Configurable forwarding element deparser

A network forwarding integrated circuit comprising at least one packet processing pipeline, the packet processing pipeline comprising:

• a parser circuit;
• a match-action circuit;
• and
• a deparser circuit configured to:
• receive, from the match-action circuit, (i) packet header field values stored in a set of data containers and (ii) a set of data indicating which packet header field types, of a plurality of possible packet header field types, to include in a packet constructed from the packet header field values;
• use the received set of data and a set of stored data comprising a list of packet header field types to generate an ordered list of references to data containers of the set of data containers, wherein for at least one packet header field type, the set of stored data is to specify which data containers store packet header field values for the packet header field type;
• and
• based on the ordered list of references, construct the packet using the packet header field values stored in the referenced data containers, wherein content of packet header fields in the constructed packet are identified by the ordered list.