SLICES 2026 Summer School keynote on experimentation with P4 switches

This presentation was delivered as a keynote on experimentation with P4 switches at the 5th SLICES Summer School hosted by Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M): The keynote focuses on a comprehensive open-source toolkit developed by the SMARTNESS Engineering Research Center to accelerate reproducible telco experiments across international research platforms such as SLICES-RI. This presentation introduces “Software-Defined Inception,” a research and experimentation vision in which programmable P4 switches are repurposed not only for packet processing, but also as a toolbox for high-fidelity network emulation and traffic generation aimed at 5G/6G protocol innovation and evaluation. It is framed as an open-source hardware experimentation approach that turns the network itself into a flexible research platform. Instead of relying only on traditional testbeds, emulators, or simulators, the presentation argues for using modern programmable switch architectures as richer, more realistic platforms for emulation, protocol testing, slicing, TSN, and 6G research. The toolbox is divided into two main components: The first is P7, a P4 Programmable Patch Panel for high-fidelity network emulation at 100G, capable of modeling latency, jitter, packet loss, bandwidth, and customizable topologies within a single P4 switch. The presentation explains both the implementation of these link characteristics and the architectural solution of separating P7 logic from user-defined P4 programs through multiple pipelines and recirculation. The second component addresses traffic generation, especially the need to inject realistic traffic into emulated topologies at line rate. This motivates PIPO-TG and related tools such as P4R, which aim to overcome the performance and accuracy limitations of software traffic generators and enable high-performance, parameterizable traffic generation directly from programmable switching hardware. The talk also includes use cases and examples showing how this toolbox can support protocol experimentation under controlled yet realistic conditions. The overall message is that programmable switches can simultaneously host custom packet-processing logic, emulate network behaviors, and generate test traffic, creating a powerful integrated environment for networking R&D. The conclusion broadens the perspective to the 5G-to-6G research landscape, emphasizing community impact, open-source experimentation, and the relevance of such tools for protocol innovation. In a bonus SMARTNESS section, the presentation also introduces the SMARTNESS Engineering Research Center as a long-term, telecom-focused collaborative research initiative oriented toward advanced communication networks and digital services for 6G.