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33 Vhost Sample Application
34 ========================
36 The vhost sample application demonstrates integration of the Data Plane Development Kit (DPDK)
37 with the Linux* KVM hypervisor by implementing the vhost-net offload API.
38 The sample application performs simple packet switching between virtual machines based on Media Access Control
39 (MAC) address or Virtual Local Area Network (VLAN) tag.
40 The splitting of Ethernet traffic from an external switch is performed in hardware by the Virtual Machine Device Queues
41 (VMDQ) and Data Center Bridging (DCB) features of the IntelĀ® 82599 10 Gigabit Ethernet Controller.
46 Virtio networking (virtio-net) was developed as the Linux* KVM para-virtualized method for communicating network packets
47 between host and guest.
48 It was found that virtio-net performance was poor due to context switching and packet copying between host, guest, and QEMU.
49 The following figure shows the system architecture for a virtio-based networking (virtio-net).
51 .. _figure_qemu_virtio_net:
53 .. figure:: img/qemu_virtio_net.*
55 System Architecture for Virtio-based Networking (virtio-net).
58 The Linux* Kernel vhost-net module was developed as an offload mechanism for virtio-net.
59 The vhost-net module enables KVM (QEMU) to offload the servicing of virtio-net devices to the vhost-net kernel module,
60 reducing the context switching and packet copies in the virtual dataplane.
62 This is achieved by QEMU sharing the following information with the vhost-net module through the vhost-net API:
64 * The layout of the guest memory space, to enable the vhost-net module to translate addresses.
66 * The locations of virtual queues in QEMU virtual address space,
67 to enable the vhost module to read/write directly to and from the virtqueues.
69 * An event file descriptor (eventfd) configured in KVM to send interrupts to the virtio- net device driver in the guest.
70 This enables the vhost-net module to notify (call) the guest.
72 * An eventfd configured in KVM to be triggered on writes to the virtio-net device's
73 Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI) config space.
74 This enables the vhost-net module to receive notifications (kicks) from the guest.
76 The following figure shows the system architecture for virtio-net networking with vhost-net offload.
78 .. _figure_virtio_linux_vhost:
80 .. figure:: img/virtio_linux_vhost.*
88 The DPDK vhost-net sample code demonstrates KVM (QEMU) offloading the servicing of a Virtual Machine's (VM's)
89 virtio-net devices to a DPDK-based application in place of the kernel's vhost-net module.
91 The DPDK vhost-net sample code is based on vhost library. Vhost library is developed for user space Ethernet switch to
92 easily integrate with vhost functionality.
94 The vhost library implements the following features:
96 * Management of virtio-net device creation/destruction events.
98 * Mapping of the VM's physical memory into the DPDK vhost-net's address space.
100 * Triggering/receiving notifications to/from VMs via eventfds.
102 * A virtio-net back-end implementation providing a subset of virtio-net features.
104 There are two vhost implementations in vhost library, vhost cuse and vhost user. In vhost cuse, a character device driver is implemented to
105 receive and process vhost requests through ioctl messages. In vhost user, a socket server is created to received vhost requests through
106 socket messages. Most of the messages share the same handler routine.
109 **Any vhost cuse specific requirement in the following sections will be emphasized**.
111 Two implementations are turned on and off statically through configure file. Only one implementation could be turned on. They don't co-exist in current implementation.
113 The vhost sample code application is a simple packet switching application with the following feature:
115 * Packet switching between virtio-net devices and the network interface card,
116 including using VMDQs to reduce the switching that needs to be performed in software.
118 The following figure shows the architecture of the Vhost sample application based on vhost-cuse.
120 .. _figure_vhost_net_arch:
122 .. figure:: img/vhost_net_arch.*
124 Vhost-net Architectural Overview
127 The following figure shows the flow of packets through the vhost-net sample application.
129 .. _figure_vhost_net_sample_app:
131 .. figure:: img/vhost_net_sample_app.*
133 Packet Flow Through the vhost-net Sample Application
136 Supported Distributions
137 -----------------------
139 The example in this section have been validated with the following distributions:
150 This section lists prerequisite packages that must be installed.
152 Installing Packages on the Host(vhost cuse required)
153 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
155 The vhost cuse code uses the following packages; fuse, fuse-devel, and kernel-modules-extra.
156 The vhost user code don't rely on those modules as eventfds are already installed into vhost process through
159 #. Install Fuse Development Libraries and headers:
161 .. code-block:: console
163 yum -y install fuse fuse-devel
165 #. Install the Cuse Kernel Module:
167 .. code-block:: console
169 yum -y install kernel-modules-extra
174 For vhost user, qemu 2.2 is required.
176 Setting up the Execution Environment
177 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
179 The vhost sample code requires that QEMU allocates a VM's memory on the hugetlbfs file system.
180 As the vhost sample code requires hugepages,
181 the best practice is to partition the system into separate hugepage mount points for the VMs and the vhost sample code.
185 This is best-practice only and is not mandatory.
186 For systems that only support 2 MB page sizes,
187 both QEMU and vhost sample code can use the same hugetlbfs mount point without issue.
191 VMs with gigabytes of memory can benefit from having QEMU allocate their memory from 1 GB huge pages.
192 1 GB huge pages must be allocated at boot time by passing kernel parameters through the grub boot loader.
194 #. Calculate the maximum memory usage of all VMs to be run on the system.
195 Then, round this value up to the nearest Gigabyte the execution environment will require.
197 #. Edit the /etc/default/grub file, and add the following to the GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX entry:
199 .. code-block:: console
201 GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="... hugepagesz=1G hugepages=<Number of hugepages required> default_hugepagesz=1G"
203 #. Update the grub boot loader:
205 .. code-block:: console
207 grub2-mkconfig -o /boot/grub2/grub.cfg
209 #. Reboot the system.
211 #. The hugetlbfs mount point (/dev/hugepages) should now default to allocating gigabyte pages.
215 Making the above modification will change the system default hugepage size to 1 GB for all applications.
217 **Vhost Sample Code**
219 In this section, we create a second hugetlbs mount point to allocate hugepages for the DPDK vhost sample code.
221 #. Allocate sufficient 2 MB pages for the DPDK vhost sample code:
223 .. code-block:: console
225 echo 256 > /sys/kernel/mm/hugepages/hugepages-2048kB/nr_hugepages
227 #. Mount hugetlbs at a separate mount point for 2 MB pages:
229 .. code-block:: console
231 mount -t hugetlbfs nodev /mnt/huge -o pagesize=2M
233 The above steps can be automated by doing the following:
235 #. Edit /etc/fstab to add an entry to automatically mount the second hugetlbfs mount point:
239 hugetlbfs <tab> /mnt/huge <tab> hugetlbfs defaults,pagesize=1G 0 0
241 #. Edit the /etc/default/grub file, and add the following to the GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX entry:
245 GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="... hugepagesz=2M hugepages=256 ... default_hugepagesz=1G"
247 #. Update the grub bootloader:
249 .. code-block:: console
251 grub2-mkconfig -o /boot/grub2/grub.cfg
253 #. Reboot the system.
257 Ensure that the default hugepage size after this setup is 1 GB.
259 Setting up the Guest Execution Environment
260 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
262 It is recommended for testing purposes that the DPDK testpmd sample application is used in the guest to forward packets,
263 the reasons for this are discussed in Section 22.7, "Running the Virtual Machine (QEMU)".
265 The testpmd application forwards packets between pairs of Ethernet devices,
266 it requires an even number of Ethernet devices (virtio or otherwise) to execute.
267 It is therefore recommended to create multiples of two virtio-net devices for each Virtual Machine either through libvirt or
268 at the command line as follows.
272 Observe that in the example, "-device" and "-netdev" are repeated for two virtio-net devices.
276 .. code-block:: console
278 user@target:~$ qemu-system-x86_64 ... \
279 -netdev tap,id=hostnet1,vhost=on,vhostfd=<open fd> \
280 -device virtio-net-pci, netdev=hostnet1,id=net1 \
281 -netdev tap,id=hostnet2,vhost=on,vhostfd=<open fd> \
282 -device virtio-net-pci, netdev=hostnet2,id=net1
286 .. code-block:: console
288 user@target:~$ qemu-system-x86_64 ... \
289 -chardev socket,id=char1,path=<sock_path> \
290 -netdev type=vhost-user,id=hostnet1,chardev=char1 \
291 -device virtio-net-pci,netdev=hostnet1,id=net1 \
292 -chardev socket,id=char2,path=<sock_path> \
293 -netdev type=vhost-user,id=hostnet2,chardev=char2 \
294 -device virtio-net-pci,netdev=hostnet2,id=net2
296 sock_path is the path for the socket file created by vhost.
298 Compiling the Sample Code
299 -------------------------
300 #. Compile vhost lib:
302 To enable vhost, turn on vhost library in the configure file config/common_linuxapp.
304 .. code-block:: console
306 CONFIG_RTE_LIBRTE_VHOST=n
308 vhost user is turned on by default in the configure file config/common_linuxapp.
309 To enable vhost cuse, disable vhost user.
311 .. code-block:: console
313 CONFIG_RTE_LIBRTE_VHOST_USER=y
315 After vhost is enabled and the implementation is selected, build the vhost library.
317 #. Go to the examples directory:
319 .. code-block:: console
321 export RTE_SDK=/path/to/rte_sdk
322 cd ${RTE_SDK}/examples/vhost
324 #. Set the target (a default target is used if not specified). For example:
326 .. code-block:: console
328 export RTE_TARGET=x86_64-native-linuxapp-gcc
330 See the DPDK Getting Started Guide for possible RTE_TARGET values.
332 #. Build the application:
334 .. code-block:: console
337 make config ${RTE_TARGET}
338 make install ${RTE_TARGET}
339 cd ${RTE_SDK}/examples/vhost
342 #. Go to the eventfd_link directory(vhost cuse required):
344 .. code-block:: console
346 cd ${RTE_SDK}/lib/librte_vhost/eventfd_link
348 #. Build the eventfd_link kernel module(vhost cuse required):
350 .. code-block:: console
354 Running the Sample Code
355 -----------------------
357 #. Install the cuse kernel module(vhost cuse required):
359 .. code-block:: console
363 #. Go to the eventfd_link directory(vhost cuse required):
365 .. code-block:: console
367 export RTE_SDK=/path/to/rte_sdk
368 cd ${RTE_SDK}/lib/librte_vhost/eventfd_link
370 #. Install the eventfd_link module(vhost cuse required):
372 .. code-block:: console
374 insmod ./eventfd_link.ko
376 #. Go to the examples directory:
378 .. code-block:: console
380 export RTE_SDK=/path/to/rte_sdk
381 cd ${RTE_SDK}/examples/vhost
383 #. Run the vhost-switch sample code:
387 .. code-block:: console
389 user@target:~$ ./build/app/vhost-switch -c f -n 4 --huge-dir / mnt/huge -- -p 0x1 --dev-basename usvhost
391 vhost user: a socket file named usvhost will be created under current directory. Use its path as the socket path in guest's qemu commandline.
393 .. code-block:: console
395 user@target:~$ ./build/app/vhost-switch -c f -n 4 --huge-dir / mnt/huge -- -p 0x1 --dev-basename usvhost
399 Please note the huge-dir parameter instructs the DPDK to allocate its memory from the 2 MB page hugetlbfs.
405 vhost cuse uses a Linux* character device to communicate with QEMU.
406 The basename is used to generate the character devices name.
410 For compatibility with the QEMU wrapper script, a base name of "usvhost" should be used:
412 .. code-block:: console
414 user@target:~$ ./build/app/vhost-switch -c f -n 4 --huge-dir / mnt/huge -- -p 0x1 --dev-basename usvhost
417 The vm2vm parameter disable/set mode of packet switching between guests in the host.
418 Value of "0" means disabling vm2vm implies that on virtual machine packet transmission will always go to the Ethernet port;
419 Value of "1" means software mode packet forwarding between guests, it needs packets copy in vHOST,
420 so valid only in one-copy implementation, and invalid for zero copy implementation;
421 value of "2" means hardware mode packet forwarding between guests, it allows packets go to the Ethernet port,
422 hardware L2 switch will determine which guest the packet should forward to or need send to external,
423 which bases on the packet destination MAC address and VLAN tag.
425 .. code-block:: console
427 user@target:~$ ./build/app/vhost-switch -c f -n 4 --huge-dir /mnt/huge -- --vm2vm [0,1,2]
429 **Mergeable Buffers.**
430 The mergeable buffers parameter controls how virtio-net descriptors are used for virtio-net headers.
431 In a disabled state, one virtio-net header is used per packet buffer;
432 in an enabled state one virtio-net header is used for multiple packets.
433 The default value is 0 or disabled since recent kernels virtio-net drivers show performance degradation with this feature is enabled.
435 .. code-block:: console
437 user@target:~$ ./build/app/vhost-switch -c f -n 4 --huge-dir / mnt/huge -- --mergeable [0,1]
440 The stats parameter controls the printing of virtio-net device statistics.
441 The parameter specifies an interval second to print statistics, with an interval of 0 seconds disabling statistics.
443 .. code-block:: console
445 user@target:~$ ./build/app/vhost-switch -c f -n 4 --huge-dir / mnt/huge -- --stats [0,n]
448 The rx-retry option enables/disables enqueue retries when the guests RX queue is full.
449 This feature resolves a packet loss that is observed at high data-rates,
450 by allowing it to delay and retry in the receive path.
451 This option is enabled by default.
453 .. code-block:: console
455 user@target:~$ ./build/app/vhost-switch -c f -n 4 --huge-dir / mnt/huge -- --rx-retry [0,1]
458 The rx-retry-num option specifies the number of retries on an RX burst,
459 it takes effect only when rx retry is enabled.
460 The default value is 4.
462 .. code-block:: console
464 user@target:~$ ./build/app/vhost-switch -c f -n 4 --huge-dir / mnt/huge -- --rx-retry 1 --rx-retry-num 5
466 **RX Retry Delay Time.**
467 The rx-retry-delay option specifies the timeout (in micro seconds) between retries on an RX burst,
468 it takes effect only when rx retry is enabled.
469 The default value is 15.
471 .. code-block:: console
473 user@target:~$ ./build/app/vhost-switch -c f -n 4 --huge-dir / mnt/huge -- --rx-retry 1 --rx-retry-delay 20
476 The zero copy option enables/disables the zero copy mode for RX/TX packet,
477 in the zero copy mode the packet buffer address from guest translate into host physical address
478 and then set directly as DMA address.
479 If the zero copy mode is disabled, then one copy mode is utilized in the sample.
480 This option is disabled by default.
482 .. code-block:: console
484 user@target:~$ ./build/app/vhost-switch -c f -n 4 --huge-dir /mnt/huge -- --zero-copy [0,1]
486 **RX descriptor number.**
487 The RX descriptor number option specify the Ethernet RX descriptor number,
488 Linux legacy virtio-net has different behavior in how to use the vring descriptor from DPDK based virtio-net PMD,
489 the former likely allocate half for virtio header, another half for frame buffer,
490 while the latter allocate all for frame buffer,
491 this lead to different number for available frame buffer in vring,
492 and then lead to different Ethernet RX descriptor number could be used in zero copy mode.
493 So it is valid only in zero copy mode is enabled. The value is 32 by default.
495 .. code-block:: console
497 user@target:~$ ./build/app/vhost-switch -c f -n 4 --huge-dir /mnt/huge -- --zero-copy 1 --rx-desc-num [0, n]
499 **TX descriptor number.**
500 The TX descriptor number option specify the Ethernet TX descriptor number, it is valid only in zero copy mode is enabled.
501 The value is 64 by default.
503 .. code-block:: console
505 user@target:~$ ./build/app/vhost-switch -c f -n 4 --huge-dir /mnt/huge -- --zero-copy 1 --tx-desc-num [0, n]
508 The VLAN strip option enable/disable the VLAN strip on host, if disabled, the guest will receive the packets with VLAN tag.
509 It is enabled by default.
511 .. code-block:: console
513 user@target:~$ ./build/app/vhost-switch -c f -n 4 --huge-dir /mnt/huge -- --vlan-strip [0, 1]
515 Running the Virtual Machine (QEMU)
516 ----------------------------------
518 QEMU must be executed with specific parameters to:
520 * Ensure the guest is configured to use virtio-net network adapters.
522 .. code-block:: console
524 user@target:~$ qemu-system-x86_64 ... -device virtio-net-pci,netdev=hostnet1,id=net1 ...
526 * Ensure the guest's virtio-net network adapter is configured with offloads disabled.
528 .. code-block:: console
530 user@target:~$ qemu-system-x86_64 ... -device virtio-net-pci,netdev=hostnet1,id=net1,csum=off,gso=off,guest_tso4=off,guest_tso6=off,guest_ecn=off
532 * Redirect QEMU to communicate with the DPDK vhost-net sample code in place of the vhost-net kernel module(vhost cuse).
534 .. code-block:: console
536 user@target:~$ qemu-system-x86_64 ... -netdev tap,id=hostnet1,vhost=on,vhostfd=<open fd> ...
538 * Enable the vhost-net sample code to map the VM's memory into its own process address space.
540 .. code-block:: console
542 user@target:~$ qemu-system-x86_64 ... -mem-prealloc -mem-path / dev/hugepages ...
546 The QEMU wrapper (qemu-wrap.py) is a Python script designed to automate the QEMU configuration described above.
547 It also facilitates integration with libvirt, although the script may also be used standalone without libvirt.
549 Redirecting QEMU to vhost-net Sample Code(vhost cuse)
550 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
552 To redirect QEMU to the vhost-net sample code implementation of the vhost-net API,
553 an open file descriptor must be passed to QEMU running as a child process.
555 .. code-block:: python
558 fd = os.open("/dev/usvhost-1", os.O_RDWR)
559 subprocess.call("qemu-system-x86_64 ... . -netdev tap,id=vhostnet0,vhost=on,vhostfd=" + fd +"...", shell=True)
563 This process is automated in the QEMU wrapper script discussed in Section 24.7.3.
565 Mapping the Virtual Machine's Memory
566 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
568 For the DPDK vhost-net sample code to be run correctly, QEMU must allocate the VM's memory on hugetlbfs.
569 This is done by specifying mem-prealloc and mem-path when executing QEMU.
570 The vhost-net sample code accesses the virtio-net device's virtual rings and packet buffers
571 by finding and mapping the VM's physical memory on hugetlbfs.
572 In this case, the path passed to the guest should be that of the 1 GB page hugetlbfs:
574 .. code-block:: console
576 user@target:~$ qemu-system-x86_64 ... -mem-prealloc -mem-path / dev/hugepages ...
580 This process is automated in the QEMU wrapper script discussed in Section 24.7.3.
581 The following two sections only applies to vhost cuse. For vhost-user, please make corresponding changes to qemu-wrapper script and guest XML file.
586 The QEMU wrapper script automatically detects and calls QEMU with the necessary parameters required
587 to integrate with the vhost sample code.
588 It performs the following actions:
590 * Automatically detects the location of the hugetlbfs and inserts this into the command line parameters.
592 * Automatically open file descriptors for each virtio-net device and inserts this into the command line parameters.
594 * Disables offloads on each virtio-net device.
596 * Calls Qemu passing both the command line parameters passed to the script itself and those it has auto-detected.
598 The QEMU wrapper script will automatically configure calls to QEMU:
600 .. code-block:: console
602 user@target:~$ qemu-wrap.py -machine pc-i440fx-1.4,accel=kvm,usb=off -cpu SandyBridge -smp 4,sockets=4,cores=1,threads=1
603 -netdev tap,id=hostnet1,vhost=on -device virtio-net-pci,netdev=hostnet1,id=net1 -hda <disk img> -m 4096
605 which will become the following call to QEMU:
607 .. code-block:: console
609 /usr/local/bin/qemu-system-x86_64 -machine pc-i440fx-1.4,accel=kvm,usb=off -cpu SandyBridge -smp 4,sockets=4,cores=1,threads=1
610 -netdev tap,id=hostnet1,vhost=on,vhostfd=<open fd> -device virtio-net-pci,netdev=hostnet1,id=net1,
611 csum=off,gso=off,guest_tso4=off,guest_tso6=off,guest_ecn=off -hda <disk img> -m 4096 -mem-path /dev/hugepages -mem-prealloc
616 The QEMU wrapper script (qemu-wrap.py) "wraps" libvirt calls to QEMU,
617 such that QEMU is called with the correct parameters described above.
618 To call the QEMU wrapper automatically from libvirt, the following configuration changes must be made:
620 * Place the QEMU wrapper script in libvirt's binary search PATH ($PATH).
621 A good location is in the directory that contains the QEMU binary.
623 * Ensure that the script has the same owner/group and file permissions as the QEMU binary.
625 * Update the VM xml file using virsh edit <vm name>:
627 * Set the VM to use the launch script
629 * Set the emulator path contained in the #<emulator><emulator/> tags For example,
630 replace <emulator>/usr/bin/qemu-kvm<emulator/> with <emulator>/usr/bin/qemu-wrap.py<emulator/>
632 * Set the VM's virtio-net device's to use vhost-net offload:
636 <interface type="network">
637 <model type="virtio"/>
638 <driver name="vhost"/>
641 * Enable libvirt to access the DPDK Vhost sample code's character device file by adding it
642 to controllers cgroup for libvirtd using the following steps:
646 cgroup_controllers = [ ... "devices", ... ] clear_emulator_capabilities = 0
647 user = "root" group = "root"
648 cgroup_device_acl = [
649 "/dev/null", "/dev/full", "/dev/zero",
650 "/dev/random", "/dev/urandom",
651 "/dev/ptmx", "/dev/kvm", "/dev/kqemu",
652 "/dev/rtc", "/dev/hpet", "/dev/net/tun",
653 "/dev/<devbase-name>-<index>",
656 * Disable SELinux or set to permissive mode.
659 * Mount cgroup device controller:
661 .. code-block:: console
663 user@target:~$ mkdir /dev/cgroup
664 user@target:~$ mount -t cgroup none /dev/cgroup -o devices
666 * Restart the libvirtd system process
668 For example, on Fedora* "systemctl restart libvirtd.service"
670 * Edit the configuration parameters section of the script:
672 * Configure the "emul_path" variable to point to the QEMU emulator.
676 emul_path = "/usr/local/bin/qemu-system-x86_64"
678 * Configure the "us_vhost_path" variable to point to the DPDK vhost-net sample code's character devices name.
679 DPDK vhost-net sample code's character device will be in the format "/dev/<basename>".
683 us_vhost_path = "/dev/usvhost"
688 * QEMU failing to allocate memory on hugetlbfs, with an error like the following::
690 file_ram_alloc: can't mmap RAM pages: Cannot allocate memory
692 When running QEMU the above error indicates that it has failed to allocate memory for the Virtual Machine on
693 the hugetlbfs. This is typically due to insufficient hugepages being free to support the allocation request.
694 The number of free hugepages can be checked as follows:
696 .. code-block:: console
698 cat /sys/kernel/mm/hugepages/hugepages-<pagesize>/nr_hugepages
700 The command above indicates how many hugepages are free to support QEMU's allocation request.
702 * User space VHOST when the guest has 2MB sized huge pages:
704 The guest may have 2MB or 1GB sized huge pages. The user space VHOST should work properly in both cases.
706 * User space VHOST will not work with QEMU without the ``-mem-prealloc`` option:
708 The current implementation works properly only when the guest memory is pre-allocated, so it is required to
709 use a QEMU version (e.g. 1.6) which supports ``-mem-prealloc``. The ``-mem-prealloc`` option must be
710 specified explicitly in the QEMU command line.
712 * User space VHOST will not work with a QEMU version without shared memory mapping:
714 As shared memory mapping is mandatory for user space VHOST to work properly with the guest, user space VHOST
715 needs access to the shared memory from the guest to receive and transmit packets. It is important to make sure
716 the QEMU version supports shared memory mapping.
718 * In an Ubuntu environment, QEMU fails to start a new guest normally with user space VHOST due to not being able
719 to allocate huge pages for the new guest:
721 The solution for this issue is to add ``-boot c`` into the QEMU command line to make sure the huge pages are
722 allocated properly and then the guest should start normally.
724 Use ``cat /proc/meminfo`` to check if there is any changes in the value of ``HugePages_Total`` and ``HugePages_Free``
725 after the guest startup.
727 * Log message: ``eventfd_link: module verification failed: signature and/or required key missing - tainting kernel``:
729 This log message may be ignored. The message occurs due to the kernel module ``eventfd_link``, which is not a standard
730 Linux module but which is necessary for the user space VHOST current implementation (CUSE-based) to communicate with
734 Running DPDK in the Virtual Machine
735 -----------------------------------
737 For the DPDK vhost-net sample code to switch packets into the VM,
738 the sample code must first learn the MAC address of the VM's virtio-net device.
739 The sample code detects the address from packets being transmitted from the VM, similar to a learning switch.
741 This behavior requires no special action or configuration with the Linux* virtio-net driver in the VM
742 as the Linux* Kernel will automatically transmit packets during device initialization.
743 However, DPDK-based applications must be modified to automatically transmit packets during initialization
744 to facilitate the DPDK vhost- net sample code's MAC learning.
746 The DPDK testpmd application can be configured to automatically transmit packets during initialization
747 and to act as an L2 forwarding switch.
749 Testpmd MAC Forwarding
750 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
752 At high packet rates, a minor packet loss may be observed.
753 To resolve this issue, a "wait and retry" mode is implemented in the testpmd and vhost sample code.
754 In the "wait and retry" mode if the virtqueue is found to be full, then testpmd waits for a period of time before retrying to enqueue packets.
756 The "wait and retry" algorithm is implemented in DPDK testpmd as a forwarding method call "mac_retry".
757 The following sequence diagram describes the algorithm in detail.
759 .. _figure_tx_dpdk_testpmd:
761 .. figure:: img/tx_dpdk_testpmd.*
763 Packet Flow on TX in DPDK-testpmd
769 The testpmd application is automatically built when DPDK is installed.
770 Run the testpmd application as follows:
772 .. code-block:: console
774 user@target:~$ x86_64-native-linuxapp-gcc/app/testpmd -c 0x3 -- n 4 -socket-mem 128 -- --burst=64 -i
776 The destination MAC address for packets transmitted on each port can be set at the command line:
778 .. code-block:: console
780 user@target:~$ x86_64-native-linuxapp-gcc/app/testpmd -c 0x3 -- n 4 -socket-mem 128 -- --burst=64 -i --eth- peer=0,aa:bb:cc:dd:ee:ff --eth-peer=1,ff,ee,dd,cc,bb,aa
782 * Packets received on port 1 will be forwarded on port 0 to MAC address
786 * Packets received on port 0 will be forwarded on port 1 to MAC address
790 The testpmd application can then be configured to act as an L2 forwarding application:
792 .. code-block:: console
794 testpmd> set fwd mac_retry
796 The testpmd can then be configured to start processing packets,
797 transmitting packets first so the DPDK vhost sample code on the host can learn the MAC address:
799 .. code-block:: console
801 testpmd> start tx_first
805 Please note "set fwd mac_retry" is used in place of "set fwd mac_fwd" to ensure the retry feature is activated.
807 Passing Traffic to the Virtual Machine Device
808 ---------------------------------------------
810 For a virtio-net device to receive traffic,
811 the traffic's Layer 2 header must include both the virtio-net device's MAC address and VLAN tag.
812 The DPDK sample code behaves in a similar manner to a learning switch in that
813 it learns the MAC address of the virtio-net devices from the first transmitted packet.
814 On learning the MAC address,
815 the DPDK vhost sample code prints a message with the MAC address and VLAN tag virtio-net device.
818 .. code-block:: console
820 DATA: (0) MAC_ADDRESS cc:bb:bb:bb:bb:bb and VLAN_TAG 1000 registered
822 The above message indicates that device 0 has been registered with MAC address cc:bb:bb:bb:bb:bb and VLAN tag 1000.
823 Any packets received on the NIC with these values is placed on the devices receive queue.
824 When a virtio-net device transmits packets, the VLAN tag is added to the packet by the DPDK vhost sample code.