P4 Runtime Implementation in P4.org projects

What:
In this video, Antonin Bas has gives a talk on the implementation of the P4 Runtime API in the open source simple_switch_grpc process. Antonin implemented most of the simple_switch and simple_switch_grpc code, and has been enhancing it and maintaining it for several years now.

Pre-req:
You will get more out of this talk if you have at least some familiarity with the P4 Runtime API protocol: https://p4.org/specs. Basically, the protocol defines the format of messages sent between a client (e.g. a controller program) and a server (e.g. a switch or NIC), enabling the client to request that the server perform operations such as adding, deleting, and/or modifying table entries in P4 tables, reading counters, configuring meters, etc.

Why:
One of the motivations for this talk is the hope that volunteers working on an implementation of the Portable Switch Architecture (PSA) in BMv2 in a process called psa_switch, will be able to learn enough to get a head start on implementing the P4 Runtime API functionality in that program, too. While a fair portion of what Antonin speaks about will be specific to the BMv2 code (https://github.com/p4lang/behavioral-model), at least some of it will be of interest to those implementing P4 Runtime API server functionality for other devices.