Episode 81 of The Linux Podcast with Fexingo dives into eXpress Data Path (XDP), a kernel technology that processes network packets before they reach the main network stack. Lucas and Luna walk through how XDP bypasses huge chunks of overhead by hooking into the network driver’s own receive ring, achieving up to 24 million packets per second on a single core. The conversation contrasts XDP with conventional socket-based networking and eBPF-based approaches, explains why Cloudflare uses XDP to mitigate DDoS attacks at line rate, and examines the trade-offs: no TCP offload, limited BPF program complexity, and stricter hardware requirements. Listeners come away understanding how XDP enables sub-microsecond packet decisions — useful for software-defined networking, load balancers, and firewalls built entirely in user space. The hosts also share how this ad-free podcast relies on listener support at buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo.

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