Programming Protocol-independent Packet Processors (P4) is a domain-specific language for network devices, specifying how data plane devices (switches, NICs, routers, filters, etc.) process packets.
Contributors in 2026
5
Same as 2025
Projects since 2016
14
4.7 a cycle on average
Cycles
3 of 11
3-cycle streak
Rank in 2026
#60
of 183, 0.4% of slots
Mentors
5
for 4 projects in 2024
Accepted projects each year, against the median organization that year
| The P4 Language Consortium | Median organization | |
|---|---|---|
| 2016 | 0 | 4 |
| 2017 | 0 | 4 |
| 2018 | 0 | 3 |
| 2019 | 0 | 4 |
| 2020 | 0 | 4 |
| 2021 | 0 | 4 |
| 2022 | 0 | 3 |
| 2023 | 0 | 4 |
| 2024 | 4 | 4 |
| 2025 | 5 | 5 |
| 2026 | 5 | 4 |
Each one has its own page of organizations and trends
Technologies
# Topics
Before P4, vendors had total control over the functionality supported in the network. And since networking silicon determined much of the possible behavior, silicon vendors controlled the rollout of new features (e.g., VXLAN), and rollouts took years.
P4 turns the traditional model on its head. Application developers and network engineers can now use P4 to implement specific behavior in the network, and changes can be made in minutes instead of years.
5 projects in 2026 · All 14 projects since 2016
Attaullah Ansari
P4TC enables programmable packet processing in the Linux kernel via TC and eBPF, but its control plane is limited to the tc CLI and shell scripts....
c8ef
BMv2 currently provides only textual logs for tracing packets through a P4 pipeline, which must be parsed with brittle regex hacks and cannot be...
Haechan Kwon
P4-SpecTec provides mechanized formal semantics for the P4 language, but its adoption is currently limited by a lack of accessible learning...
Vineet Goel
This project is to improve the P4Sim module by enhancing its Traffic Manager and integrating ns-3's built-in QueueDisc class into it. This will help...
WeiWei Luo
This project integrates Planter, an in-network machine learning framework, into the P4Pi Raspberry Pi platform. The work includes adding a p4c-dpdk...
Advay SinghMentored by Davide Scano, mshahbaz, Murayyiam Parvez +2
Gigaflow is an innovative solution to accelerate network processing in large-scale data centers by leveraging flow locality and pipeline-aware...
Sankalp JhaMentored by Davide Scano, mshahbaz, Murayyiam Parvez +2
Contemporary developments of Machine Learning Applications in real-time Networks to classify traffic for better security and performance are examples...
Vineet GoelMentored by Davide Scano, Mingyu Ma
This project aims to extend the existing P4sim module integrated within the ns-3 network simulator by implementing control plane functionalities. The...
Xiaomin Liu
P4C, being a reference compiler for the P4 language, struggles with some fundamental shortcomings of its internal code representation (IR). These...
Xiyu HaoMentored by Jonathan DiLorenzo, Bili Dong (qobilidop), Matthew Lam
P4 empowers developers to program the data plane of network devices—switches, routers, and NICs—at a level of detail previously only accessible to...
Adarsh RawatMentored by Fabian Ruffy, Davide Scano
The project aims to centralize the P4 compiler (p4c) documentation by developing a new, well-structured documentation website using Doxygen for...
Stanislav KosorinMentored by Davide Scano, Radostin
Kubernetes has recently moved its forensic container checkpointing feature into beta. This feature allows checkpointing containers within Kubernetes...
Nitish Kumar.Mentored by Fabian Ruffy, Bili Dong (qobilidop)
P4 (Programming Protocol-independent Packet Processors) is a domain-specific language for network devices. It allows programmers to specify how data...
Rupesh ChilukaMentored by Hari Thantry, Bili Dong (qobilidop)
Programming Protocol-independent Packet Processors (P4) is a domain-specific language for network devices, specifying how data plane devices...
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Claim your project13 contributors in 2026 · 11 cycles
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Data: Google Summer of Code public archive. Contributor counts are accepted projects.
