| 摘要 |
The device 400 includes a general purpose processor 202 for performing flow-aware, i.e. stateful, processing for a network flow. The device further includes a many-core network processor 208 in communication with the general purpose processor, and a non-transitory computer readable medium having stored thereon program code executable by the many-core network processor. When executed, the program code causes the many-core network processor to offload at least a portion of the flow-aware processing for at least a portion of the network flow from the general purpose processor, thereby reducing the load on the general purpose processor and improving the overall performance of the device. The nature of the offloading (e.g., timing, portion of the flow offloaded, etc.) is configurable by an application running on the general purpose processor. Many-core NP 208 can take over at least a portion of the Layer 4-7 packet processing previously handled by general purpose processor 202. For example, many-core NP 208 can offload stateless processing tasks from general purpose processor 202, such as Denial of Service (DoS) protection and stateless firewall filtering. In addition, many-core NP 208 can offload stateful, or flow-aware, processing tasks from general purpose processor 202, such as Layer 4 or 7 load balancing. In this latter case, many-core NP 208 can execute a flow offload engine that enables applications running on general purpose processor 202 to flexibly control the nature of the offloading (e.g., which tasks are offloaded, which flows or portions thereof are offloaded, etc.). With this flow offload capability, many-core NP 208 can significantly reduce the flow processing load on general purpose processor 202, thereby freeing up general purpose processor 202 to handle other tasks or implement new features/capabilities. |
