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The click modular router
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Source ACM Transactions on Computer Systems (TOCS) archive
Volume 18 ,  Issue 3  (August 2000) table of contents
Pages: 263 - 297  
Year of Publication: 2000
ISSN:0734-2071
Authors
Eddie Kohler  MIT Labs, Cambridge, MA
Robert Morris  MIT Labs, Cambridge, MA
Benjie Chen  MIT Labs, Cambridge, MA
John Jannotti  MIT Labs, Cambridge, MA
M. Frans Kaashoek  MIT Labs, Cambridge, MA
Publisher
ACM  New York, NY, USA
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ABSTRACT

Clicks is a new software architecture for building flexible and configurable routers. A Click router is assembled from packet processing modules called elements. Individual elements implement simple router functions like packet classification, queuing, scheduling, and interfacing with network devices. A router configurable is a directed graph with elements at the vertices; packets flow along the edges of the graph. Several features make individual elements more powerful and complex configurations easier to write, including pull connections, which model packet flow drivn by transmitting hardware devices, and flow-based router context, which helps an element locate other interesting elements. Click configurations are modular and easy to extend. A standards-compliant Click IP router has 16 elements on its forwarding path; some of its elements are also useful in Ethernet switches and IP tunnelling configurations. Extending the IP router to support dropping policies, fairness among flows, or Differentiated Services simply requires adding a couple of element at the right place. On conventional PC hardware, the Click IP router achieves a maximum loss-free forwarding rate of 333,000 64-byte packets per second, demonstrating that Click's modular and flexible architecture is compatible with good performance.


REFERENCES

Note: OCR errors may be found in this Reference List extracted from the full text article. ACM has opted to expose the complete List rather than only correct and linked references.

 
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CITED BY  225

Collaborative Colleagues:
Eddie Kohler: colleagues
Robert Morris: colleagues
Benjie Chen: colleagues
John Jannotti: colleagues
M. Frans Kaashoek: colleagues