Restricted by software and hardware technologies, earlier network device operating systems used monolithic models. The software was compiled into an executive file and executed by an embedded operating system. Only single-CPU hardware was available, providing integrated control management and running all protocols and management data on one node. With the development and popularization of Internet technologies as well as the IP orientation of carrier networks, network devices evolved from single-core CPUs to multi-core CPUs.
Following this development trend to provide higher network reliability and to fully use the processing capabilities of the multi-core hardware, Huawei developed the VRP8 based on pre-existing versions. The VRP8 supports the following features: