Cadeia-Aberta: In-kernel SFC Architecture Using eBPF

• Matheus S. Castanho Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais
• Cristina K. Dominicini Instituto Federal do Espírito Santo
• Marcos A. M. Vieira Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais

DOI: https://doi.org/10.5753/sbrc.2019.7401

Abstract

RFC 7665 proposes a reference architecture for Service Function Chaining (SFC) that splits all SFC functionality into a set of specialized elements. However, this approach relies on the underlying network infrastructure and requires communication between Service Functions (SF) and SFC elements. In this work, we propose Cadeia-Aberta: an architecture in which SFC elements are implemented transparently inside SFs kernel using Extended Berkeley Packet Filters (eBPF). A proof-of-concept prototype demonstrates that this approach allows direct communication between SFs and reduces communication overhead.

Keywords: Network Function Virtualization, Service Function Chaining, Programmable Data Planes, eBPF

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