Lightweight benchmarking of platforms for network traffic processing

Abstract

Embedded processors seem to be a viable solution for network traffic processing. We can observe that the current network development boards utilize ARM, MIPS rather than specialized network processors. The processors for embedded applications are low cost, low power but their performance is not clear. In this work we aim at revealing their performance in terms of their throughput and processing power. To this end, we select three network processing functions such as longest prefix match, filtering and pattern matching. We benchmark several available platforms with embedded processors by implementing and running these tests in a controlled environment.