P4 Developer Days – OpenDesc: Describing NIC-Host Interfaces

Abstract

Modern NIC hardware is increasingly expressive, yet host software remains shackled to static, device-specific descriptors and ad-hoc glue layers. We present OpenDesc, a framework that leverages P4 to define the interface between host and NIC. By treating software intent and hardware capabilities as negotiable P4 programs, OpenDesc automatically compiles minimalist, application-specific driver datapaths for metadata. This approach eliminates the “lowest common denominator” bottleneck, enabling seamless metadata exchange and hardware-software co-design across heterogeneous NIC architectures.

Speaker

Seyyidahmed is a systems researcher at imec. His research interests include the co-design of programmable hardware and high-performance networking stacks, with a focus on improving the flexibility, programmability, and efficiency of modern networked systems.