ARP-P4: A Hybrid ARP-Path/P4Runtime Switch

This paper presents ARP-P4, a hybrid switch based on a local ARP-Path control plane written in P4, but maintaining legacy P4 Runtime control plane capabilities. Its main purpose is to study the readiness of P4 to perform directly local control actions at the data plane, such as the required ones for the ARP-Path protocol. Thus, ARP-P4 defines a data plane that forwards any ingress packet locally via ARP-Path or remotely via P4 Runtime installed rules through an SDN controller. Finally, we discuss the current limitations of P4 non-standard externs to interact with P4 Runtime to develop autonomous capabilities.