Hardware alone isn’t the key to longevity. We learned that lesson with the Voyager program. How do those lessons parallel with ASIC design today? Tom Hollingsworth takes a look at the Barefoot Networks presentation from Networking Field Day 21. They extended this metaphor to their own use of software to extend their Tofino chips using the P4 programming language. While they might not see the same 50 year life span as the Voyager vessels, it’s an approach that can better adapt to business needs as they change over time.
