RE: QoS in local SA entity

Sean Hefty
2009-11-05T16:40:55Z

>I believe we can go also on a middle way, where the SA isn't contacted
>directly using path query for each resolution, but rather "indirectly"
>e.g using a dedicated multicast based protocol.

Yes - I wasn't trying to limit how the SA could 'distribute' QoS information to
the end nodes. ACM will obtain QoS information from the SA when it joins its
multicast groups.

>So assuming ACM supports AF_INET, using network stack route lookup on
>the destination address / rdma_bind on the source address, etc as we
>discussed, ACM can use the rdma-cm to resolve the pkey, then use this
>pkey the MGID and a management software could tell the SA to use a
>specific SL for MGIDs on this partition. Next, ACM can use this SL in
>the path it generates for the IB connection, makes sense?

ACM is intended to be a service that's used by the librdmacm to resolve address
mappings and routes. Trying to have ACM use the librdmacm ends up with a
circular dependency. That's the part I'm trying to avoid.

ACM uses address mappings as defined in an address configuration file (IP ->
device, port, pkey). The address file can be created using the provided ib_acme
utility, which uses the current system configuration (in an ugly way, but it
works). I think this provides QoS behavior similar to what you're describing.

At some future point, the ib_acm service can be merged with ib_acme to respond
to dynamic changes in ipoib address mappings, but that's a non-trivial amount of
work and involves changes to the ACM multicast groups.

- Sean