NET-210 · Kernel Networking · Advanced
DPDK & Kernel Bypass — full syllabus
When to leave the kernel network stack entirely, and what you give up when you do.
Who this course is for
Engineers evaluating or operating kernel-bypass data planes who need an honest account of what DPDK buys, what it costs, and when XDP or the tuned kernel stack is the better answer.
Prerequisites
- NET-101 or strong kernel-networking knowledge
- C programming
- NUMA and hugepage basics
Course outline
Day 1 — the bypass architecture
- What the kernel path costs: context switches, copies, per-packet work
- Poll-mode drivers and the run-to-completion model
- UIO and VFIO: taking a NIC away from the kernel
- Hugepages, memory pools and mbufs
- lcore assignment and NUMA placement rules
Day 2 — programming the data plane
- EAL initialisation and device probing
- rx/tx rings, descriptors and burst processing
- A minimal forwarder, line by line
- Multi-queue, RSS and scaling across lcores
- What happens to tcpdump, ethtool and ss when the kernel no longer sees the NIC
Day 3 — evaluation and operations
- Benchmarking honestly: DPDK vs XDP vs the tuned kernel stack
- NUMA and hugepage misconfiguration penalties
- Operational cost: debugging, monitoring, upgrades, onboarding
- Failure modes: what a poll-mode loop hides until it melts
- Decision framework: bypass, XDP, or fix the kernel path
Hands-on labs
- Lab: bind a NIC to VFIO, allocate hugepages and reach line rate with testpmd
- Lab: write a minimal DPDK forwarder and measure throughput and latency against the kernel path
- Lab: move the same workload across NUMA nodes and quantify the placement penalty
- Lab: run one filtering task on the kernel stack, XDP and DPDK; chart throughput, CPU and debuggability
Capstone project
Run a controlled bake-off and write the recommendation: one packet-processing workload implemented on the tuned kernel path, XDP and DPDK, with a shared measurement harness — then deliver a decision memo covering throughput, tail latency, CPU cost and operational burden, defended in a review session.
What you leave with
- Hands-on DPDK setup: VFIO, hugepages, testpmd and a minimal forwarder
- A measurement methodology that compares data planes fairly
- Quantified knowledge of NUMA and placement effects
- A defensible decision framework for bypass vs XDP vs the kernel stack
Upcoming dates
| Dates | Where | Seats | Early bird | Regular | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 25 Oct – 27 Oct 20263 full days | RiyadhIn person · KAFD Conference Centre | 10 of 14 | — | SAR 9,000 | |
| 1 Nov – 3 Nov 20263 full days | Kuwait CityIn person · Al Hamra Tower | 5 of 14 | — | KWD 740 | |
| 1 Nov – 3 Nov 20263 full days | MuscatIn person · Knowledge Oasis Muscat | 10 of 14 | — | OMR 920 | |
| 8 Nov – 15 Nov 20266 half-days | Gulf bandLive online · 09:00–13:00 GMT+3 | 4 of 20 | US$1,580until 9 Oct | ||
| 9 Nov – 11 Nov 20263 full days | OttawaIn person · Kanata North Tech Park | 5 of 14 | CAD 2,930until 10 Oct | ||
| 16 Nov – 18 Nov 20263 full days | TorontoIn person · MaRS Discovery District | 10 of 14 | CAD 2,930until 17 Oct | ||
| 16 Nov – 18 Nov 20263 full days | LondonIn person · Shoreditch Works | 5 of 14 | GBP 1,680until 17 Oct | ||
| 16 Nov – 23 Nov 20266 half-days | Europe bandLive online · 09:00–13:00 CET | 9 of 20 | US$1,580until 17 Oct | ||
| 16 Nov – 23 Nov 20266 half-days | Americas bandLive online · 13:00–17:00 ET | 14 of 20 | US$1,580until 17 Oct | ||
| 23 Nov – 25 Nov 20263 full days | BerlinIn person · Factory Görlitzer Park | 10 of 14 | EUR 1,990until 24 Oct |
Book a seat, or bring this course to your team
Seats can be reserved online; private delivery runs on-site or live online, adapted to your stack.
Questions about fit or prerequisites? Email hello@kernelsystems.academy. To save this syllabus, print this page to PDF from your browser.