README.hwtables

Hardware Table Support					-*- text -*-
----------------------

The OpenFlow reference implementation in this distribution provides a
mechanism to support hardware that can accelerate OpenFlow switching.
The mechanism consists of the ability to add a "hardware acceleration"
switching table ahead of the software switching tables implemented by
the reference implementation.  The hardware switching table is
expected to handle any incoming packets that it can on its own.  Any
packets that it cannot handle itself it may pass up to the software
table implementations.

Hardware table implementation are provided as a library and built
in the userspace datapath executable.

Creating a hardware table module is straightforward.  Create a
directory in the openflow source tree named hw-lib/NAME,
where NAME identifies the hardware that the module supports.  Populate
that directory with the C source files that comprise the module, plus
a file named automake.mk that specifies how to build the module in
the hw-lib directory.  This distribution includes a "skeleton" hardware
library that demonstrates how this works.

When you perform 'configure', specify each NAME that identifies a
library to be included on the OpenFlow configure script command as
the argument to --enable-hw-lib, e.g.:
	./configure --enable-hw-lib=NAME

Each hardware table library's code is encapsulated in a directory, so
it is easy to separate a hardware table implementation from OpenFlow.
Simply package up the contents of the hw-lib/NAME directory and
distribute it for builders to extract into their distribution
directory.

Included in this distribution is a dummy hardware table to aid in beginning
your own hardware table port, it is located in the hw-lib/skeleton
folder. Also included is a fully functional NetFPGA hardware table that can run
as a 1Gbx4 port line-rate OpenFlow switch. Information and instructions for its
use can be found in the hw-lib/nf2/README file.