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Diffstat (limited to 'Documentation/networking/netlink_mmap.txt')
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diff --git a/Documentation/networking/netlink_mmap.txt b/Documentation/networking/netlink_mmap.txt new file mode 100644 index 000000000000..1c2dab409625 --- /dev/null +++ b/Documentation/networking/netlink_mmap.txt @@ -0,0 +1,339 @@ +This file documents how to use memory mapped I/O with netlink. + +Author: Patrick McHardy <kaber@trash.net> + +Overview +-------- + +Memory mapped netlink I/O can be used to increase throughput and decrease +overhead of unicast receive and transmit operations. Some netlink subsystems +require high throughput, these are mainly the netfilter subsystems +nfnetlink_queue and nfnetlink_log, but it can also help speed up large +dump operations of f.i. the routing database. + +Memory mapped netlink I/O used two circular ring buffers for RX and TX which +are mapped into the processes address space. + +The RX ring is used by the kernel to directly construct netlink messages into +user-space memory without copying them as done with regular socket I/O, +additionally as long as the ring contains messages no recvmsg() or poll() +syscalls have to be issued by user-space to get more message. + +The TX ring is used to process messages directly from user-space memory, the +kernel processes all messages contained in the ring using a single sendmsg() +call. + +Usage overview +-------------- + +In order to use memory mapped netlink I/O, user-space needs three main changes: + +- ring setup +- conversion of the RX path to get messages from the ring instead of recvmsg() +- conversion of the TX path to construct messages into the ring + +Ring setup is done using setsockopt() to provide the ring parameters to the +kernel, then a call to mmap() to map the ring into the processes address space: + +- setsockopt(fd, SOL_NETLINK, NETLINK_RX_RING, ¶ms, sizeof(params)); +- setsockopt(fd, SOL_NETLINK, NETLINK_TX_RING, ¶ms, sizeof(params)); +- ring = mmap(NULL, size, PROT_READ | PROT_WRITE, MAP_SHARED, fd, 0) + +Usage of either ring is optional, but even if only the RX ring is used the +mapping still needs to be writable in order to update the frame status after +processing. + +Conversion of the reception path involves calling poll() on the file +descriptor, once the socket is readable the frames from the ring are +processsed in order until no more messages are available, as indicated by +a status word in the frame header. + +On kernel side, in order to make use of memory mapped I/O on receive, the +originating netlink subsystem needs to support memory mapped I/O, otherwise +it will use an allocated socket buffer as usual and the contents will be + copied to the ring on transmission, nullifying most of the performance gains. +Dumps of kernel databases automatically support memory mapped I/O. + +Conversion of the transmit path involves changing message contruction to +use memory from the TX ring instead of (usually) a buffer declared on the +stack and setting up the frame header approriately. Optionally poll() can +be used to wait for free frames in the TX ring. + +Structured and definitions for using memory mapped I/O are contained in +<linux/netlink.h>. + +RX and TX rings +---------------- + +Each ring contains a number of continous memory blocks, containing frames of +fixed size dependant on the parameters used for ring setup. + +Ring: [ block 0 ] + [ frame 0 ] + [ frame 1 ] + [ block 1 ] + [ frame 2 ] + [ frame 3 ] + ... + [ block n ] + [ frame 2 * n ] + [ frame 2 * n + 1 ] + +The blocks are only visible to the kernel, from the point of view of user-space +the ring just contains the frames in a continous memory zone. + +The ring parameters used for setting up the ring are defined as follows: + +struct nl_mmap_req { + unsigned int nm_block_size; + unsigned int nm_block_nr; + unsigned int nm_frame_size; + unsigned int nm_frame_nr; +}; + +Frames are grouped into blocks, where each block is a continous region of memory +and holds nm_block_size / nm_frame_size frames. The total number of frames in +the ring is nm_frame_nr. The following invariants hold: + +- frames_per_block = nm_block_size / nm_frame_size + +- nm_frame_nr = frames_per_block * nm_block_nr + +Some parameters are constrained, specifically: + +- nm_block_size must be a multiple of the architectures memory page size. + The getpagesize() function can be used to get the page size. + +- nm_frame_size must be equal or larger to NL_MMAP_HDRLEN, IOW a frame must be + able to hold at least the frame header + +- nm_frame_size must be smaller or equal to nm_block_size + +- nm_frame_size must be a multiple of NL_MMAP_MSG_ALIGNMENT + +- nm_frame_nr must equal the actual number of frames as specified above. + +When the kernel can't allocate phsyically continous memory for a ring block, +it will fall back to use physically discontinous memory. This might affect +performance negatively, in order to avoid this the nm_frame_size parameter +should be chosen to be as small as possible for the required frame size and +the number of blocks should be increased instead. + +Ring frames +------------ + +Each frames contain a frame header, consisting of a synchronization word and some +meta-data, and the message itself. + +Frame: [ header message ] + +The frame header is defined as follows: + +struct nl_mmap_hdr { + unsigned int nm_status; + unsigned int nm_len; + __u32 nm_group; + /* credentials */ + __u32 nm_pid; + __u32 nm_uid; + __u32 nm_gid; +}; + +- nm_status is used for synchronizing processing between the kernel and user- + space and specifies ownership of the frame as well as the operation to perform + +- nm_len contains the length of the message contained in the data area + +- nm_group specified the destination multicast group of message + +- nm_pid, nm_uid and nm_gid contain the netlink pid, UID and GID of the sending + process. These values correspond to the data available using SOCK_PASSCRED in + the SCM_CREDENTIALS cmsg. + +The possible values in the status word are: + +- NL_MMAP_STATUS_UNUSED: + RX ring: frame belongs to the kernel and contains no message + for user-space. Approriate action is to invoke poll() + to wait for new messages. + + TX ring: frame belongs to user-space and can be used for + message construction. + +- NL_MMAP_STATUS_RESERVED: + RX ring only: frame is currently used by the kernel for message + construction and contains no valid message yet. + Appropriate action is to invoke poll() to wait for + new messages. + +- NL_MMAP_STATUS_VALID: + RX ring: frame contains a valid message. Approriate action is + to process the message and release the frame back to + the kernel by setting the status to + NL_MMAP_STATUS_UNUSED or queue the frame by setting the + status to NL_MMAP_STATUS_SKIP. + + TX ring: the frame contains a valid message from user-space to + be processed by the kernel. After completing processing + the kernel will release the frame back to user-space by + setting the status to NL_MMAP_STATUS_UNUSED. + +- NL_MMAP_STATUS_COPY: + RX ring only: a message is ready to be processed but could not be + stored in the ring, either because it exceeded the + frame size or because the originating subsystem does + not support memory mapped I/O. Appropriate action is + to invoke recvmsg() to receive the message and release + the frame back to the kernel by setting the status to + NL_MMAP_STATUS_UNUSED. + +- NL_MMAP_STATUS_SKIP: + RX ring only: user-space queued the message for later processing, but + processed some messages following it in the ring. The + kernel should skip this frame when looking for unused + frames. + +The data area of a frame begins at a offset of NL_MMAP_HDRLEN relative to the +frame header. + +TX limitations +-------------- + +Kernel processing usually involves validation of the message received by +user-space, then processing its contents. The kernel must assure that +userspace is not able to modify the message contents after they have been +validated. In order to do so, the message is copied from the ring frame +to an allocated buffer if either of these conditions is false: + +- only a single mapping of the ring exists +- the file descriptor is not shared between processes + +This means that for threaded programs, the kernel will fall back to copying. + +Example +------- + +Ring setup: + + unsigned int block_size = 16 * getpagesize(); + struct nl_mmap_req req = { + .nm_block_size = block_size, + .nm_block_nr = 64, + .nm_frame_size = 16384, + .nm_frame_nr = 64 * block_size / 16384, + }; + unsigned int ring_size; + void *rx_ring, *tx_ring; + + /* Configure ring parameters */ + if (setsockopt(fd, NETLINK_RX_RING, &req, sizeof(req)) < 0) + exit(1); + if (setsockopt(fd, NETLINK_TX_RING, &req, sizeof(req)) < 0) + exit(1) + + /* Calculate size of each invididual ring */ + ring_size = req.nm_block_nr * req.nm_block_size; + + /* Map RX/TX rings. The TX ring is located after the RX ring */ + rx_ring = mmap(NULL, 2 * ring_size, PROT_READ | PROT_WRITE, + MAP_SHARED, fd, 0); + if ((long)rx_ring == -1L) + exit(1); + tx_ring = rx_ring + ring_size: + +Message reception: + +This example assumes some ring parameters of the ring setup are available. + + unsigned int frame_offset = 0; + struct nl_mmap_hdr *hdr; + struct nlmsghdr *nlh; + unsigned char buf[16384]; + ssize_t len; + + while (1) { + struct pollfd pfds[1]; + + pfds[0].fd = fd; + pfds[0].events = POLLIN | POLLERR; + pfds[0].revents = 0; + + if (poll(pfds, 1, -1) < 0 && errno != -EINTR) + exit(1); + + /* Check for errors. Error handling omitted */ + if (pfds[0].revents & POLLERR) + <handle error> + + /* If no new messages, poll again */ + if (!(pfds[0].revents & POLLIN)) + continue; + + /* Process all frames */ + while (1) { + /* Get next frame header */ + hdr = rx_ring + frame_offset; + + if (hdr->nm_status == NL_MMAP_STATUS_VALID) + /* Regular memory mapped frame */ + nlh = (void *hdr) + NL_MMAP_HDRLEN; + len = hdr->nm_len; + + /* Release empty message immediately. May happen + * on error during message construction. + */ + if (len == 0) + goto release; + } else if (hdr->nm_status == NL_MMAP_STATUS_COPY) { + /* Frame queued to socket receive queue */ + len = recv(fd, buf, sizeof(buf), MSG_DONTWAIT); + if (len <= 0) + break; + nlh = buf; + } else + /* No more messages to process, continue polling */ + break; + + process_msg(nlh); +release: + /* Release frame back to the kernel */ + hdr->nm_status = NL_MMAP_STATUS_UNUSED; + + /* Advance frame offset to next frame */ + frame_offset = (frame_offset + frame_size) % ring_size; + } + } + +Message transmission: + +This example assumes some ring parameters of the ring setup are available. +A single message is constructed and transmitted, to send multiple messages +at once they would be constructed in consecutive frames before a final call +to sendto(). + + unsigned int frame_offset = 0; + struct nl_mmap_hdr *hdr; + struct nlmsghdr *nlh; + struct sockaddr_nl addr = { + .nl_family = AF_NETLINK, + }; + + hdr = tx_ring + frame_offset; + if (hdr->nm_status != NL_MMAP_STATUS_UNUSED) + /* No frame available. Use poll() to avoid. */ + exit(1); + + nlh = (void *)hdr + NL_MMAP_HDRLEN; + + /* Build message */ + build_message(nlh); + + /* Fill frame header: length and status need to be set */ + hdr->nm_len = nlh->nlmsg_len; + hdr->nm_status = NL_MMAP_STATUS_VALID; + + if (sendto(fd, NULL, 0, 0, &addr, sizeof(addr)) < 0) + exit(1); + + /* Advance frame offset to next frame */ + frame_offset = (frame_offset + frame_size) % ring_size; |