P4DB -- The Case for In-Network OLTP (Extended Technical Report)

TL;DR

P4DB introduces a novel distributed database approach that leverages programmable switches to accelerate OLTP workloads, achieving up to 8x speedup by processing hot data directly in-network.

Contribution

This work presents the first implementation of a transaction engine on a P4-programmable switch for in-network OLTP acceleration.

Findings

Achieves up to 8x speedup over traditional architectures

Demonstrates effective processing of hot tuples in-network

Validates the feasibility of in-switch transaction processing

Abstract

In this paper we present a new approach for distributed DBMSs called P4DB, that uses a programmable switch to accelerate OLTP workloads. The main idea of P4DB is that it implements a transaction processing engine on top of a P4-programmable switch. The switch can thus act as an accelerator in the network, especially when it is used to store and process hot (contended) tuples on the switch. In our experiments, we show that P4DB hence provides significant benefits compared to traditional DBMS architectures and can achieve a speedup of up to 8x.