wind - formerly Wind River Systems
• ZTE

The following open source projects use ODP API as the abstraction layer towards data plane hardware.

• [https://github.com/openeventmachine OpenEventMachine] data plane application framework
• [https://openfastpath.org OpenFastPath] TCP/IP stack

{{reflist}}

Category:Application programming interfaces

Category:Free software programmed in C

Category:Software using the BSD license