Re: [RFC][PATCH v2 0/3] Provide a zero-copy method on KVM virtio-net.

[Sridhar Samudrala <sri@us.ibm.com>]

On Fri, 2010-04-02 at 15:25 +0800, xiaohui.xin@intel.com wrote:
> The idea is simple, just to pin the guest VM user space and then
> let host NIC driver has the chance to directly DMA to it. 
> The patches are based on vhost-net backend driver. We add a device
> which provides proto_ops as sendmsg/recvmsg to vhost-net to
> send/recv directly to/from the NIC driver. KVM guest who use the
> vhost-net backend may bind any ethX interface in the host side to
> get copyless data transfer thru guest virtio-net frontend.

What is the advantage of this approach compared to PCI-passthrough
of the host NIC to the guest?
Does this require pinning of the entire guest memory? Or only the
send/receive buffers?

Thanks
Sridhar
> 
> The scenario is like this:
> 
> The guest virtio-net driver submits multiple requests thru vhost-net
> backend driver to the kernel. And the requests are queued and then
> completed after corresponding actions in h/w are done.
> 
> For read, user space buffers are dispensed to NIC driver for rx when
> a page constructor API is invoked. Means NICs can allocate user buffers
> from a page constructor. We add a hook in netif_receive_skb() function
> to intercept the incoming packets, and notify the zero-copy device.
> 
> For write, the zero-copy deivce may allocates a new host skb and puts
> payload on the skb_shinfo(skb)->frags, and copied the header to skb->data.
> The request remains pending until the skb is transmitted by h/w.
> 
> Here, we have ever considered 2 ways to utilize the page constructor
> API to dispense the user buffers.
> 
> One:	Modify __alloc_skb() function a bit, it can only allocate a 
> 	structure of sk_buff, and the data pointer is pointing to a 
> 	user buffer which is coming from a page constructor API.
> 	Then the shinfo of the skb is also from guest.
> 	When packet is received from hardware, the skb->data is filled
> 	directly by h/w. What we have done is in this way.
> 
> 	Pros:	We can avoid any copy here.
> 	Cons:	Guest virtio-net driver needs to allocate skb as almost
> 		the same method with the host NIC drivers, say the size
> 		of netdev_alloc_skb() and the same reserved space in the
> 		head of skb. Many NIC drivers are the same with guest and
> 		ok for this. But some lastest NIC drivers reserves special
> 		room in skb head. To deal with it, we suggest to provide
> 		a method in guest virtio-net driver to ask for parameter
> 		we interest from the NIC driver when we know which device 
> 		we have bind to do zero-copy. Then we ask guest to do so.
> 		Is that reasonable?
> 
> Two:	Modify driver to get user buffer allocated from a page constructor
> 	API(to substitute alloc_page()), the user buffer are used as payload
> 	buffers and filled by h/w directly when packet is received. Driver
> 	should associate the pages with skb (skb_shinfo(skb)->frags). For 
> 	the head buffer side, let host allocates skb, and h/w fills it. 
> 	After that, the data filled in host skb header will be copied into
> 	guest header buffer which is submitted together with the payload buffer.
> 
> 	Pros:	We could less care the way how guest or host allocates their
> 		buffers.
> 	Cons:	We still need a bit copy here for the skb header.
> 
> We are not sure which way is the better here. This is the first thing we want
> to get comments from the community. We wish the modification to the network
> part will be generic which not used by vhost-net backend only, but a user
> application may use it as well when the zero-copy device may provides async
> read/write operations later.
> 
> Please give comments especially for the network part modifications.
> 
> 
> We provide multiple submits and asynchronous notifiicaton to 
> vhost-net too.
> 
> Our goal is to improve the bandwidth and reduce the CPU usage.
> Exact performance data will be provided later. But for simple
> test with netperf, we found bindwidth up and CPU % up too,
> but the bindwidth up ratio is much more than CPU % up ratio.
> 
> What we have not done yet:
> 	packet split support
> 	To support GRO
> 	Performance tuning
> 
> what we have done in v1:
> 	polish the RCU usage
> 	deal with write logging in asynchroush mode in vhost
> 	add notifier block for mp device
> 	rename page_ctor to mp_port in netdevice.h to make it looks generic
> 	add mp_dev_change_flags() for mp device to change NIC state
> 	add CONIFG_VHOST_MPASSTHRU to limit the usage when module is not load
> 	a small fix for missing dev_put when fail
> 	using dynamic minor instead of static minor number
> 	a __KERNEL__ protect to mp_get_sock()
> 
> what we have done in v2:
> 	
> 	remove most of the RCU usage, since the ctor pointer is only
> 	changed by BIND/UNBIND ioctl, and during that time, NIC will be
> 	stopped to get good cleanup(all outstanding requests are finished),
> 	so the ctor pointer cannot be raced into wrong situation.
> 
> 	Remove the struct vhost_notifier with struct kiocb.
> 	Let vhost-net backend to alloc/free the kiocb and transfer them
> 	via sendmsg/recvmsg.
> 
> 	use get_user_pages_fast() and set_page_dirty_lock() when read.
> 
> 	Add some comments for netdev_mp_port_prep() and handle_mpassthru().
> 
> 
> Comments not addressed yet in this time:
> 	the async write logging is not satified by vhost-net
> 	Qemu needs a sync write
> 	a limit for locked pages from get_user_pages_fast()
> 	
> 		
> performance:
> 	using netperf with GSO/TSO disabled, 10G NIC, 
> 	disabled packet split mode, with raw socket case compared to vhost.
> 
> 	bindwidth will be from 1.1Gbps to 1.7Gbps
> 	CPU % from 120%-140% to 140%-160%
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