Melange: creating a "functional" internet

Most implementations of critical Internet protocols are written in type-unsafe languages such as C or C++ and are regularly vulnerable to serious security and reliability problems. Type-safe languages eliminate many errors but are not used to due to the perceived performance overheads. We combine two techniques to eliminate this performance penalty in a practical fashion: strong static typing and generative metaprogramming. Static typing eliminates run-time type information by checking safety at compile-time and minimises dynamic checks. Meta-programming uses a single specification to abstract the lowlevel code required to transmit and receive packets. Our domain-specific language, MPL, describes Internet packet protocols and compiles into fast, zero-copy code for both parsing and creating these packets. MPL is designed for implementing quirky Internet protocols ranging from the low-level: Ethernet, IPv4, ICMP and TCP; to the complex application-level: SSH, DNS and BGP; and even fi...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2007
• Where: EUROSYS
• Authors: Anil Madhavapeddy, Alex Ho, Tim Deegan, David Scott, Ripduman Sohan
• Keywords: Critical Internet Protocols, EUROSYS 2007, Internet Packet Protocols, Quirky Internet Protocols, System Software