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This chapter is an overview of the boot and system initialization process, starting from the BIOS (firmware) POST, to the first user process creation. Since the initial steps of system startup are very architecture dependent, the IA-32 architecture is used as an example.
A computer running FreeBSD can boot by several methods, although the most common method, booting from a harddisk where the OS is installed, will be discussed here. The boot process is divided into several steps:
BIOS POST
boot0 stage
boot2 stage
loader stage
kernel initialization
The boot0 and boot2 stages are also referred to as bootstrap stages 1 and 2 in boot(8) as the first steps in FreeBSD's 3-stage bootstrapping procedure. Various information is printed on the screen at each stage, so you may visually recognize them using the table that follows. Please note that the actual data may differ from machine to machine:
may vary |
BIOS (firmware) messages |
F1 FreeBSD F2 BSD F5 Disk 2 |
boot0 |
>>FreeBSD/i386 BOOT Default: 1:ad(1,a)/boot/loader boot: |
boot2a |
BTX loader 1.0 BTX version is 1.01 BIOS drive A: is disk0 BIOS drive C: is disk1 BIOS 639kB/64512kB available memory FreeBSD/i386 bootstrap loader, Revision 0.8 Console internal video/keyboard ([email protected], Mon Nov 20 11:41:23 GMT 2000) /kernel text=0x1234 data=0x2345 syms=[0x4+0x3456] Hit [Enter] to boot immediately, or any other key for command prompt Booting [kernel] in 9 seconds..._ |
loader |
Copyright (c) 1992-2002 The FreeBSD Project. Copyright (c) 1979, 1980, 1983, 1986, 1988, 1989, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994 The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. FreeBSD 4.6-RC #0: Sat May 4 22:49:02 GMT 2002 devnull@kukas:/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/DEVNULL Timecounter "i8254" frequency 1193182 Hz |
kernel |
Notes: a. This prompt will appear if the user presses a key just after selecting an OS to boot at the boot0 stage. |
When the PC powers on, the processor's registers are set to some predefined values. One of the registers is the instruction pointer register, and its value after a power on is well defined: it is a 32-bit value of 0xfffffff0. The instruction pointer register points to code to be executed by the processor. One of the registers is the cr1 32-bit control register, and its value just after the reboot is 0. One of the cr1's bits, the bit PE (Protected Enabled) indicates whether the processor is running in protected or real mode. Since at boot time this bit is cleared, the processor boots in real mode. Real mode means, among other things, that linear and physical addresses are identical.
The value of 0xfffffff0 is slightly less then 4Gb, so unless the machine has 4Gb physical memory, it cannot point to a valid memory address. The computer's hardware translates this address so that it points to a BIOS memory block.
BIOS stands for Basic Input Output System, and it is a chip on the motherboard that has a relatively small amount of read-only memory (ROM). This memory contains various low-level routines that are specific to the hardware supplied with the motherboard. So, the processor will first jump to the address 0xfffffff0, which really resides in the BIOS's memory. Usually this address contains a jump instruction to the BIOS's POST routines.
POST stands for Power On Self Test. This is a set of routines including the memory check, system bus check and other low-level stuff so that the CPU can initialize the computer properly. The important step on this stage is determining the boot device. All modern BIOS's allow the boot device to be set manually, so you can boot from a floppy, CD-ROM, harddisk etc.
The very last thing in the POST is the INT 0x19 instruction. That instruction reads 512 bytes from the first sector of boot device into the memory at address 0x7c00. The term first sector originates from harddrive architecture, where the magnetic plate is divided to a number of cylindrical tracks. Tracks are numbered, and every track is divided by a number (usually 64) sectors. Track number 0 is the outermost on the magnetic plate, and sector 1, the first sector (tracks, or, cylinders, are numbered starting from 0, but sectors - starting from 1), has a special meaning. It is also called Master Boot Record, or MBR. The remaining sectors on the first track are never used [1].
Take a look at the file /boot/boot0. This is a small 512-byte file, and it is exactly what FreeBSD's installation procedure wrote to your harddisk's MBR if you chose the “bootmanager” option at installation time.
As mentioned previously, the INT 0x19 instruction loads an MBR, i.e. the boot0 content, into the memory at address 0x7c00. Taking a look at the file sys/boot/i386/boot0/boot0.S can give a guess at what is happening there - this is the boot manager, which is an awesome piece of code written by Robert Nordier.
The MBR, or, boot0, has a special structure starting from offset 0x1be, called the partition table. It has 4 records of 16 bytes each, called partition records, which represent how the harddisk(s) are partitioned, or, in FreeBSD's terminology, sliced. One byte of those 16 says whether a partition (slice) is bootable or not. Exactly one record must have that flag set, otherwise boot0's code will refuse to proceed.
A partition record has the following fields:
the 1-byte filesystem type
the 1-byte bootable flag
the 6 byte descriptor in CHS format
the 8 byte descriptor in LBA format
A partition record descriptor has the information about where exactly the partition resides on the drive. Both descriptors, LBA and CHS, describe the same information, but in different ways: LBA (Logical Block Addressing) has the starting sector for the partition and the partition's length, while CHS (Cylinder Head Sector) has coordinates for the first and last sectors of the partition.
The boot manager scans the partition table and prints the menu on the screen so the user can select what disk and what slice to boot. By pressing an appropriate key, boot0 performs the following actions:
modifies the bootable flag for the selected partition to make it bootable, and clears the previous
saves itself to disk to remember what partition (slice) has been selected so to use it as the default on the next boot
loads the first sector of the selected partition (slice) into memory and jumps there
What kind of data should reside on the very first sector of a bootable partition (slice), in our case, a FreeBSD slice? As you may have already guessed, it is boot2.
You might wonder, why boot2 comes after boot0, and not boot1. Actually, there is a 512-byte file called boot1 in the directory /boot as well. It is used for booting from a floppy. When booting from a floppy, boot1 plays the same role as boot0 for a harddisk: it locates boot2 and runs it.
You may have realized that a file /boot/mbr exists as well. It is a simplified version of boot0. The code in mbr does not provide a menu for the user, it just blindly boots the partition marked active.
The code implementing boot2 resides in sys/boot/i386/boot2/, and the executable itself is in /boot. The files boot0 and boot2 that are in /boot are not used by the bootstrap, but by utilities such as boot0cfg. The actual position for boot0 is in the MBR. For boot2 it is the beginning of a bootable FreeBSD slice. These locations are not under the filesystem's control, so they are invisible to commands like ls.
The main task for boot2 is to load the file /boot/loader, which is the third stage in the bootstrapping
procedure. The code in boot2 cannot use any services like open()
and read()
, since the kernel
is not yet loaded. It must scan the harddisk, knowing about the filesystem structure,
find the file /boot/loader, read it into memory using a BIOS
service, and then pass the execution to the loader's entry point.
Besides that, boot2 prompts for user input so the loader can be booted from different disk, unit, slice and partition.
The boot2 binary is created in special way:
sys/boot/i386/boot2/Makefile boot2: boot2.ldr boot2.bin ${BTX}/btx/btx btxld -v -E ${ORG2} -f bin -b ${BTX}/btx/btx -l boot2.ldr \ -o boot2.ld -P 1 boot2.bin
This Makefile snippet shows that btxld(8) is used to link the binary. BTX, which stands for BooT eXtender, is a piece of code that provides a protected mode environment for the program, called the client, that it is linked with. So boot2 is a BTX client, i.e. it uses the service provided by BTX.
The btxld utility is the linker. It links two binaries together. The difference between btxld(8) and ld(1) is that ld usually links object files into a shared object or executable, while btxld links an object file with the BTX, producing the binary file suitable to be put on the beginning of the partition for the system boot.
boot0 passes the execution to BTX's entry point. BTX then switches the processor to protected mode, and prepares a simple environment before calling the client. This includes:
virtual v86 mode. That means, the BTX is a v86 monitor. Real mode instructions like pushf, popf, cli, sti, if called by the client, will work.
Interrupt Descriptor Table (IDT) is set up so all hardware interrupts are routed to the default BIOS's handlers, and interrupt 0x30 is set up to be the syscall gate.
Two system calls: exec
and exit
, are defined:
sys/boot/i386/btx/lib/btxsys.s: .set INT_SYS,0x30 # Interrupt number # # System call: exit # __exit: xorl %eax,%eax # BTX system int $INT_SYS # call 0x0 # # System call: exec # __exec: movl $0x1,%eax # BTX system int $INT_SYS # call 0x1
BTX creates a Global Descriptor Table (GDT):
sys/boot/i386/btx/btx/btx.s: gdt: .word 0x0,0x0,0x0,0x0 # Null entry .word 0xffff,0x0,0x9a00,0xcf # SEL_SCODE .word 0xffff,0x0,0x9200,0xcf # SEL_SDATA .word 0xffff,0x0,0x9a00,0x0 # SEL_RCODE .word 0xffff,0x0,0x9200,0x0 # SEL_RDATA .word 0xffff,MEM_USR,0xfa00,0xcf# SEL_UCODE .word 0xffff,MEM_USR,0xf200,0xcf# SEL_UDATA .word _TSSLM,MEM_TSS,0x8900,0x0 # SEL_TSS
The client's code and data start from address MEM_USR (0xa000), and a selector (SEL_UCODE) points to the client's code segment. The SEL_UCODE descriptor has Descriptor Privilege Level (DPL) 3, which is the lowest privilege level. But the INT 0x30 instruction handler resides in a segment pointed to by the SEL_SCODE (supervisor code) selector, as shown from the code that creates an IDT:
mov $SEL_SCODE,%dh # Segment selector init.2: shr %bx # Handle this int? jnc init.3 # No mov %ax,(%di) # Set handler offset mov %dh,0x2(%di) # and selector mov %dl,0x5(%di) # Set P:DPL:type add $0x4,%ax # Next handler
So, when the client calls __exec()
, the code will be
executed with the highest privileges. This allows the kernel to change the protected mode
data structures, such as page tables, GDT, IDT, etc later, if needed.
boot2 defines an important structure, struct bootinfo. This structure is initialized by boot2 and passed to the loader, and then further to the kernel. Some nodes of this structures are set by boot2, the rest by the loader. This structure, among other information, contains the kernel filename, BIOS harddisk geometry, BIOS drive number for boot device, physical memory available, envp pointer etc. The definition for it is:
/usr/include/machine/bootinfo.h struct bootinfo { u_int32_t bi_version; u_int32_t bi_kernelname; /* represents a char * */ u_int32_t bi_nfs_diskless; /* struct nfs_diskless * */ /* End of fields that are always present. */ #define bi_endcommon bi_n_bios_used u_int32_t bi_n_bios_used; u_int32_t bi_bios_geom[N_BIOS_GEOM]; u_int32_t bi_size; u_int8_t bi_memsizes_valid; u_int8_t bi_bios_dev; /* bootdev BIOS unit number */ u_int8_t bi_pad[2]; u_int32_t bi_basemem; u_int32_t bi_extmem; u_int32_t bi_symtab; /* struct symtab * */ u_int32_t bi_esymtab; /* struct symtab * */ /* Items below only from advanced bootloader */ u_int32_t bi_kernend; /* end of kernel space */ u_int32_t bi_envp; /* environment */ u_int32_t bi_modulep; /* preloaded modules */ };
boot2 enters into an infinite loop waiting for user input,
then calls load()
. If the user does not press anything, the
loop breaks by a timeout, so load()
will load the default
file (/boot/loader). Functions ino_t
lookup(char *filename)
and int xfsread(ino_t inode, void
*buf, size_t nbyte)
are used to read the content of a file into memory. /boot/loader is an ELF binary, but where the ELF header is
prepended with a.out's struct exec structure. load()
scans the loader's ELF header, loading the content of /boot/loader into memory, and passing the execution to the loader's
entry:
sys/boot/i386/boot2/boot2.c: __exec((caddr_t)addr, RB_BOOTINFO | (opts & RBX_MASK), MAKEBOOTDEV(dev_maj[dsk.type], 0, dsk.slice, dsk.unit, dsk.part), 0, 0, 0, VTOP(&bootinfo));
loader is a BTX client as well. I will not describe it here in detail, there is a comprehensive manpage written by Mike Smith, loader(8). The underlying mechanisms and BTX were discussed above.
The main task for the loader is to boot the kernel. When the kernel is loaded into memory, it is being called by the loader:
sys/boot/common/boot.c: /* Call the exec handler from the loader matching the kernel */ module_formats[km->m_loader]->l_exec(km);
Let us take a look at the command that links the kernel. This will help us identify the exact location where the loader passes execution to the kernel. This location is the kernel's actual entry point.
sys/conf/Makefile.i386: ld -elf -Bdynamic -T /usr/src/sys/conf/ldscript.i386 -export-dynamic \ -dynamic-linker /red/herring -o kernel -X locore.o \ <lots of kernel .o files>
A few interesting things can be seen in this line. First, the kernel is an ELF dynamically linked binary, but the dynamic linker for kernel is /red/herring, which is definitely a bogus file. Second, taking a look at the file sys/conf/ldscript.i386 gives an idea about what ld options are used when compiling a kernel. Reading through the first few lines, the string
sys/conf/ldscript.i386: ENTRY(btext)
says that a kernel's entry point is the symbol `btext'. This symbol is defined in locore.s:
sys/i386/i386/locore.s: .text /********************************************************************** * * This is where the bootblocks start us, set the ball rolling... * */ NON_GPROF_ENTRY(btext)
First what is done is the register EFLAGS is set to a predefined value of 0x00000002, and then all the segment registers are initialized:
sys/i386/i386/locore.s /* Don't trust what the BIOS gives for eflags. */ pushl $PSL_KERNEL popfl /* * Don't trust what the BIOS gives for %fs and %gs. Trust the bootstrap * to set %cs, %ds, %es and %ss. */ mov %ds, %ax mov %ax, %fs mov %ax, %gs
btext calls the routines recover_bootinfo()
, identify_cpu()
, create_pagetables()
, which are also defined in locore.s. Here is a description of what they do:
recover_bootinfo |
This routine parses the parameters to the kernel passed from the bootstrap. The kernel may have been booted in 3 ways: by the loader, described above, by the old disk boot blocks, and by the old diskless boot procedure. This function determines the booting method, and stores the struct bootinfo structure into the kernel memory. |
identify_cpu |
This functions tries to find out what CPU it is running on, storing the value found
in a variable _cpu . |
create_pagetables |
This function allocates and fills out a Page Table Directory at the top of the kernel memory area. |
The next steps are enabling VME, if the CPU supports it:
testl $CPUID_VME, R(_cpu_feature) jz 1f movl %cr4, %eax orl $CR4_VME, %eax movl %eax, %cr4
Then, enabling paging:
/* Now enable paging */ movl R(_IdlePTD), %eax movl %eax,%cr3 /* load ptd addr into mmu */ movl %cr0,%eax /* get control word */ orl $CR0_PE|CR0_PG,%eax /* enable paging */ movl %eax,%cr0 /* and let's page NOW! */
The next three lines of code are because the paging was set, so the jump is needed to continue the execution in virtualized address space:
pushl $begin /* jump to high virtualized address */ ret /* now running relocated at KERNBASE where the system is linked to run */ begin:
The function init386()
is called, with a pointer to the
first free physical page, after that mi_startup()
. init386
is an architecture dependent initialization function, and
mi_startup()
is an architecture independent one (the 'mi_'
prefix stands for Machine Independent). The kernel never returns from mi_startup()
, and by calling it, the kernel finishes booting:
sys/i386/i386/locore.s: movl physfree, %esi pushl %esi /* value of first for init386(first) */ call _init386 /* wire 386 chip for unix operation */ call _mi_startup /* autoconfiguration, mountroot etc */ hlt /* never returns to here */
init386()
init386()
is defined in sys/i386/i386/machdep.c and performs low-level initialization,
specific to the i386 chip. The switch to protected mode was performed by the loader. The
loader has created the very first task, in which the kernel continues to operate. Before
running straight away to the code, I will enumerate the tasks the processor must complete
to initialize protected mode execution:
Initialize the kernel tunable parameters, passed from the bootstrapping program.
Prepare the GDT.
Prepare the IDT.
Initialize the system console.
Initialize the DDB, if it is compiled into kernel.
Initialize the TSS.
Prepare the LDT.
Set up proc0's pcb.
What init386()
first does is initialize the tunable
parameters passed from bootstrap. This is done by setting the environment pointer (envp)
and calling init_param1()
. The envp pointer has been passed
from loader in the bootinfo structure:
sys/i386/i386/machdep.c: kern_envp = (caddr_t)bootinfo.bi_envp + KERNBASE; /* Init basic tunables, hz etc */ init_param1();
init_param1()
is defined in sys/kern/subr_param.c. That file has a number of sysctls, and two
functions, init_param1()
and init_param2()
, that are called from init386()
:
sys/kern/subr_param.c hz = HZ; TUNABLE_INT_FETCH("kern.hz", &hz);
TUNABLE_<typename>_FETCH is used to fetch the value from the environment:
/usr/src/sys/sys/kernel.h #define TUNABLE_INT_FETCH(path, var) getenv_int((path), (var))
Sysctl kern.hz is the system clock tick. Along with this, the
following sysctls are set by init_param1()
: kern.maxswzone, kern.maxbcache, kern.maxtsiz, kern.dfldsiz, kern.maxdsiz,
kern.dflssiz, kern.maxssiz, kern.sgrowsiz.
Then init386()
prepares the Global Descriptors Table
(GDT). Every task on an x86 is running in its own virtual address space, and this space
is addressed by a segment:offset pair. Say, for instance, the current instruction to be
executed by the processor lies at CS:EIP, then the linear virtual address for that
instruction would be “the virtual address of code segment CS” + EIP. For
convenience, segments begin at virtual address 0 and end at a 4Gb boundary. Therefore,
the instruction's linear virtual address for this example would just be the value of EIP.
Segment registers such as CS, DS etc are the selectors, i.e. indexes, into GDT (to be
more precise, an index is not a selector itself, but the INDEX field of a selector).
FreeBSD's GDT holds descriptors for 15 selectors per CPU:
sys/i386/i386/machdep.c: union descriptor gdt[NGDT * MAXCPU]; /* global descriptor table */ sys/i386/include/segments.h: /* * Entries in the Global Descriptor Table (GDT) */ #define GNULL_SEL 0 /* Null Descriptor */ #define GCODE_SEL 1 /* Kernel Code Descriptor */ #define GDATA_SEL 2 /* Kernel Data Descriptor */ #define GPRIV_SEL 3 /* SMP Per-Processor Private Data */ #define GPROC0_SEL 4 /* Task state process slot zero and up */ #define GLDT_SEL 5 /* LDT - eventually one per process */ #define GUSERLDT_SEL 6 /* User LDT */ #define GTGATE_SEL 7 /* Process task switch gate */ #define GBIOSLOWMEM_SEL 8 /* BIOS low memory access (must be entry 8) */ #define GPANIC_SEL 9 /* Task state to consider panic from */ #define GBIOSCODE32_SEL 10 /* BIOS interface (32bit Code) */ #define GBIOSCODE16_SEL 11 /* BIOS interface (16bit Code) */ #define GBIOSDATA_SEL 12 /* BIOS interface (Data) */ #define GBIOSUTIL_SEL 13 /* BIOS interface (Utility) */ #define GBIOSARGS_SEL 14 /* BIOS interface (Arguments) */
Note that those #defines are not selectors themselves, but just a field INDEX of a selector, so they are exactly the indices of the GDT. for example, an actual selector for the kernel code (GCODE_SEL) has the value 0x08.
The next step is to initialize the Interrupt Descriptor Table (IDT). This table is to be referenced by the processor when a software or hardware interrupt occurs. For example, to make a system call, user application issues the INT 0x80 instruction. This is a software interrupt, so the processor's hardware looks up a record with index 0x80 in the IDT. This record points to the routine that handles this interrupt, in this particular case, this will be the kernel's syscall gate. The IDT may have a maximum of 256 (0x100) records. The kernel allocates NIDT records for the IDT, where NIDT is the maximum (256):
sys/i386/i386/machdep.c: static struct gate_descriptor idt0[NIDT]; struct gate_descriptor *idt = &idt0[0]; /* interrupt descriptor table */
For each interrupt, an appropriate handler is set. The syscall gate for INT 0x80 is set as well:
sys/i386/i386/machdep.c: setidt(0x80, &IDTVEC(int0x80_syscall), SDT_SYS386TGT, SEL_UPL, GSEL(GCODE_SEL, SEL_KPL));
So when a userland application issues the INT 0x80
instruction, control will transfer to the function _Xint0x80_syscall
, which is in the kernel code segment and will
be executed with supervisor privileges.
Console and DDB are then initialized:
sys/i386/i386/machdep.c: cninit(); /* skipped */ #ifdef DDB kdb_init(); if (boothowto & RB_KDB) Debugger("Boot flags requested debugger"); #endif
The Task State Segment is another x86 protected mode structure, the TSS is used by the hardware to store task information when a task switch occurs.
The Local Descriptors Table is used to reference userland code and data. Several selectors are defined to point to the LDT, they are the system call gates and the user code and data selectors:
/usr/include/machine/segments.h #define LSYS5CALLS_SEL 0 /* forced by intel BCS */ #define LSYS5SIGR_SEL 1 #define L43BSDCALLS_SEL 2 /* notyet */ #define LUCODE_SEL 3 #define LSOL26CALLS_SEL 4 /* Solaris >= 2.6 system call gate */ #define LUDATA_SEL 5 /* separate stack, es,fs,gs sels ? */ /* #define LPOSIXCALLS_SEL 5*/ /* notyet */ #define LBSDICALLS_SEL 16 /* BSDI system call gate */ #define NLDT (LBSDICALLS_SEL + 1)
Next, proc0's Process Control Block (struct pcb) structure is initialized. proc0 is a struct proc structure that describes a kernel process. It is always present while the kernel is running, therefore it is declared as global:
sys/kern/kern_init.c: struct proc proc0;
The structure struct pcb is a part of a proc structure. It is defined in /usr/include/machine/pcb.h and has a process's information specific to the i386 architecture, such as registers values.
mi_startup()
This function performs a bubble sort of all the system initialization objects and then calls the entry of each object one by one:
sys/kern/init_main.c: for (sipp = sysinit; *sipp; sipp++) { /* ... skipped ... */ /* Call function */ (*((*sipp)->func))((*sipp)->udata); /* ... skipped ... */ }
Although the sysinit framework is described in the Developers' Handbook, I will discuss the internals of it.
Every system initialization object (sysinit object) is created by calling a SYSINIT() macro. Let us take as example an announce sysinit object. This object prints the copyright message:
sys/kern/init_main.c: static void print_caddr_t(void *data __unused) { printf("%s", (char *)data); } SYSINIT(announce, SI_SUB_COPYRIGHT, SI_ORDER_FIRST, print_caddr_t, copyright)
The subsystem ID for this object is SI_SUB_COPYRIGHT (0x0800001), which comes right after the SI_SUB_CONSOLE (0x0800000). So, the copyright message will be printed out first, just after the console initialization.
Let us take a look at what exactly the macro SYSINIT() does. It expands to a C_SYSINIT() macro. The C_SYSINIT() macro then expands to a static struct sysinit structure declaration with another DATA_SET macro call:
/usr/include/sys/kernel.h: #define C_SYSINIT(uniquifier, subsystem, order, func, ident) \ static struct sysinit uniquifier ## _sys_init = { \ subsystem, \ order, \ func, \ ident \ }; \ DATA_SET(sysinit_set,uniquifier ## _sys_init); #define SYSINIT(uniquifier, subsystem, order, func, ident) \ C_SYSINIT(uniquifier, subsystem, order, \ (sysinit_cfunc_t)(sysinit_nfunc_t)func, (void *)ident)
The DATA_SET() macro expands to a MAKE_SET(), and that macro is the point where the all sysinit magic is hidden:
/usr/include/linker_set.h #define MAKE_SET(set, sym) \ static void const * const __set_##set##_sym_##sym = &sym; \ __asm(".section .set." #set ",\"aw\""); \ __asm(".long " #sym); \ __asm(".previous") #endif #define TEXT_SET(set, sym) MAKE_SET(set, sym) #define DATA_SET(set, sym) MAKE_SET(set, sym)
In our case, the following declaration will occur:
static struct sysinit announce_sys_init = { SI_SUB_COPYRIGHT, SI_ORDER_FIRST, (sysinit_cfunc_t)(sysinit_nfunc_t) print_caddr_t, (void *) copyright }; static void const *const __set_sysinit_set_sym_announce_sys_init = &announce_sys_init; __asm(".section .set.sysinit_set" ",\"aw\""); __asm(".long " "announce_sys_init"); __asm(".previous");
The first __asm instruction will create an ELF section within the kernel's executable. This will happen at kernel link time. The section will have the name .set.sysinit_set. The content of this section is one 32-bit value, the address of announce_sys_init structure, and that is what the second __asm is. The third __asm instruction marks the end of a section. If a directive with the same section name occurred before, the content, i.e. the 32-bit value, will be appended to the existing section, so forming an array of 32-bit pointers.
Running objdump on a kernel binary, you may notice the presence of such small sections:
% objdump -h /kernel 7 .set.cons_set 00000014 c03164c0 c03164c0 002154c0 2**2 CONTENTS, ALLOC, LOAD, DATA 8 .set.kbddriver_set 00000010 c03164d4 c03164d4 002154d4 2**2 CONTENTS, ALLOC, LOAD, DATA 9 .set.scrndr_set 00000024 c03164e4 c03164e4 002154e4 2**2 CONTENTS, ALLOC, LOAD, DATA 10 .set.scterm_set 0000000c c0316508 c0316508 00215508 2**2 CONTENTS, ALLOC, LOAD, DATA 11 .set.sysctl_set 0000097c c0316514 c0316514 00215514 2**2 CONTENTS, ALLOC, LOAD, DATA 12 .set.sysinit_set 00000664 c0316e90 c0316e90 00215e90 2**2 CONTENTS, ALLOC, LOAD, DATA
This screen dump shows that the size of .set.sysinit_set section is 0x664 bytes, so 0x664/sizeof(void *) sysinit objects are compiled into the kernel. The other sections such as .set.sysctl_set represent other linker sets.
By defining a variable of type struct linker_set the content of .set.sysinit_set section will be “collected” into that variable:
sys/kern/init_main.c: extern struct linker_set sysinit_set; /* XXX */
The struct linker_set is defined as follows:
/usr/include/linker_set.h: struct linker_set { int ls_length; void *ls_items[1]; /* really ls_length of them, trailing NULL */ };
The first node will be equal to the number of a sysinit objects, and the second node will be a NULL-terminated array of pointers to them.
Returning to the mi_startup()
discussion, it is must be
clear now, how the sysinit objects are being organized. The mi_startup()
function sorts them and calls each. The very last
object is the system scheduler:
/usr/include/sys/kernel.h: enum sysinit_sub_id { SI_SUB_DUMMY = 0x0000000, /* not executed; for linker*/ SI_SUB_DONE = 0x0000001, /* processed*/ SI_SUB_CONSOLE = 0x0800000, /* console*/ SI_SUB_COPYRIGHT = 0x0800001, /* first use of console*/ ... SI_SUB_RUN_SCHEDULER = 0xfffffff /* scheduler: no return*/ };
The system scheduler sysinit object is defined in the file sys/vm/vm_glue.c, and the entry point for that object is scheduler()
. That function is actually an infinite loop, and it
represents a process with PID 0, the swapper process. The proc0 structure, mentioned
before, is used to describe it.
The first user process, called init, is created by the sysinit object init:
sys/kern/init_main.c: static void create_init(const void *udata __unused) { int error; int s; s = splhigh(); error = fork1(&proc0, RFFDG | RFPROC, &initproc); if (error) panic("cannot fork init: %d\n", error); initproc->p_flag |= P_INMEM | P_SYSTEM; cpu_set_fork_handler(initproc, start_init, NULL); remrunqueue(initproc); splx(s); } SYSINIT(init,SI_SUB_CREATE_INIT, SI_ORDER_FIRST, create_init, NULL)
The create_init()
allocates a new process by calling
fork1()
, but does not mark it runnable. When this new
process is scheduled for execution by the scheduler, the start_init()
will be called. That function is defined in init_main.c. It tries to load and exec the init binary, probing /sbin/init first,
then /sbin/oinit, /sbin/init.bak, and
finally /stand/sysinstall:
sys/kern/init_main.c: static char init_path[MAXPATHLEN] = #ifdef INIT_PATH __XSTRING(INIT_PATH); #else "/sbin/init:/sbin/oinit:/sbin/init.bak:/stand/sysinstall"; #endif
This chapter is maintained by the FreeBSD SMP Next Generation Project.
This document outlines the locking used in the FreeBSD kernel to permit effective multi-processing within the kernel. Locking can be achieved via several means. Data structures can be protected by mutexes or lockmgr(9) locks. A few variables are protected simply by always using atomic operations to access them.
A mutex is simply a lock used to guarantee mutual exclusion. Specifically, a mutex may only be owned by one entity at a time. If another entity wishes to obtain a mutex that is already owned, it must wait until the mutex is released. In the FreeBSD kernel, mutexes are owned by processes.
Mutexes may be recursively acquired, but they are intended to be held for a short period of time. Specifically, one may not sleep while holding a mutex. If you need to hold a lock across a sleep, use a lockmgr(9) lock.
Each mutex has several properties of interest:
The name of the struct mtx variable in the kernel source.
The name of the mutex assigned to it by mtx_init
. This
name is displayed in KTR trace messages and witness errors and warnings and is used to
distinguish mutexes in the witness code.
The type of the mutex in terms of the MTX_*
flags. The
meaning for each flag is related to its meaning as documented in mutex(9).
MTX_DEF
A sleep mutex
MTX_SPIN
A spin mutex
MTX_RECURSE
This mutex is allowed to recurse.
A list of data structures or data structure members that this entry protects. For data
structure members, the name will be in the form of structure
name
.member name
.
Functions that can only be called if this mutex is held.
Table 2-1. Mutex List
Variable Name | Logical Name | Type | Protectees | Dependent Functions |
---|---|---|---|---|
sched_lock | “sched lock” | MTX_SPIN | MTX_RECURSE
|
_gmonparam , cnt.v_swtch ,
cp_time , curpriority , mtx .mtx_blocked , mtx .mtx_contested , proc .p_procq , proc .p_slpq , proc .p_sflag , proc .p_stat , proc .p_estcpu , proc .p_cpticks proc .p_pctcpu , proc .p_wchan , proc .p_wmesg , proc .p_swtime , proc .p_slptime , proc .p_runtime , proc .p_uu , proc .p_su , proc .p_iu , proc .p_uticks , proc .p_sticks , proc .p_iticks , proc .p_oncpu , proc .p_lastcpu , proc .p_rqindex , proc .p_heldmtx , proc .p_blocked , proc .p_mtxname , proc .p_contested , proc .p_priority , proc .p_usrpri , proc .p_nativepri , proc .p_nice , proc .p_rtprio , pscnt , slpque , itqueuebits , itqueues , rtqueuebits , rtqueues , queuebits , queues , idqueuebits , idqueues , switchtime , switchticks |
setrunqueue , remrunqueue ,
mi_switch , chooseproc , schedclock , resetpriority , updatepri , maybe_resched , cpu_switch , cpu_throw , need_resched , resched_wanted , clear_resched , aston , astoff , astpending , calcru , proc_compare |
vm86pcb_lock | “vm86pcb lock” | MTX_DEF |
vm86pcb |
vm86_bioscall |
Giant | “Giant” | MTX_DEF | MTX_RECURSE
|
nearly everything | lots |
callout_lock | “callout lock” | MTX_SPIN | MTX_RECURSE
|
callfree , callwheel , nextsoftcheck , proc .p_itcallout , proc .p_slpcallout , softticks , ticks |
These locks provide basic reader-writer type functionality and may be held by a sleeping process. Currently they are backed by lockmgr(9).
An atomically protected variable is a special variable that is not protected by an explicit lock. Instead, all data accesses to the variables use special atomic operations as described in atomic(9). Very few variables are treated this way, although other synchronization primitives such as mutexes are implemented with atomically protected variables.
mtx
.mtx_lock
Kernel Objects, or Kobj provides an object-oriented C programming system for the kernel. As such the data being operated on carries the description of how to operate on it. This allows operations to be added and removed from an interface at run time and without breaking binary compatibility.
A set of data - data structure - data allocation.
An operation - function.
One or more methods.
A standard set of one or more methods.
Kobj works by generating descriptions of methods. Each description holds a unique id as well as a default function. The description's address is used to uniquely identify the method within a class' method table.
A class is built by creating a method table associating one or more functions with method descriptions. Before use the class is compiled. The compilation allocates a cache and associates it with the class. A unique id is assigned to each method description within the method table of the class if not already done so by another referencing class compilation. For every method to be used a function is generated by script to qualify arguments and automatically reference the method description for a lookup. The generated function looks up the method by using the unique id associated with the method description as a hash into the cache associated with the object's class. If the method is not cached the generated function proceeds to use the class' table to find the method. If the method is found then the associated function within the class is used; otherwise, the default function associated with the method description is used.
These indirections can be visualized as the following:
object->cache<->class
struct kobj_method
void kobj_class_compile(kobj_class_t cls); void kobj_class_compile_static(kobj_class_t cls, kobj_ops_t ops); void kobj_class_free(kobj_class_t cls); kobj_t kobj_create(kobj_class_t cls, struct malloc_type *mtype, int mflags); void kobj_init(kobj_t obj, kobj_class_t cls); void kobj_delete(kobj_t obj, struct malloc_type *mtype);
The first step in using Kobj is to create an Interface. Creating the interface involves creating a template that the script src/sys/kern/makeobjops.pl can use to generate the header and code for the method declarations and method lookup functions.
Within this template the following keywords are used: #include, INTERFACE, CODE, METHOD, STATICMETHOD, and DEFAULT.
The #include statement and what follows it is copied verbatim to the head of the generated code file.
For example:
#include <sys/foo.h>
The INTERFACE keyword is used to define the interface name. This name is concatenated with each method name as [interface name]_[method name]. Its syntax is INTERFACE [interface name];.
For example:
INTERFACE foo;
The CODE keyword copies its arguments verbatim into the code file. Its syntax is CODE { [whatever] };
For example:
CODE { struct foo * foo_alloc_null(struct bar *) { return NULL; } };
The METHOD keyword describes a method. Its syntax is METHOD [return type] [method name] { [object [, arguments]] };
For example:
METHOD int bar { struct object *; struct foo *; struct bar; };
The DEFAULT keyword may follow the METHOD keyword. It extends the METHOD key word to include the default function for method. The extended syntax is METHOD [return type] [method name] { [object; [other arguments]] }DEFAULT [default function];
For example:
METHOD int bar { struct object *; struct foo *; int bar; } DEFAULT foo_hack;
The STATICMETHOD keyword is used like the METHOD keyword except the kobj data is not at the head of the object structure so casting to kobj_t would be incorrect. Instead STATICMETHOD relies on the Kobj data being referenced as 'ops'. This is also useful for calling methods directly out of a class's method table.
Other complete examples:
src/sys/kern/bus_if.m src/sys/kern/device_if.m
The second step in using Kobj is to create a class. A class consists of a name, a
table of methods, and the size of objects if Kobj's object handling facilities are used.
To create the class use the macro DEFINE_CLASS()
. To create
the method table create an array of kobj_method_t terminated by a NULL entry. Each
non-NULL entry may be created using the macro KOBJMETHOD()
.
For example:
DEFINE_CLASS(fooclass, foomethods, sizeof(struct foodata)); kobj_method_t foomethods[] = { KOBJMETHOD(bar_doo, foo_doo), KOBJMETHOD(bar_foo, foo_foo), { NULL, NULL} };
The class must be “compiled”. Depending on the state of the system at the
time that the class is to be initialized a statically allocated cache, “ops
table” have to be used. This can be accomplished by declaring a struct kobj_ops
and using kobj_class_compile_static();
otherwise, kobj_class_compile()
should be used.
The third step in using Kobj involves how to define the object. Kobj object creation
routines assume that Kobj data is at the head of an object. If this in not appropriate
you will have to allocate the object yourself and then use kobj_init()
on the Kobj portion of it; otherwise, you may use
kobj_create()
to allocate and initialize the Kobj portion
of the object automatically. kobj_init()
may also be used
to change the class that an object uses.
To integrate Kobj into the object you should use the macro KOBJ_FIELDS.
For example
struct foo_data { KOBJ_FIELDS; foo_foo; foo_bar; };
The last step in using Kobj is to simply use the generated functions to use the desired method within the object's class. This is as simple as using the interface name and the method name with a few modifications. The interface name should be concatenated with the method name using a '_' between them, all in upper case.
For example, if the interface name was foo and the method was bar then the call would be:
[return value = ] FOO_BAR(object [, other parameters]);
When an object allocated through kobj_create()
is no
longer needed kobj_delete()
may be called on it, and when a
class is no longer being used kobj_class_free()
may be
called on it.
On most UNIX® systems, root has omnipotent power. This promotes insecurity. If an attacker gained root on a system, he would have every function at his fingertips. In FreeBSD there are sysctls which dilute the power of root, in order to minimize the damage caused by an attacker. Specifically, one of these functions is called secure levels. Similarly, another function which is present from FreeBSD 4.0 and onward, is a utility called jail(8). Jail chroots an environment and sets certain restrictions on processes which are forked within the jail. For example, a jailed process cannot affect processes outside the jail, utilize certain system calls, or inflict any damage on the host environment.
Jail is becoming the new security model. People are running potentially vulnerable servers such as Apache, BIND, and sendmail within jails, so that if an attacker gains root within the jail, it is only an annoyance, and not a devastation. This article mainly focuses on the internals (source code) of jail. If you are looking for a how-to on setting up a jail, I suggest you look at my other article in Sys Admin Magazine, May 2001, entitled "Securing FreeBSD using Jail."
Jail consists of two realms: the userland program, jail(8), and the code implemented within the kernel: the jail(2) system call and associated restrictions. I will be discussing the userland program and then how jail is implemented within the kernel.
The source for the userland jail is located in /usr/src/usr.sbin/jail, consisting of one file, jail.c. The program takes these arguments: the path of the jail, hostname, IP address, and the command to be executed.
In jail.c, the first thing I would note is the declaration of an important structure struct jail j; which was included from /usr/include/sys/jail.h.
The definition of the jail structure is:
/usr/include/sys/jail.h: struct jail { u_int32_t version; char *path; char *hostname; u_int32_t ip_number; };
As you can see, there is an entry for each of the arguments passed to the jail(8) program, and indeed, they are set during its execution.
/usr/src/usr.sbin/jail/jail.c char path[PATH_MAX]; ... if (realpath(argv[0], path) == NULL) err(1, "realpath: %s", argv[0]); if (chdir(path) != 0) err(1, "chdir: %s", path); memset(&j, 0, sizeof(j)); j.version = 0; j.path = path; j.hostname = argv[1];
One of the arguments passed to the jail(8) program is an IP address with which the jail can be accessed over the network. jail(8) translates the IP address given into host byte order and then stores it in j (the jail structure).
/usr/src/usr.sbin/jail/jail.c: struct in_addr in; ... if (inet_aton(argv[2], &in) == 0) errx(1, "Could not make sense of ip-number: %s", argv[2]); j.ip_number = ntohl(in.s_addr);
The inet_aton(3) function "interprets the specified character string as an Internet address, placing the address into the structure provided." The ip_number member in the jail structure is set only when the IP address placed onto the in structure by inet_aton(3) is translated into host byte order by ntohl(3).
Finally, the userland program jails the process. Jail now becomes an imprisoned process itself and then executes the command given using execv(3).
/usr/src/usr.sbin/jail/jail.c i = jail(&j); ... if (execv(argv[3], argv + 3) != 0) err(1, "execv: %s", argv[3]);
As you can see, the jail() function is called, and its argument is the jail structure which has been filled with the arguments given to the program. Finally, the program you specify is executed. I will now discuss how jail is implemented within the kernel.
We will now be looking at the file /usr/src/sys/kern/kern_jail.c. This is the file where the jail(2) system call, appropriate sysctls, and networking functions are defined.
In kern_jail.c, the following sysctls are defined:
/usr/src/sys/kern/kern_jail.c: int jail_set_hostname_allowed = 1; SYSCTL_INT(_security_jail, OID_AUTO, set_hostname_allowed, CTLFLAG_RW, &jail_set_hostname_allowed, 0, "Processes in jail can set their hostnames"); int jail_socket_unixiproute_only = 1; SYSCTL_INT(_security_jail, OID_AUTO, socket_unixiproute_only, CTLFLAG_RW, &jail_socket_unixiproute_only, 0, "Processes in jail are limited to creating UNIX/IPv4/route sockets only"); int jail_sysvipc_allowed = 0; SYSCTL_INT(_security_jail, OID_AUTO, sysvipc_allowed, CTLFLAG_RW, &jail_sysvipc_allowed, 0, "Processes in jail can use System V IPC primitives"); static int jail_enforce_statfs = 2; SYSCTL_INT(_security_jail, OID_AUTO, enforce_statfs, CTLFLAG_RW, &jail_enforce_statfs, 0, "Processes in jail cannot see all mounted file systems"); int jail_allow_raw_sockets = 0; SYSCTL_INT(_security_jail, OID_AUTO, allow_raw_sockets, CTLFLAG_RW, &jail_allow_raw_sockets, 0, "Prison root can create raw sockets"); int jail_chflags_allowed = 0; SYSCTL_INT(_security_jail, OID_AUTO, chflags_allowed, CTLFLAG_RW, &jail_chflags_allowed, 0, "Processes in jail can alter system file flags"); int jail_mount_allowed = 0; SYSCTL_INT(_security_jail, OID_AUTO, mount_allowed, CTLFLAG_RW, &jail_mount_allowed, 0, "Processes in jail can mount/unmount jail-friendly file systems");
Each of these sysctls can be accessed by the user through the sysctl(8) program. Throughout the kernel, these specific sysctls are recognized by their name. For example, the name of the first sysctl is security.jail.set_hostname_allowed.
Like all system calls, the jail(2) system call takes two arguments, struct thread *td and struct jail_args *uap. td is a pointer to the thread structure which describes the calling thread. In this context, uap is a pointer to the structure in which a pointer to the jail structure passed by the userland jail.c is contained. When I described the userland program before, you saw that the jail(2) system call was given a jail structure as its own argument.
/usr/src/sys/kern/kern_jail.c: /* * struct jail_args { * struct jail *jail; * }; */ int jail(struct thread *td, struct jail_args *uap)
Therefore, uap->jail can be used to access the jail structure which was passed to the system call. Next, the system call copies the jail structure into kernel space using the copyin(9) function. copyin(9) takes three arguments: the address of the data which is to be copied into kernel space, uap->jail, where to store it, j and the size of the storage. The jail structure pointed by uap->jail is copied into kernel space and is stored in another jail structure, j.
/usr/src/sys/kern/kern_jail.c: error = copyin(uap->jail, &j, sizeof(j));
There is another important structure defined in jail.h. It is the prison structure. The prison structure is used exclusively within kernel space. Here is the definition of the prison structure.
/usr/include/sys/jail.h: struct prison { LIST_ENTRY(prison) pr_list; /* (a) all prisons */ int pr_id; /* (c) prison id */ int pr_ref; /* (p) refcount */ char pr_path[MAXPATHLEN]; /* (c) chroot path */ struct vnode *pr_root; /* (c) vnode to rdir */ char pr_host[MAXHOSTNAMELEN]; /* (p) jail hostname */ u_int32_t pr_ip; /* (c) ip addr host */ void *pr_linux; /* (p) linux abi */ int pr_securelevel; /* (p) securelevel */ struct task pr_task; /* (d) destroy task */ struct mtx pr_mtx; void **pr_slots; /* (p) additional data */ };
The jail(2) system call then allocates memory for a prison structure and copies data between the jail and prison structure.
/usr/src/sys/kern/kern_jail.c: MALLOC(pr, struct prison *, sizeof(*pr), M_PRISON, M_WAITOK | M_ZERO); ... error = copyinstr(j.path, &pr->pr_path, sizeof(pr->pr_path), 0); if (error) goto e_killmtx; ... error = copyinstr(j.hostname, &pr->pr_host, sizeof(pr->pr_host), 0); if (error) goto e_dropvnref; pr->pr_ip = j.ip_number;
Next, we will discuss another important system call jail_attach(2), which implements the function to put a process into the jail.
/usr/src/sys/kern/kern_jail.c: /* * struct jail_attach_args { * int jid; * }; */ int jail_attach(struct thread *td, struct jail_attach_args *uap)
This system call makes the changes that can distinguish a jailed process from those unjailed ones. To understand what jail_attach(2) does for us, certain background information is needed.
On FreeBSD, each kernel visible thread is identified by its thread structure, while the processes are described by their proc structures. You can find the definitions of the thread and proc structure in /usr/include/sys/proc.h. For example, the td argument in any system call is actually a pointer to the calling thread's thread structure, as stated before. The td_proc member in the thread structure pointed by td is a pointer to the proc structure which represents the process that contains the thread represented by td. The proc structure contains members which can describe the owner's identity(p_ucred), the process resource limits(p_limit), and so on. In the ucred structure pointed by p_ucred member in the proc structure, there is a pointer to the prison structure(cr_prison).
/usr/include/sys/proc.h: struct thread { ... struct proc *td_proc; ... }; struct proc { ... struct ucred *p_ucred; ... }; /usr/include/sys/ucred.h struct ucred { ... struct prison *cr_prison; ... };
In kern_jail.c, the function jail() then calls function jail_attach() with a given jid. And jail_attach() calls function change_root() to change the root directory of the calling process. The jail_attach() then creates a new ucred structure, and attaches the newly created ucred structure to the calling process after it has successfully attached the prison structure to the ucred structure. From then on, the calling process is recognized as jailed. When the kernel routine jailed() is called in the kernel with the newly created ucred structure as its argument, it returns 1 to tell that the credential is connected with a jail. The public ancestor process of all the process forked within the jail, is the process which runs jail(8), as it calls the jail(2) system call. When a program is executed through execve(2), it inherits the jailed property of its parent's ucred structure, therefore it has a jailed ucred structure.
/usr/src/sys/kern/kern_jail.c int jail(struct thread *td, struct jail_args *uap) { ... struct jail_attach_args jaa; ... error = jail_attach(td, &jaa); if (error) goto e_dropprref; ... } int jail_attach(struct thread *td, struct jail_attach_args *uap) { struct proc *p; struct ucred *newcred, *oldcred; struct prison *pr; ... p = td->td_proc; ... pr = prison_find(uap->jid); ... change_root(pr->pr_root, td); ... newcred->cr_prison = pr; p->p_ucred = newcred; ... }
When a process is forked from its parent process, the fork(2) system call uses crhold() to maintain the credential for the newly forked process. It inherently keep the newly forked child's credential consistent with its parent, so the child process is also jailed.
/usr/src/sys/kern/kern_fork.c: p2->p_ucred = crhold(td->td_ucred); ... td2->td_ucred = crhold(p2->p_ucred);
Throughout the kernel there are access restrictions relating to jailed processes. Usually, these restrictions only check whether the process is jailed, and if so, returns an error. For example:
if (jailed(td->td_ucred)) return (EPERM);
System V IPC is based on messages. Processes can send each other these messages which tell them how to act. The functions which deal with messages are: msgctl(3), msgget(3), msgsnd(3) and msgrcv(3). Earlier, I mentioned that there were certain sysctls you could turn on or off in order to affect the behavior of jail. One of these sysctls was security.jail.sysvipc_allowed. By default, this sysctl is set to 0. If it were set to 1, it would defeat the whole purpose of having a jail; privileged users from the jail would be able to affect processes outside the jailed environment. The difference between a message and a signal is that the message only consists of the signal number.
/usr/src/sys/kern/sysv_msg.c:
msgget(key, msgflg): msgget returns (and possibly creates) a message descriptor that designates a message queue for use in other functions.
msgctl(msgid, cmd, buf): Using this function, a process can query the status of a message descriptor.
msgsnd(msgid, msgp, msgsz, msgflg): msgsnd sends a message to a process.
msgrcv(msgid, msgp, msgsz, msgtyp, msgflg): a process receives messages using this function
In each of the system calls corresponding to these functions, there is this conditional:
/usr/src/sys/kern/sysv_msg.c: if (!jail_sysvipc_allowed && jailed(td->td_ucred)) return (ENOSYS);
Semaphore system calls allow processes to synchronize execution by doing a set of operations atomically on a set of semaphores. Basically semaphores provide another way for processes lock resources. However, process waiting on a semaphore, that is being used, will sleep until the resources are relinquished. The following semaphore system calls are blocked inside a jail: semget(2), semctl(2) and semop(2).
/usr/src/sys/kern/sysv_sem.c:
semctl(semid, semnum, cmd, ...): semctl does the specified cmd on the semaphore queue indicated by semid.
semget(key, nsems, flag): semget creates an array of semaphores, corresponding to key.
key and flag take on the same meaning as they do in msgget.
semop(semid, array, nops): semop performs a group of operations indicated by array, to the set of semaphores identified by semid.
System V IPC allows for processes to share memory. Processes can communicate directly with each other by sharing parts of their virtual address space and then reading and writing data stored in the shared memory. These system calls are blocked within a jailed environment: shmdt(2), shmat(2), shmctl(2) and shmget(2).
/usr/src/sys/kern/sysv_shm.c:
shmctl(shmid, cmd, buf): shmctl does various control operations on the shared memory region identified by shmid.
shmget(key, size, flag): shmget accesses or creates a shared memory region of size bytes.
shmat(shmid, addr, flag): shmat attaches a shared memory region identified by shmid to the address space of a process.
shmdt(addr): shmdt detaches the shared memory region previously attached at addr.
Jail treats the socket(2) system call and related lower-level socket functions in a special manner. In order to determine whether a certain socket is allowed to be created, it first checks to see if the sysctl security.jail.socket_unixiproute_only is set. If set, sockets are only allowed to be created if the family specified is either PF_LOCAL, PF_INET or PF_ROUTE. Otherwise, it returns an error.
/usr/src/sys/kern/uipc_socket.c: int socreate(int dom, struct socket **aso, int type, int proto, struct ucred *cred, struct thread *td) { struct protosw *prp; ... if (jailed(cred) && jail_socket_unixiproute_only && prp->pr_domain->dom_family != PF_LOCAL && prp->pr_domain->dom_family != PF_INET && prp->pr_domain->dom_family != PF_ROUTE) { return (EPROTONOSUPPORT); } ... }
The Berkeley Packet Filter provides a raw interface to data link layers in a protocol independent fashion. BPF is now controlled by the devfs(8) whether it can be used in a jailed environment.
There are certain protocols which are very common, such as TCP, UDP, IP and ICMP. IP and ICMP are on the same level: the network layer 2. There are certain precautions which are taken in order to prevent a jailed process from binding a protocol to a certain address only if the nam parameter is set. nam is a pointer to a sockaddr structure, which describes the address on which to bind the service. A more exact definition is that sockaddr "may be used as a template for referring to the identifying tag and length of each address". In the function in_pcbbind_setup(), sin is a pointer to a sockaddr_in structure, which contains the port, address, length and domain family of the socket which is to be bound. Basically, this disallows any processes from jail to be able to specify the address that doesn't belong to the jail in which the calling process exists.
/usr/src/sys/netinet/in_pcb.c: int in_pcbbind_setup(struct inpcb *inp, struct sockaddr *nam, in_addr_t *laddrp, u_short *lportp, struct ucred *cred) { ... struct sockaddr_in *sin; ... if (nam) { sin = (struct sockaddr_in *)nam; ... if (sin->sin_addr.s_addr != INADDR_ANY) if (prison_ip(cred, 0, &sin->sin_addr.s_addr)) return(EINVAL); ... if (lport) { ... if (prison && prison_ip(cred, 0, &sin->sin_addr.s_addr)) return (EADDRNOTAVAIL); ... } } if (lport == 0) { ... if (laddr.s_addr != INADDR_ANY) if (prison_ip(cred, 0, &laddr.s_addr)) return (EINVAL); ... } ... if (prison_ip(cred, 0, &laddr.s_addr)) return (EINVAL); ... }
You might be wondering what function prison_ip() does. prison_ip() is given three arguments, a pointer to the credential(represented by cred), any flags, and an IP address. It returns 1 if the IP address does NOT belong to the jail or 0 otherwise. As you can see from the code, if it is indeed an IP address not belonging to the jail, the protocol is not allowed to bind to that address.
/usr/src/sys/kern/kern_jail.c: int prison_ip(struct ucred *cred, int flag, u_int32_t *ip) { u_int32_t tmp; if (!jailed(cred)) return (0); if (flag) tmp = *ip; else tmp = ntohl(*ip); if (tmp == INADDR_ANY) { if (flag) *ip = cred->cr_prison->pr_ip; else *ip = htonl(cred->cr_prison->pr_ip); return (0); } if (tmp == INADDR_LOOPBACK) { if (flag) *ip = cred->cr_prison->pr_ip; else *ip = htonl(cred->cr_prison->pr_ip); return (0); } if (cred->cr_prison->pr_ip != tmp) return (1); return (0); }
Even root users within the jail are not allowed to unset or modify any file flags, such as immutable, append-only, and undeleteable flags, if the securelevel is greater than 0.
/usr/src/sys/ufs/ufs/ufs_vnops.c: static int ufs_setattr(ap) ... { ... if (!priv_check_cred(cred, PRIV_VFS_SYSFLAGS, 0)) { if (ip->i_flags & (SF_NOUNLINK | SF_IMMUTABLE | SF_APPEND)) { error = securelevel_gt(cred, 0); if (error) return (error); } ... } } /usr/src/sys/kern/kern_priv.c int priv_check_cred(struct ucred *cred, int priv, int flags) { ... error = prison_priv_check(cred, priv); if (error) return (error); ... } /usr/src/sys/kern/kern_jail.c int prison_priv_check(struct ucred *cred, int priv) { ... switch (priv) { ... case PRIV_VFS_SYSFLAGS: if (jail_chflags_allowed) return (0); else return (EPERM); ... } ... }
SYSINIT is the framework for a generic call sort and dispatch mechanism. FreeBSD currently uses it for the dynamic initialization of the kernel. SYSINIT allows FreeBSD's kernel subsystems to be reordered, and added, removed, and replaced at kernel link time when the kernel or one of its modules is loaded without having to edit a statically ordered initialization routing and recompile the kernel. This system also allows kernel modules, currently called KLD's, to be separately compiled, linked, and initialized at boot time and loaded even later while the system is already running. This is accomplished using the “kernel linker” and “linker sets”.
A linker technique in which the linker gathers statically declared data throughout a program's source files into a single contiguously addressable unit of data.
SYSINIT relies on the ability of the linker to take static data declared at multiple locations throughout a program's source and group it together as a single contiguous chunk of data. This linker technique is called a “linker set”. SYSINIT uses two linker sets to maintain two data sets containing each consumer's call order, function, and a pointer to the data to pass to that function.
SYSINIT uses two priorities when ordering the functions for execution. The first priority is a subsystem ID giving an overall order for SYSINIT's dispatch of functions. Current predeclared ID's are in <sys/kernel.h> in the enum list sysinit_sub_id. The second priority used is an element order within the subsystem. Current predeclared subsystem element orders are in <sys/kernel.h> in the enum list sysinit_elem_order.
There are currently two uses for SYSINIT. Function dispatch at system startup and kernel module loads, and function dispatch at system shutdown and kernel module unload. Kernel subsystems often use system startup SYSINIT's to initialize data structures, for example the process scheduling subsystem uses a SYSINIT to initialize the run queue data structure. Device drivers should avoid using SYSINIT() directly. Instead drivers for real devices that are part of a bus structure should use DRIVER_MODULE() to provide a function that detects the device and, if it is present, initializes the device. It will do a few things specific to devices and then call SYSINIT() itself. For pseudo-devices, which are not part of a bus structure, use DEV_MODULE().
<sys/kernel.h>
SYSINIT(uniquifier, subsystem, order, func, ident) SYSUNINIT(uniquifier, subsystem, order, func, ident)
The SYSINIT() macro creates the necessary SYSINIT data in SYSINIT's startup data set for SYSINIT to sort and dispatch a function at system startup and module load. SYSINIT() takes a uniquifier that SYSINIT uses to identify the particular function dispatch data, the subsystem order, the subsystem element order, the function to call, and the data to pass the function. All functions must take a constant pointer argument.
Example 5-1. Example of a SYSINIT()
#include <sys/kernel.h> void foo_null(void *unused) { foo_doo(); } SYSINIT(foo, SI_SUB_FOO, SI_ORDER_FOO, foo_null, NULL); struct foo foo_voodoo = { FOO_VOODOO; } void foo_arg(void *vdata) { struct foo *foo = (struct foo *)vdata; foo_data(foo); } SYSINIT(bar, SI_SUB_FOO, SI_ORDER_FOO, foo_arg, &foo_voodoo);
Note that SI_SUB_FOO and SI_ORDER_FOO need to be in the sysinit_sub_id and sysinit_elem_order enum's as mentioned above. Either use existing ones or add your own to the enum's. You can also use math for fine-tuning the order a SYSINIT will run in. This example shows a SYSINIT that needs to be run just barely before the SYSINIT's that handle tuning kernel parameters.
The SYSUNINIT() macro behaves similarly to the SYSINIT() macro except that it adds the SYSINIT data to SYSINIT's shutdown data set.
Example 5-3. Example of a SYSUNINIT()
#include <sys/kernel.h> void foo_cleanup(void *unused) { foo_kill(); } SYSUNINIT(foobar, SI_SUB_FOO, SI_ORDER_FOO, foo_cleanup, NULL); struct foo_stack foo_stack = { FOO_STACK_VOODOO; } void foo_flush(void *vdata) { } SYSUNINIT(barfoo, SI_SUB_FOO, SI_ORDER_FOO, foo_flush, &foo_stack);
This documentation was developed for the FreeBSD Project by Chris Costello at Safeport Network Services and Network Associates Laboratories, the Security Research Division of Network Associates, Inc. under DARPA/SPAWAR contract N66001-01-C-8035 (“CBOSS”), as part of the DARPA CHATS research program.
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FreeBSD includes experimental support for several mandatory access control policies, as well as a framework for kernel security extensibility, the TrustedBSD MAC Framework. The MAC Framework is a pluggable access control framework, permitting new security policies to be easily linked into the kernel, loaded at boot, or loaded dynamically at run-time. The framework provides a variety of features to make it easier to implement new security policies, including the ability to easily tag security labels (such as confidentiality information) onto system objects.
This chapter introduces the MAC policy framework and provides documentation for a sample MAC policy module.
The TrustedBSD MAC framework provides a mechanism to allow the compile-time or run-time extension of the kernel access control model. New system policies may be implemented as kernel modules and linked to the kernel; if multiple policy modules are present, their results will be composed. The MAC Framework provides a variety of access control infrastructure services to assist policy writers, including support for transient and persistent policy-agnostic object security labels. This support is currently considered experimental.
This chapter provides information appropriate for developers of policy modules, as well as potential consumers of MAC-enabled environments, to learn about how the MAC Framework supports access control extension of the kernel.
Mandatory Access Control (MAC), refers to a set of access control policies that are mandatorily enforced on users by the operating system. MAC policies may be contrasted with Discretionary Access Control (DAC) protections, by which non-administrative users may (at their discretion) protect objects. In traditional UNIX systems, DAC protections include file permissions and access control lists; MAC protections include process controls preventing inter-user debugging and firewalls. A variety of MAC policies have been formulated by operating system designers and security researches, including the Multi-Level Security (MLS) confidentiality policy, the Biba integrity policy, Role-Based Access Control (RBAC), Domain and Type Enforcement (DTE), and Type Enforcement (TE). Each model bases decisions on a variety of factors, including user identity, role, and security clearance, as well as security labels on objects representing concepts such as data sensitivity and integrity.
The TrustedBSD MAC Framework is capable of supporting policy modules that implement all of these policies, as well as a broad class of system hardening policies, which may use existing security attributes, such as user and group IDs, as well as extended attributes on files, and other system properties. In addition, despite the name, the MAC Framework can also be used to implement purely discretionary policies, as policy modules are given substantial flexibility in how they authorize protections.
The TrustedBSD MAC Framework permits kernel modules to extend the operating system security policy, as well as providing infrastructure functionality required by many access control modules. If multiple policies are simultaneously loaded, the MAC Framework will usefully (for some definition of useful) compose the results of the policies.
The MAC Framework contains a number of kernel elements:
Framework management interfaces
Concurrency and synchronization primitives.
Policy registration
Extensible security label for kernel objects
Policy entry point composition operators
Label management primitives
Entry point API invoked by kernel services
Entry point API to policy modules
Entry points implementations (policy life cycle, object life cycle/label management, access control checks).
Policy-agnostic label-management system calls
mac_syscall()
multiplex system call
Various security policies implemented as MAC policy modules
The TrustedBSD MAC Framework may be directly managed using sysctl's, loader tunables, and system calls.
In most cases, sysctl's and loader tunables of the same name modify the same parameters, and control behavior such as enforcement of protections relating to various kernel subsystems. In addition, if MAC debugging support is compiled into the kernel, several counters will be maintained tracking label allocation. It is generally advisable that per-subsystem enforcement controls not be used to control policy behavior in production environments, as they broadly impact the operation of all active policies. Instead, per-policy controls should be preferred, as they provide greater granularity and greater operational consistency for policy modules.
Loading and unloading of policy modules is performed using the system module management system calls and other system interfaces, including boot loader variables; policy modules will have the opportunity to influence load and unload events, including preventing undesired unloading of the policy.
As the set of active policies may change at run-time, and the invocation of entry points is non-atomic, synchronization is required to prevent loading or unloading of policies while an entry point invocation is in progress, freezing the set of active policies for the duration. This is accomplished by means of a framework busy count: whenever an entry point is entered, the busy count is incremented; whenever it is exited, the busy count is decremented. While the busy count is elevated, policy list changes are not permitted, and threads attempting to modify the policy list will sleep until the list is not busy. The busy count is protected by a mutex, and a condition variable is used to wake up sleepers waiting on policy list modifications. One side effect of this synchronization model is that recursion into the MAC Framework from within a policy module is permitted, although not generally used.
Various optimizations are used to reduce the overhead of the busy count, including avoiding the full cost of incrementing and decrementing if the list is empty or contains only static entries (policies that are loaded before the system starts, and cannot be unloaded). A compile-time option is also provided which prevents any change in the set of loaded policies at run-time, which eliminates the mutex locking costs associated with supporting dynamically loaded and unloaded policies as synchronization is no longer required.
As the MAC Framework is not permitted to block in some entry points, a normal sleep lock cannot be used; as a result, it is possible for the load or unload attempt to block for a substantial period of time waiting for the framework to become idle.
As kernel objects of interest may generally be accessed from more than one thread at a time, and simultaneous entry of more than one thread into the MAC Framework is permitted, security attribute storage maintained by the MAC Framework is carefully synchronized. In general, existing kernel synchronization on kernel object data is used to protect MAC Framework security labels on the object: for example, MAC labels on sockets are protected using the existing socket mutex. Likewise, semantics for concurrent access are generally identical to those of the container objects: for credentials, copy-on-write semantics are maintained for label contents as with the remainder of the credential structure. The MAC Framework asserts necessary locks on objects when invoked with an object reference. Policy authors must be aware of these synchronization semantics, as they will sometimes limit the types of accesses permitted on labels: for example, when a read-only reference to a credential is passed to a policy via an entry point, only read operations are permitted on the label state attached to the credential.
Policy modules must be written to assume that many kernel threads may simultaneously enter one more policy entry points due to the parallel and preemptive nature of the FreeBSD kernel. If the policy module makes use of mutable state, this may require the use of synchronization primitives within the policy to prevent inconsistent views on that state resulting in incorrect operation of the policy. Policies will generally be able to make use of existing FreeBSD synchronization primitives for this purpose, including mutexes, sleep locks, condition variables, and counting semaphores. However, policies should be written to employ these primitives carefully, respecting existing kernel lock orders, and recognizing that some entry points are not permitted to sleep, limiting the use of primitives in those entry points to mutexes and wakeup operations.
When policy modules call out to other kernel subsystems, they will generally need to release any in-policy locks in order to avoid violating the kernel lock order or risking lock recursion. This will maintain policy locks as leaf locks in the global lock order, helping to avoid deadlock.
The MAC Framework maintains two lists of active policies: a static list, and a dynamic list. The lists differ only with regards to their locking semantics: an elevated reference count is not required to make use of the static list. When kernel modules containing MAC Framework policies are loaded, the policy module will use SYSINIT to invoke a registration function; when a policy module is unloaded, SYSINIT will likewise invoke a de-registration function. Registration may fail if a policy module is loaded more than once, if insufficient resources are available for the registration (for example, the policy might require labeling and insufficient labeling state might be available), or other policy prerequisites might not be met (some policies may only be loaded prior to boot). Likewise, de-registration may fail if a policy is flagged as not unloadable.
Kernel services interact with the MAC Framework in two ways: they invoke a series of APIs to notify the framework of relevant events, and they provide a policy-agnostic label structure pointer in security-relevant objects. The label pointer is maintained by the MAC Framework via label management entry points, and permits the Framework to offer a labeling service to policy modules through relatively non-invasive changes to the kernel subsystem maintaining the object. For example, label pointers have been added to processes, process credentials, sockets, pipes, vnodes, Mbufs, network interfaces, IP reassembly queues, and a variety of other security-relevant structures. Kernel services also invoke the MAC Framework when they perform important security decisions, permitting policy modules to augment those decisions based on their own criteria (possibly including data stored in security labels). Most of these security critical decisions will be explicit access control checks; however, some affect more general decision functions such as packet matching for sockets and label transition at program execution.
When more than one policy module is loaded into the kernel at a time, the results of the policy modules will be composed by the framework using a composition operator. This operator is currently hard-coded, and requires that all active policies must approve a request for it to return success. As policies may return a variety of error conditions (success, access denied, object does not exist, ...), a precedence operator selects the resulting error from the set of errors returned by policies. In general, errors indicating that an object does not exist will be preferred to errors indicating that access to an object is denied. While it is not guaranteed that the resulting composition will be useful or secure, we have found that it is for many useful selections of policies. For example, traditional trusted systems often ship with two or more policies using a similar composition.
As many interesting access control extensions rely on security labels on objects, the MAC Framework provides a set of policy-agnostic label management system calls covering a variety of user-exposed objects. Common label types include partition identifiers, sensitivity labels, integrity labels, compartments, domains, roles, and types. By policy agnostic, we mean that policy modules are able to completely define the semantics of meta-data associated with an object. Policy modules participate in the internalization and externalization of string-based labels provides by user applications, and can expose multiple label elements to applications if desired.
In-memory labels are stored in slab-allocated struct
label
, which consists of a fixed-length array of unions, each holding a void * pointer and a long. Policies
registering for label storage will be assigned a "slot" identifier, which may be used to
dereference the label storage. The semantics of the storage are left entirely up to the
policy module: modules are provided with a variety of entry points associated with the
kernel object life cycle, including initialization, association/creation, and
destruction. Using these interfaces, it is possible to implement reference counting and
other storage models. Direct access to the object structure is generally not required by
policy modules to retrieve a label, as the MAC Framework generally passes both a pointer
to the object and a direct pointer to the object's label into entry points. The primary
exception to this rule is the process credential, which must be manually dereferenced to
access the credential label. This may change in future revisions of the MAC
Framework.
Initialization entry points frequently include a sleeping disposition flag indicating whether or not an initialization is permitted to sleep; if sleeping is not permitted, a failure may be returned to cancel allocation of the label (and hence object). This may occur, for example, in the network stack during interrupt handling, where sleeping is not permitted, or while the caller holds a mutex. Due to the performance cost of maintaining labels on in-flight network packets (Mbufs), policies must specifically declare a requirement that Mbuf labels be allocated. Dynamically loaded policies making use of labels must be able to handle the case where their init function has not been called on an object, as objects may already exist when the policy is loaded. The MAC Framework guarantees that uninitialized label slots will hold a 0 or NULL value, which policies may use to detect uninitialized values. However, as allocation of Mbuf labels is conditional, policies must also be able to handle a NULL label pointer for Mbufs if they have been loaded dynamically.
In the case of file system labels, special support is provided for the persistent storage of security labels in extended attributes. Where available, extended attribute transactions are used to permit consistent compound updates of security labels on vnodes--currently this support is present only in the UFS2 file system. Policy authors may choose to implement multilabel file system object labels using one (or more) extended attributes. For efficiency reasons, the vnode label (v_label) is a cache of any on-disk label; policies are able to load values into the cache when the vnode is instantiated, and update the cache as needed. As a result, the extended attribute need not be directly accessed with every access control check.
Note: Currently, if a labeled policy permits dynamic unloading, its state slot cannot be reclaimed, which places a strict (and relatively low) bound on the number of unload-reload operations for labeled policies.
The MAC Framework implements a number of system calls: most of these calls support the policy-agnostic label retrieval and manipulation APIs exposed to user applications.
The label management calls accept a label description structure, struct mac
, which contains a series of MAC label elements. Each
element contains a character string name, and character string value. Each policy will be
given the chance to claim a particular element name, permitting policies to expose
multiple independent elements if desired. Policy modules perform the internalization and
externalization between kernel labels and user-provided labels via entry points,
permitting a variety of semantics. Label management system calls are generally wrapped by
user library functions to perform memory allocation and error handling, simplifying user
applications that must manage labels.
The following MAC-related system calls are present in the FreeBSD kernel:
mac_get_proc()
may be used to retrieve the label of the
current process.
mac_set_proc()
may be used to request a change in the
label of the current process.
mac_get_fd()
may be used to retrieve the label of an
object (file, socket, pipe, ...) referenced by a file descriptor.
mac_get_file()
may be used to retrieve the label of an
object referenced by a file system path.
mac_set_fd()
may be used to request a change in the
label of an object (file, socket, pipe, ...) referenced by a file descriptor.
mac_set_file()
may be used to request a change in the
label of an object referenced by a file system path.
mac_syscall()
permits policy modules to create new
system calls without modifying the system call table; it accepts a target policy name,
operation number, and opaque argument for use by the policy.
mac_get_pid()
may be used to request the label of
another process by process id.
mac_get_link()
is identical to mac_get_file()
, only it will not follow a symbolic link if it is
the final entry in the path, so may be used to retrieve the label on a symlink.
mac_set_link()
is identical to mac_set_file()
, only it will not follow a symbolic link if it is
the final entry in a path, so may be used to manipulate the label on a symlink.
mac_execve()
is identical to the execve()
system call, only it also accepts a requested label to
set the process label to when beginning execution of a new program. This change in label
on execution is referred to as a "transition".
mac_get_peer()
, actually implemented via a socket
option, retrieves the label of a remote peer on a socket, if available.
In addition to these system calls, the SIOCSIGMAC and SIOCSIFMAC network interface ioctls permit the labels on network interfaces to be retrieved and set.
Security policies are either linked directly into the kernel, or compiled into loadable kernel modules that may be loaded at boot, or dynamically using the module loading system calls at runtime. Policy modules interact with the system through a set of declared entry points, providing access to a stream of system events and permitting the policy to influence access control decisions. Each policy contains a number of elements:
Optional configuration parameters for policy.
Centralized implementation of the policy logic and parameters.
Optional implementation of policy life cycle events, such as initialization and destruction.
Optional support for initializing, maintaining, and destroying labels on selected kernel objects.
Optional support for user process inspection and modification of labels on selected objects.
Implementation of selected access control entry points that are of interest to the policy.
Declaration of policy identity, module entry points, and policy properties.
Modules may be declared using the MAC_POLICY_SET()
macro, which names the policy, provides a reference to the MAC entry point vector,
provides load-time flags determining how the policy framework should handle the policy,
and optionally requests the allocation of label state by the framework.
static struct mac_policy_ops mac_policy_ops = { .mpo_destroy = mac_policy_destroy, .mpo_init = mac_policy_init, .mpo_init_bpfdesc_label = mac_policy_init_bpfdesc_label, .mpo_init_cred_label = mac_policy_init_label, /* ... */ .mpo_check_vnode_setutimes = mac_policy_check_vnode_setutimes, .mpo_check_vnode_stat = mac_policy_check_vnode_stat, .mpo_check_vnode_write = mac_policy_check_vnode_write, };
The MAC policy entry point vector, mac_policy_ops
in this example, associates functions
defined in the module with specific entry points. A complete listing of available entry
points and their prototypes may be found in the MAC entry point reference section. Of
specific interest during module registration are the .mpo_destroy
and .mpo_init
entry
points. .mpo_init
will be invoked once a policy is
successfully registered with the module framework but prior to any other entry points
becoming active. This permits the policy to perform any policy-specific allocation and
initialization, such as initialization of any data or locks. .mpo_destroy
will be invoked when a policy module is unloaded to
permit releasing of any allocated memory and destruction of locks. Currently, these two
entry points are invoked with the MAC policy list mutex held to prevent any other entry
points from being invoked: this will be changed, but in the mean time, policies should be
careful about what kernel primitives they invoke so as to avoid lock ordering or sleeping
problems.
The policy declaration's module name field exists so that the module may be uniquely identified for the purposes of module dependencies. An appropriate string should be selected. The full string name of the policy is displayed to the user via the kernel log during load and unload events, and also exported when providing status information to userland processes.
The policy declaration flags field permits the module to provide the framework with information about its capabilities at the time the module is loaded. Currently, three flags are defined:
This flag indicates that the policy module may be unloaded. If this flag is not provided, then the policy framework will reject requests to unload the module. This flag might be used by modules that allocate label state and are unable to free that state at runtime.
This flag indicates that the policy module must be loaded and initialized early in the boot process. If the flag is specified, attempts to register the module following boot will be rejected. The flag may be used by policies that require pervasive labeling of all system objects, and cannot handle objects that have not been properly initialized by the policy.
This flag indicates that the policy module requires labeling of Mbufs, and that memory should always be allocated for the storage of Mbuf labels. By default, the MAC Framework will not allocate label storage for Mbufs unless at least one loaded policy has this flag set. This measurably improves network performance when policies do not require Mbuf labeling. A kernel option, MAC_ALWAYS_LABEL_MBUF, exists to force the MAC Framework to allocate Mbuf label storage regardless of the setting of this flag, and may be useful in some environments.
Note: Policies using the MPC_LOADTIME_FLAG_LABELMBUFS without the MPC_LOADTIME_FLAG_NOTLATE flag set must be able to correctly handle NULL Mbuf label pointers passed into entry points. This is necessary as in-flight Mbufs without label storage may persist after a policy enabling Mbuf labeling has been loaded. If a policy is loaded before the network subsystem is active (i.e., the policy is not being loaded late), then all Mbufs are guaranteed to have label storage.
Four classes of entry points are offered to policies registered with the framework:
entry points associated with the registration and management of policies, entry points
denoting initialization, creation, destruction, and other life cycle events for kernel
objects, events associated with access control decisions that the policy module may
influence, and calls associated with the management of labels on objects. In addition, a
mac_syscall()
entry point is provided so that policies may
extend the kernel interface without registering new system calls.
Policy module writers should be aware of the kernel locking strategy, as well as what object locks are available during which entry points. Writers should attempt to avoid deadlock scenarios by avoiding grabbing non-leaf locks inside of entry points, and also follow the locking protocol for object access and modification. In particular, writers should be aware that while necessary locks to access objects and their labels are generally held, sufficient locks to modify an object or its label may not be present for all entry points. Locking information for arguments is documented in the MAC framework entry point document.
Policy entry points will pass a reference to the object label along with the object itself. This permits labeled policies to be unaware of the internals of the object yet still make decisions based on the label. The exception to this is the process credential, which is assumed to be understood by policies as a first class security object in the kernel.
mpo_init
Policy load event. The policy list mutex is held, so sleep operations cannot be performed, and calls out to other kernel subsystems must be made with caution. If potentially sleeping memory allocations are required during policy initialization, they should be made using a separate module SYSINIT().
mpo_syscall
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
td |
Calling thread | |
call |
Policy-specific syscall number | |
arg |
Pointer to syscall arguments |
This entry point provides a policy-multiplexed system call so that policies may provide additional services to user processes without registering specific system calls. The policy name provided during registration is used to demux calls from userland, and the arguments will be forwarded to this entry point. When implementing new services, security modules should be sure to invoke appropriate access control checks from the MAC framework as needed. For example, if a policy implements an augmented signal functionality, it should call the necessary signal access control checks to invoke the MAC framework and other registered policies.
Note: Modules must currently perform the
copyin()
of the syscall data on their own.
mpo_thread_userret
This entry point permits policy modules to perform MAC-related events when a thread returns to user space, via a system call return, trap return, or otherwise. This is required for policies that have floating process labels, as it is not always possible to acquire the process lock at arbitrary points in the stack during system call processing; process labels might represent traditional authentication data, process history information, or other data. To employ this mechanism, intended changes to the process credential label may be stored in the p_label protected by a per-policy spin lock, and then set the per-thread TDF_ASTPENDING flag and per-process PS_MACPENDM flag to schedule a call to the userret entry point. From this entry point, the policy may create a replacement credential with less concern about the locking context. Policy writers are cautioned that event ordering relating to scheduling an AST and the AST being performed may be complex and interlaced in multithreaded applications.
mpo_init_bpfdesc_label
Initialize the label on a newly instantiated bpfdesc (BPF descriptor). Sleeping is permitted.
mpo_init_cred_label
Initialize the label for a newly instantiated user credential. Sleeping is permitted.
mpo_init_devfsdirent_label
Initialize the label on a newly instantiated devfs entry. Sleeping is permitted.
mpo_init_ifnet_label
Initialize the label on a newly instantiated network interface. Sleeping is permitted.
mpo_init_ipq_label
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
label |
New label to apply | |
flag |
Sleeping/non-sleeping malloc(9); see below |
Initialize the label on a newly instantiated IP fragment reassembly queue. The flag
field may be one of M_WAITOK
and M_NOWAIT
, and should be employed to avoid performing a
sleeping malloc(9) during this
initialization call. IP fragment reassembly queue allocation frequently occurs in
performance sensitive environments, and the implementation should be careful to avoid
sleeping or long-lived operations. This entry point is permitted to fail resulting in the
failure to allocate the IP fragment reassembly queue.
mpo_init_mbuf_label
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
flag |
Sleeping/non-sleeping malloc(9); see below | |
label |
Policy label to initialize |
Initialize the label on a newly instantiated mbuf packet header (mbuf
). The flag
field may be one
of M_WAITOK
and M_NOWAIT
, and
should be employed to avoid performing a sleeping malloc(9) during this
initialization call. Mbuf allocation frequently occurs in performance sensitive
environments, and the implementation should be careful to avoid sleeping or long-lived
operations. This entry point is permitted to fail resulting in the failure to allocate
the mbuf header.
mpo_init_mount_label
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
mntlabel |
Policy label to be initialized for the mount itself | |
fslabel |
Policy label to be initialized for the file system |
Initialize the labels on a newly instantiated mount point. Sleeping is permitted.
mpo_init_mount_fs_label
Initialize the label on a newly mounted file system. Sleeping is permitted
mpo_init_pipe_label
Initialize a label for a newly instantiated pipe. Sleeping is permitted.
mpo_init_socket_label
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
label |
New label to initialize | |
flag |
malloc(9) flags |
Initialize a label for a newly instantiated socket. The flag
field may be one of M_WAITOK
and M_NOWAIT
, and should be employed to avoid performing a
sleeping malloc(9) during this
initialization call.
mpo_init_socket_peer_label
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
label |
New label to initialize | |
flag |
malloc(9) flags |
Initialize the peer label for a newly instantiated socket. The flag
field may be one of M_WAITOK
and M_NOWAIT
, and should be employed to avoid performing a
sleeping malloc(9) during this
initialization call.
mpo_init_proc_label
Initialize the label for a newly instantiated process. Sleeping is permitted.
mpo_init_vnode_label
Initialize the label on a newly instantiated vnode. Sleeping is permitted.
mpo_destroy_bpfdesc_label
Destroy the label on a BPF descriptor. In this entry point a policy should free any
internal storage associated with label
so that it may be
destroyed.
mpo_destroy_cred_label
Destroy the label on a credential. In this entry point, a policy module should free
any internal storage associated with label
so that it may
be destroyed.
mpo_destroy_devfsdirent_label
Destroy the label on a devfs entry. In this entry point, a policy module should free
any internal storage associated with label
so that it may
be destroyed.
mpo_destroy_ifnet_label
Destroy the label on a removed interface. In this entry point, a policy module should
free any internal storage associated with label
so that it
may be destroyed.
mpo_destroy_ipq_label
Destroy the label on an IP fragment queue. In this entry point, a policy module should
free any internal storage associated with label
so that it
may be destroyed.
mpo_destroy_mbuf_label
Destroy the label on an mbuf header. In this entry point, a policy module should free
any internal storage associated with label
so that it may
be destroyed.
mpo_destroy_mount_label
Destroy the labels on a mount point. In this entry point, a policy module should free
the internal storage associated with mntlabel
so that they
may be destroyed.
mpo_destroy_mount_label
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
mntlabel |
Mount point label being destroyed | |
fslabel |
File system label being destroyed> |
Destroy the labels on a mount point. In this entry point, a policy module should free
the internal storage associated with mntlabel
and fslabel
so that they may be destroyed.
mpo_destroy_socket_label
Destroy the label on a socket. In this entry point, a policy module should free any
internal storage associated with label
so that it may be
destroyed.
mpo_destroy_socket_peer_label
Destroy the peer label on a socket. In this entry point, a policy module should free
any internal storage associated with label
so that it may
be destroyed.
mpo_destroy_pipe_label
Destroy the label on a pipe. In this entry point, a policy module should free any
internal storage associated with label
so that it may be
destroyed.
mpo_destroy_proc_label
Destroy the label on a process. In this entry point, a policy module should free any
internal storage associated with label
so that it may be
destroyed.
mpo_destroy_vnode_label
Destroy the label on a vnode. In this entry point, a policy module should free any
internal storage associated with label
so that it may be
destroyed.
mpo_externalize_cred_label
int mpo_externalize_cred_label
(struct label *label,
char *element_name, struct sbuf *sb, int *claimed);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
label |
Label to be externalized | |
element_name |
Name of the policy whose label should be externalized | |
sb |
String buffer to be filled with a text representation of label | |
claimed |
Should be incremented when element_data can be filled
in. |
Produce an externalized label based on the label structure passed. An externalized
label consists of a text representation of the label contents that can be used with
userland applications and read by the user. Currently, all policies' externalize
entry points will be called, so the implementation
should check the contents of element_name
before
attempting to fill in sb
. If element_name
does not match the name of your policy, simply
return 0. Only return nonzero if an error occurs while
externalizing the label data. Once the policy fills in element_data
, *claimed
should be
incremented.
mpo_externalize_ifnet_label
int mpo_externalize_ifnet_label
(struct label
*label, char *element_name, struct sbuf *sb, int *claimed);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
label |
Label to be externalized | |
element_name |
Name of the policy whose label should be externalized | |
sb |
String buffer to be filled with a text representation of label | |
claimed |
Should be incremented when element_data can be filled
in. |
Produce an externalized label based on the label structure passed. An externalized
label consists of a text representation of the label contents that can be used with
userland applications and read by the user. Currently, all policies' externalize
entry points will be called, so the implementation
should check the contents of element_name
before
attempting to fill in sb
. If element_name
does not match the name of your policy, simply
return 0. Only return nonzero if an error occurs while
externalizing the label data. Once the policy fills in element_data
, *claimed
should be
incremented.
mpo_externalize_pipe_label
int mpo_externalize_pipe_label
(struct label *label,
char *element_name, struct sbuf *sb, int *claimed);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
label |
Label to be externalized | |
element_name |
Name of the policy whose label should be externalized | |
sb |
String buffer to be filled with a text representation of label | |
claimed |
Should be incremented when element_data can be filled
in. |
Produce an externalized label based on the label structure passed. An externalized
label consists of a text representation of the label contents that can be used with
userland applications and read by the user. Currently, all policies' externalize
entry points will be called, so the implementation
should check the contents of element_name
before
attempting to fill in sb
. If element_name
does not match the name of your policy, simply
return 0. Only return nonzero if an error occurs while
externalizing the label data. Once the policy fills in element_data
, *claimed
should be
incremented.
mpo_externalize_socket_label
int mpo_externalize_socket_label
(struct label
*label, char *element_name, struct sbuf *sb, int *claimed);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
label |
Label to be externalized | |
element_name |
Name of the policy whose label should be externalized | |
sb |
String buffer to be filled with a text representation of label | |
claimed |
Should be incremented when element_data can be filled
in. |
Produce an externalized label based on the label structure passed. An externalized
label consists of a text representation of the label contents that can be used with
userland applications and read by the user. Currently, all policies' externalize
entry points will be called, so the implementation
should check the contents of element_name
before
attempting to fill in sb
. If element_name
does not match the name of your policy, simply
return 0. Only return nonzero if an error occurs while
externalizing the label data. Once the policy fills in element_data
, *claimed
should be
incremented.
mpo_externalize_socket_peer_label
int mpo_externalize_socket_peer_label
(struct label
*label, char *element_name, struct sbuf *sb, int *claimed);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
label |
Label to be externalized | |
element_name |
Name of the policy whose label should be externalized | |
sb |
String buffer to be filled with a text representation of label | |
claimed |
Should be incremented when element_data can be filled
in. |
Produce an externalized label based on the label structure passed. An externalized
label consists of a text representation of the label contents that can be used with
userland applications and read by the user. Currently, all policies' externalize
entry points will be called, so the implementation
should check the contents of element_name
before
attempting to fill in sb
. If element_name
does not match the name of your policy, simply
return 0. Only return nonzero if an error occurs while
externalizing the label data. Once the policy fills in element_data
, *claimed
should be
incremented.
mpo_externalize_vnode_label
int mpo_externalize_vnode_label
(struct label
*label, char *element_name, struct sbuf *sb, int *claimed);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
label |
Label to be externalized | |
element_name |
Name of the policy whose label should be externalized | |
sb |
String buffer to be filled with a text representation of label | |
claimed |
Should be incremented when element_data can be filled
in. |
Produce an externalized label based on the label structure passed. An externalized
label consists of a text representation of the label contents that can be used with
userland applications and read by the user. Currently, all policies' externalize
entry points will be called, so the implementation
should check the contents of element_name
before
attempting to fill in sb
. If element_name
does not match the name of your policy, simply
return 0. Only return nonzero if an error occurs while
externalizing the label data. Once the policy fills in element_data
, *claimed
should be
incremented.
mpo_internalize_cred_label
int mpo_internalize_cred_label
(struct label *label,
char *element_name, char *element_data, int *claimed);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
label |
Label to be filled in | |
element_name |
Name of the policy whose label should be internalized | |
element_data |
Text data to be internalized | |
claimed |
Should be incremented when data can be successfully internalized. |
Produce an internal label structure based on externalized label data in text format.
Currently, all policies' internalize
entry points are
called when internalization is requested, so the implementation should compare the
contents of element_name
to its own name in order to be
sure it should be internalizing the data in element_data
.
Just as in the externalize
entry points, the entry point
should return 0 if element_name
does not match its own name, or when data can
successfully be internalized, in which case *claimed
should
be incremented.
mpo_internalize_ifnet_label
int mpo_internalize_ifnet_label
(struct label
*label, char *element_name, char *element_data, int *claimed);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
label |
Label to be filled in | |
element_name |
Name of the policy whose label should be internalized | |
element_data |
Text data to be internalized | |
claimed |
Should be incremented when data can be successfully internalized. |
Produce an internal label structure based on externalized label data in text format.
Currently, all policies' internalize
entry points are
called when internalization is requested, so the implementation should compare the
contents of element_name
to its own name in order to be
sure it should be internalizing the data in element_data
.
Just as in the externalize
entry points, the entry point
should return 0 if element_name
does not match its own name, or when data can
successfully be internalized, in which case *claimed
should
be incremented.
mpo_internalize_pipe_label
int mpo_internalize_pipe_label
(struct label *label,
char *element_name, char *element_data, int *claimed);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
label |
Label to be filled in | |
element_name |
Name of the policy whose label should be internalized | |
element_data |
Text data to be internalized | |
claimed |
Should be incremented when data can be successfully internalized. |
Produce an internal label structure based on externalized label data in text format.
Currently, all policies' internalize
entry points are
called when internalization is requested, so the implementation should compare the
contents of element_name
to its own name in order to be
sure it should be internalizing the data in element_data
.
Just as in the externalize
entry points, the entry point
should return 0 if element_name
does not match its own name, or when data can
successfully be internalized, in which case *claimed
should
be incremented.
mpo_internalize_socket_label
int mpo_internalize_socket_label
(struct label
*label, char *element_name, char *element_data, int *claimed);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
label |
Label to be filled in | |
element_name |
Name of the policy whose label should be internalized | |
element_data |
Text data to be internalized | |
claimed |
Should be incremented when data can be successfully internalized. |
Produce an internal label structure based on externalized label data in text format.
Currently, all policies' internalize
entry points are
called when internalization is requested, so the implementation should compare the
contents of element_name
to its own name in order to be
sure it should be internalizing the data in element_data
.
Just as in the externalize
entry points, the entry point
should return 0 if element_name
does not match its own name, or when data can
successfully be internalized, in which case *claimed
should
be incremented.
mpo_internalize_vnode_label
int mpo_internalize_vnode_label
(struct label
*label, char *element_name, char *element_data, int *claimed);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
label |
Label to be filled in | |
element_name |
Name of the policy whose label should be internalized | |
element_data |
Text data to be internalized | |
claimed |
Should be incremented when data can be successfully internalized. |
Produce an internal label structure based on externalized label data in text format.
Currently, all policies' internalize
entry points are
called when internalization is requested, so the implementation should compare the
contents of element_name
to its own name in order to be
sure it should be internalizing the data in element_data
.
Just as in the externalize
entry points, the entry point
should return 0 if element_name
does not match its own name, or when data can
successfully be internalized, in which case *claimed
should
be incremented.
This class of entry points is used by the MAC framework to permit policies to maintain label information on kernel objects. For each labeled kernel object of interest to a MAC policy, entry points may be registered for relevant life cycle events. All objects implement initialization, creation, and destruction hooks. Some objects will also implement relabeling, allowing user processes to change the labels on objects. Some objects will also implement object-specific events, such as label events associated with IP reassembly. A typical labeled object will have the following life cycle of entry points:
Label initialization o (object-specific wait) \ Label creation o \ Relabel events, o--<--. Various object-specific, | | Access control events ~-->--o \ Label destruction o
Label initialization permits policies to allocate memory and set initial values for labels without context for the use of the object. The label slot allocated to a policy will be zeroed by default, so some policies may not need to perform initialization.
Label creation occurs when the kernel structure is associated with an actual kernel object. For example, Mbufs may be allocated and remain unused in a pool until they are required. mbuf allocation causes label initialization on the mbuf to take place, but mbuf creation occurs when the mbuf is associated with a datagram. Typically, context will be provided for a creation event, including the circumstances of the creation, and labels of other relevant objects in the creation process. For example, when an mbuf is created from a socket, the socket and its label will be presented to registered policies in addition to the new mbuf and its label. Memory allocation in creation events is discouraged, as it may occur in performance sensitive ports of the kernel; in addition, creation calls are not permitted to fail so a failure to allocate memory cannot be reported.
Object specific events do not generally fall into the other broad classes of label
events, but will generally provide an opportunity to modify or update the label on an
object based on additional context. For example, the label on an IP fragment reassembly
queue may be updated during the MAC_UPDATE_IPQ
entry point as
a result of the acceptance of an additional mbuf to that queue.
Access control events are discussed in detail in the following section.
Label destruction permits policies to release storage or state associated with a label during its association with an object so that the kernel data structures supporting the object may be reused or released.
In addition to labels associated with specific kernel objects, an additional class of
labels exists: temporary labels. These labels are used to store update information
submitted by user processes. These labels are initialized and destroyed as with other
label types, but the creation event is MAC_INTERNALIZE
, which
accepts a user label to be converted to an in-kernel representation.
mpo_associate_vnode_devfs
void mpo_associate_vnode_devfs
(struct mount *mp,
struct label *fslabel, struct devfs_dirent *de, struct label *delabel, struct vnode *vp,
struct label *vlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
mp |
Devfs mount point | |
fslabel |
Devfs file system label (mp->mnt_fslabel ) |
|
de |
Devfs directory entry | |
delabel |
Policy label associated with de |
|
vp |
vnode associated with de |
|
vlabel |
Policy label associated with vp |
Fill in the label (vlabel
) for a newly created devfs
vnode based on the devfs directory entry passed in de
and
its label.
mpo_associate_vnode_extattr
int mpo_associate_vnode_extattr
(struct mount *mp,
struct label *fslabel, struct vnode *vp, struct label *vlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
mp |
File system mount point | |
fslabel |
File system label | |
vp |
Vnode to label | |
vlabel |
Policy label associated with vp |
Attempt to retrieve the label for vp
from the file
system extended attributes. Upon success, the value 0 is
returned. Should extended attribute retrieval not be supported, an accepted fallback is
to copy fslabel
into vlabel
. In the event of an error, an appropriate value for errno
should be returned.
mpo_associate_vnode_singlelabel
void mpo_associate_vnode_singlelabel
(struct mount
*mp, struct label *fslabel, struct vnode *vp, struct label *vlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
mp |
File system mount point | |
fslabel |
File system label | |
vp |
Vnode to label | |
vlabel |
Policy label associated with vp |
On non-multilabel file systems, this entry point is called to set the policy label for
vp
based on the file system label, fslabel
.
mpo_create_devfs_device
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
dev |
Device corresponding with devfs_dirent |
|
devfs_dirent |
Devfs directory entry to be labeled. | |
label |
Label for devfs_dirent to be filled in. |
Fill out the label on a devfs_dirent being created for the passed device. This call will be made when the device file system is mounted, regenerated, or a new device is made available.
mpo_create_devfs_directory
void mpo_create_devfs_directory
(char *dirname, int
dirnamelen, struct devfs_dirent *devfs_dirent, struct label *label);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
dirname |
Name of directory being created | |
namelen |
Length of string dirname |
|
devfs_dirent |
Devfs directory entry for directory being created. |
Fill out the label on a devfs_dirent being created for the passed directory. This call will be made when the device file system is mounted, regenerated, or a new device requiring a specific directory hierarchy is made available.
mpo_create_devfs_symlink
void mpo_create_devfs_symlink
(struct ucred *cred,
struct mount *mp, struct devfs_dirent *dd, struct label *ddlabel, struct devfs_dirent
*de, struct label *delabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
mp |
Devfs mount point | |
dd |
Link destination | |
ddlabel |
Label associated with dd |
|
de |
Symlink entry | |
delabel |
Label associated with de |
Fill in the label (delabel
) for a newly created
devfs(5)
symbolic link entry.
mpo_create_vnode_extattr
int mpo_create_vnode_extattr
(struct ucred *cred,
struct mount *mp, struct label *fslabel, struct vnode *dvp, struct label *dlabel, struct
vnode *vp, struct label *vlabel, struct componentname *cnp);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
mount |
File system mount point | |
label |
File system label | |
dvp |
Parent directory vnode | |
dlabel |
Label associated with dvp |
|
vp |
Newly created vnode | |
vlabel |
Policy label associated with vp |
|
cnp |
Component name for vp |
Write out the label for vp
to the appropriate extended
attribute. If the write succeeds, fill in vlabel
with the
label, and return 0. Otherwise, return an appropriate
error.
mpo_create_mount
void mpo_create_mount
(struct ucred *cred, struct
mount *mp, struct label *mnt, struct label *fslabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
mp |
Object; file system being mounted | |
mntlabel |
Policy label to be filled in for mp |
|
fslabel |
Policy label for the file system mp mounts. |
Fill out the labels on the mount point being created by the passed subject credential. This call will be made when a new file system is mounted.
mpo_create_root_mount
void mpo_create_root_mount
(struct ucred *cred,
struct mount *mp, struct label *mntlabel, struct label *fslabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
See Section 6.7.3.1.8. |
Fill out the labels on the mount point being created by the passed subject credential. This call will be made when the root file system is mounted, after mpo_create_mount;.
mpo_relabel_vnode
void mpo_relabel_vnode
(struct ucred *cred, struct
vnode *vp, struct label *vnodelabel, struct label *newlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
vnode to relabel | |
vnodelabel |
Existing policy label for vp |
|
newlabel |
New, possibly partial label to replace vnodelabel |
Update the label on the passed vnode given the passed update vnode label and the passed subject credential.
mpo_setlabel_vnode_extattr
int mpo_setlabel_vnode_extattr
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *vp, struct label *vlabel, struct label *intlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Vnode for which the label is being written | |
vlabel |
Policy label associated with vp |
|
intlabel |
Label to write out |
Write out the policy from intlabel
to an extended
attribute. This is called from vop_stdcreatevnode_ea
.
mpo_update_devfsdirent
void mpo_update_devfsdirent
(struct devfs_dirent
*devfs_dirent, struct label *direntlabel, struct vnode *vp, struct label
*vnodelabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
devfs_dirent |
Object; devfs directory entry | |
direntlabel |
Policy label for devfs_dirent to be updated. |
|
vp |
Parent vnode | Locked |
vnodelabel |
Policy label for vp |
Update the devfs_dirent
label from the passed devfs
vnode label. This call will be made when a devfs vnode has been successfully relabeled to
commit the label change such that it lasts even if the vnode is recycled. It will also be
made when when a symlink is created in devfs, following a call to mac_vnode_create_from_vnode
to initialize the vnode label.
mpo_create_mbuf_from_socket
void mpo_create_mbuf_from_socket
(struct socket *so,
struct label *socketlabel, struct mbuf *m, struct label *mbuflabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
socket |
Socket | Socket locking WIP |
socketlabel |
Policy label for socket |
|
m |
Object; mbuf | |
mbuflabel |
Policy label to fill in for m |
Set the label on a newly created mbuf header from the passed socket label. This call is made when a new datagram or message is generated by the socket and stored in the passed mbuf.
mpo_create_pipe
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
pipe |
Pipe | |
pipelabel |
Policy label associated with pipe |
Set the label on a newly created pipe from the passed subject credential. This call is made when a new pipe is created.
mpo_create_socket
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | Immutable |
so |
Object; socket to label | |
socketlabel |
Label to fill in for so |
Set the label on a newly created socket from the passed subject credential. This call is made when a socket is created.
mpo_create_socket_from_socket
void mpo_create_socket_from_socket
(struct socket
*oldsocket, struct label *oldsocketlabel, struct socket *newsocket, struct label
*newsocketlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
oldsocket |
Listening socket | |
oldsocketlabel |
Policy label associated with oldsocket |
|
newsocket |
New socket | |
newsocketlabel |
Policy label associated with newsocketlabel |
Label a socket, newsocket
, newly accept(2)ed, based on
the listen(2) socket,
oldsocket
.
mpo_relabel_pipe
void mpo_relabel_pipe
(struct ucred *cred, struct
pipe *pipe, struct label *oldlabel, struct label *newlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
pipe |
Pipe | |
oldlabel |
Current policy label associated with pipe |
|
newlabel |
Policy label update to apply to pipe |
Apply a new label, newlabel
, to pipe
.
mpo_relabel_socket
void mpo_relabel_socket
(struct ucred *cred, struct
socket *so, struct label *oldlabel, struct label *newlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | Immutable |
so |
Object; socket | |
oldlabel |
Current label for so |
|
newlabel |
Label update for so |
Update the label on a socket from the passed socket label update.
mpo_set_socket_peer_from_mbuf
void mpo_set_socket_peer_from_mbuf
(struct mbuf
*mbuf, struct label *mbuflabel, struct label *oldlabel, struct label
*newlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
mbuf |
First datagram received over socket | |
mbuflabel |
Label for mbuf |
|
oldlabel |
Current label for the socket | |
newlabel |
Policy label to be filled out for the socket |
Set the peer label on a stream socket from the passed mbuf label. This call will be made when the first datagram is received by the stream socket, with the exception of Unix domain sockets.
mpo_set_socket_peer_from_socket
void mpo_set_socket_peer_from_socket
(struct socket
*oldsocket, struct label *oldsocketlabel, struct socket *newsocket, struct label
*newsocketpeerlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
oldsocket |
Local socket | |
oldsocketlabel |
Policy label for oldsocket |
|
newsocket |
Peer socket | |
newsocketpeerlabel |
Policy label to fill in for newsocket |
Set the peer label on a stream UNIX domain socket from the passed remote socket endpoint. This call will be made when the socket pair is connected, and will be made for both endpoints.
mpo_create_bpfdesc
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | Immutable |
bpf_d |
Object; bpf descriptor | |
bpf |
Policy label to be filled in for bpf_d |
Set the label on a newly created BPF descriptor from the passed subject credential. This call will be made when a BPF device node is opened by a process with the passed subject credential.
mpo_create_ifnet
Set the label on a newly created interface. This call may be made when a new physical interface becomes available to the system, or when a pseudo-interface is instantiated during the boot or as a result of a user action.
mpo_create_ipq
void mpo_create_ipq
(struct mbuf *fragment, struct
label *fragmentlabel, struct ipq *ipq, struct label *ipqlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
fragment |
First received IP fragment | |
fragmentlabel |
Policy label for fragment |
|
ipq |
IP reassembly queue to be labeled | |
ipqlabel |
Policy label to be filled in for ipq |
Set the label on a newly created IP fragment reassembly queue from the mbuf header of the first received fragment.
mpo_create_datagram_from_ipq
void mpo_create_create_datagram_from_ipq
(struct ipq
*ipq, struct label *ipqlabel, struct mbuf *datagram, struct label
*datagramlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
ipq |
IP reassembly queue | |
ipqlabel |
Policy label for ipq |
|
datagram |
Datagram to be labeled | |
datagramlabel |
Policy label to be filled in for datagramlabel |
Set the label on a newly reassembled IP datagram from the IP fragment reassembly queue from which it was generated.
mpo_create_fragment
void mpo_create_fragment
(struct mbuf *datagram,
struct label *datagramlabel, struct mbuf *fragment, struct label
*fragmentlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
datagram |
Datagram | |
datagramlabel |
Policy label for datagram |
|
fragment |
Fragment to be labeled | |
fragmentlabel |
Policy label to be filled in for datagram |
Set the label on the mbuf header of a newly created IP fragment from the label on the mbuf header of the datagram it was generate from.
mpo_create_mbuf_from_mbuf
void mpo_create_mbuf_from_mbuf
(struct mbuf
*oldmbuf, struct label *oldmbuflabel, struct mbuf *newmbuf, struct label
*newmbuflabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
oldmbuf |
Existing (source) mbuf | |
oldmbuflabel |
Policy label for oldmbuf |
|
newmbuf |
New mbuf to be labeled | |
newmbuflabel |
Policy label to be filled in for newmbuf |
Set the label on the mbuf header of a newly created datagram from the mbuf header of an existing datagram. This call may be made in a number of situations, including when an mbuf is re-allocated for alignment purposes.
mpo_create_mbuf_linklayer
void mpo_create_mbuf_linklayer
(struct ifnet *ifnet,
struct label *ifnetlabel, struct mbuf *mbuf, struct label *mbuflabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
ifnet |
Network interface | |
ifnetlabel |
Policy label for ifnet |
|
mbuf |
mbuf header for new datagram | |
mbuflabel |
Policy label to be filled in for mbuf |
Set the label on the mbuf header of a newly created datagram generated for the purposes of a link layer response for the passed interface. This call may be made in a number of situations, including for ARP or ND6 responses in the IPv4 and IPv6 stacks.
mpo_create_mbuf_from_bpfdesc
void mpo_create_mbuf_from_bpfdesc
(struct bpf_d
*bpf_d, struct label *bpflabel, struct mbuf *mbuf, struct label *mbuflabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
bpf_d |
BPF descriptor | |
bpflabel |
Policy label for bpflabel |
|
mbuf |
New mbuf to be labeled | |
mbuflabel |
Policy label to fill in for mbuf |
Set the label on the mbuf header of a newly created datagram generated using the passed BPF descriptor. This call is made when a write is performed to the BPF device associated with the passed BPF descriptor.
mpo_create_mbuf_from_ifnet
void mpo_create_mbuf_from_ifnet
(struct ifnet
*ifnet, struct label *ifnetlabel, struct mbuf *mbuf, struct label *mbuflabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
ifnet |
Network interface | |
ifnetlabel |
Policy label for ifnetlabel |
|
mbuf |
mbuf header for new datagram | |
mbuflabel |
Policy label to be filled in for mbuf |
Set the label on the mbuf header of a newly created datagram generated from the passed network interface.
mpo_create_mbuf_multicast_encap
void mpo_create_mbuf_multicast_encap
(struct mbuf
*oldmbuf, struct label *oldmbuflabel, struct ifnet *ifnet, struct label *ifnetlabel,
struct mbuf *newmbuf, struct label *newmbuflabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
oldmbuf |
mbuf header for existing datagram | |
oldmbuflabel |
Policy label for oldmbuf |
|
ifnet |
Network interface | |
ifnetlabel |
Policy label for ifnet |
|
newmbuf |
mbuf header to be labeled for new datagram | |
newmbuflabel |
Policy label to be filled in for newmbuf |
Set the label on the mbuf header of a newly created datagram generated from the existing passed datagram when it is processed by the passed multicast encapsulation interface. This call is made when an mbuf is to be delivered using the virtual interface.
mpo_create_mbuf_netlayer
void mpo_create_mbuf_netlayer
(struct mbuf *oldmbuf,
struct label *oldmbuflabel, struct mbuf *newmbuf, struct label *newmbuflabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
oldmbuf |
Received datagram | |
oldmbuflabel |
Policy label for oldmbuf |
|
newmbuf |
Newly created datagram | |
newmbuflabel |
Policy label for newmbuf |
Set the label on the mbuf header of a newly created datagram generated by the IP stack
in response to an existing received datagram (oldmbuf
).
This call may be made in a number of situations, including when responding to ICMP
request datagrams.
mpo_fragment_match
int mpo_fragment_match
(struct mbuf *fragment,
struct label *fragmentlabel, struct ipq *ipq, struct label *ipqlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
fragment |
IP datagram fragment | |
fragmentlabel |
Policy label for fragment |
|
ipq |
IP fragment reassembly queue | |
ipqlabel |
Policy label for ipq |
Determine whether an mbuf header containing an IP datagram (fragment
) fragment matches the label of the passed IP fragment
reassembly queue (ipq
). Return (1) for a successful match, or (0) for no match. This call is made when the IP stack attempts
to find an existing fragment reassembly queue for a newly received fragment; if this
fails, a new fragment reassembly queue may be instantiated for the fragment. Policies may
use this entry point to prevent the reassembly of otherwise matching IP fragments if
policy does not permit them to be reassembled based on the label or other
information.
mpo_relabel_ifnet
void mpo_relabel_ifnet
(struct ucred *cred, struct
ifnet *ifnet, struct label *ifnetlabel, struct label *newlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
ifnet |
Object; Network interface | |
ifnetlabel |
Policy label for ifnet |
|
newlabel |
Label update to apply to ifnet |
Update the label of network interface, ifnet
, based on
the passed update label, newlabel
, and the passed subject
credential, cred
.
mpo_update_ipq
void mpo_update_ipq
(struct mbuf *fragment, struct
label *fragmentlabel, struct ipq *ipq, struct label *ipqlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
mbuf |
IP fragment | |
mbuflabel |
Policy label for mbuf |
|
ipq |
IP fragment reassembly queue | |
ipqlabel |
Policy label to be updated for ipq |
Update the label on an IP fragment reassembly queue (ipq
) based on the acceptance of the passed IP fragment mbuf
header (mbuf
).
mpo_create_cred
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
parent_cred |
Parent subject credential | |
child_cred |
Child subject credential |
Set the label of a newly created subject credential from the passed subject credential. This call will be made when crcopy(9) is invoked on a newly created struct ucred. This call should not be confused with a process forking or creation event.
mpo_execve_transition
void mpo_execve_transition
(struct ucred *old,
struct ucred *new, struct vnode *vp, struct label *vnodelabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
old |
Existing subject credential | Immutable |
new |
New subject credential to be labeled | |
vp |
File to execute | Locked |
vnodelabel |
Policy label for vp |
Update the label of a newly created subject credential (new
) from the passed existing subject credential (old
) based on a label transition caused by executing the passed
vnode (vp
). This call occurs when a process executes the
passed vnode and one of the policies returns a success from the mpo_execve_will_transition
entry point. Policies may choose to
implement this call simply by invoking mpo_create_cred
and
passing the two subject credentials so as not to implement a transitioning event.
Policies should not leave this entry point unimplemented if they implement mpo_create_cred
, even if they do not implement mpo_execve_will_transition
.
mpo_execve_will_transition
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
old |
Subject credential prior to execve(2) | Immutable |
vp |
File to execute | |
vnodelabel |
Policy label for vp |
Determine whether the policy will want to perform a transition event as a result of
the execution of the passed vnode by the passed subject credential. Return 1 if a transition is required, 0 if not. Even if a policy returns 0, it should behave correctly in the presence of an unexpected
invocation of mpo_execve_transition
, as that call may
happen as a result of another policy requesting a transition.
mpo_create_proc0
Create the subject credential of process 0, the parent of all kernel processes.
mpo_create_proc1
Create the subject credential of process 1, the parent of all user processes.
Access control entry points permit policy modules to influence access control
decisions made by the kernel. Generally, although not always, arguments to an access
control entry point will include one or more authorizing credentials, information
(possibly including a label) for any other objects involved in the operation. An access
control entry point may return 0 to permit the operation, or an errno(2) error value.
The results of invoking the entry point across various registered policy modules will be
composed as follows: if all modules permit the operation to succeed, success will be
returned. If one or modules returns a failure, a failure will be returned. If more than
one module returns a failure, the errno value to return to the user will be selected
using the following precedence, implemented by the error_select()
function in kern_mac.c:
If none of the error values returned by all modules are listed in the precedence chart then an arbitrarily selected value from the set will be returned. In general, the rules provide precedence to errors in the following order: kernel failures, invalid arguments, object not present, access not permitted, other.
mpo_check_bpfdesc_receive
int mpo_check_bpfdesc_receive
(struct bpf_d *bpf_d,
struct label *bpflabel, struct ifnet *ifnet, struct label *ifnetlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
bpf_d |
Subject; BPF descriptor | |
bpflabel |
Policy label for bpf_d |
|
ifnet |
Object; network interface | |
ifnetlabel |
Policy label for ifnet |
Determine whether the MAC framework should permit datagrams from the passed interface
to be delivered to the buffers of the passed BPF descriptor. Return (0) for success, or an errno
value
for failure Suggested failure: EACCES for label
mismatches, EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_kenv_dump
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to retrieve the kernel environment (see kenv(2)).
mpo_check_kenv_get
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to retrieve the value of the specified kernel environment variable.
mpo_check_kenv_set
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to set the specified kernel environment variable.
mpo_check_kenv_unset
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to unset the specified kernel environment variable.
mpo_check_kld_load
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Kernel module vnode | |
vlabel |
Label associated with vp |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to load the specified module file.
mpo_check_kld_stat
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to retrieve a list of loaded kernel module files and associated statistics.
mpo_check_kld_unload
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to unload a kernel module.
mpo_check_pipe_ioctl
int mpo_check_pipe_ioctl
(struct ucred *cred, struct
pipe *pipe, struct label *pipelabel, unsigned long cmd, void *data);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
pipe |
Pipe | |
pipelabel |
Policy label associated with pipe |
|
cmd |
ioctl(2) command | |
data |
ioctl(2) data |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to make the specified ioctl(2) call.
mpo_check_pipe_poll
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
pipe |
Pipe | |
pipelabel |
Policy label associated with pipe |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to poll pipe
.
mpo_check_pipe_read
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
pipe |
Pipe | |
pipelabel |
Policy label associated with pipe |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed read access to pipe
.
mpo_check_pipe_relabel
int mpo_check_pipe_relabel
(struct ucred *cred,
struct pipe *pipe, struct label *pipelabel, struct label *newlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
pipe |
Pipe | |
pipelabel |
Current policy label associated with pipe |
|
newlabel |
Label update to pipelabel |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to relabel pipe
.
mpo_check_pipe_stat
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
pipe |
Pipe | |
pipelabel |
Policy label associated with pipe |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to retrieve statistics related to
pipe
.
mpo_check_pipe_write
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
pipe |
Pipe | |
pipelabel |
Policy label associated with pipe |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to write to pipe
.
mpo_check_socket_bind
mpo_check_socket_connect
int mpo_check_socket_connect
(struct ucred *cred,
struct socket *socket, struct label *socketlabel, struct sockaddr *sockaddr);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
socket |
Socket to be connected | |
socketlabel |
Policy label for socket |
|
sockaddr |
Address of socket |
Determine whether the subject credential (cred
) can
connect the passed socket (socket
) to the passed socket
address (sockaddr
). Return 0 for success, or an errno
value
for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label
mismatches, EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_socket_receive
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
so |
Socket | |
socketlabel |
Policy label associated with so |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to receive information from the socket
so
.
mpo_check_socket_send
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
so |
Socket | |
socketlabel |
Policy label associated with so |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to send information across the socket
so
.
mpo_check_cred_visible
Determine whether the subject credential u1
can
“see” other subjects with the passed subject credential u2
. Return 0 for success, or an
errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatches, EPERM for lack of privilege, or ESRCH to hide visibility. This call may be made in a number of
situations, including inter-process status sysctl's used by ps,
and in procfs lookups.
mpo_check_ifnet_relabel
int mpo_check_ifnet_relabel
(struct ucred *cred,
struct ifnet *ifnet, struct label *ifnetlabel, struct label *newlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
ifnet |
Object; network interface | |
ifnetlabel |
Existing policy label for ifnet |
|
newlabel |
Policy label update to later be applied to ifnet |
Determine whether the subject credential can relabel the passed network interface to the passed label update.
mpo_check_socket_relabel
int mpo_check_socket_relabel
(struct ucred *cred,
struct socket *socket, struct label *socketlabel, struct label *newlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
socket |
Object; socket | |
socketlabel |
Existing policy label for socket |
|
newlabel |
Label update to later be applied to socketlabel |
Determine whether the subject credential can relabel the passed socket to the passed label update.
mpo_check_cred_relabel
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
newlabel |
Label update to later be applied to cred |
Determine whether the subject credential can relabel itself to the passed label update.
mpo_check_vnode_relabel
int mpo_check_vnode_relabel
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *vp, struct label *vnodelabel, struct label *newlabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | Immutable |
vp |
Object; vnode | Locked |
vnodelabel |
Existing policy label for vp |
|
newlabel |
Policy label update to later be applied to vp |
Determine whether the subject credential can relabel the passed vnode to the passed label update.
mpo_check_mount_stat
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
mp |
Object; file system mount | |
mountlabel |
Policy label for mp |
Determine whether the subject credential can see the results of a statfs performed on
the file system. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatches or EPERM for lack of privilege. This call may be made in a number
of situations, including during invocations of statfs(2) and related
calls, as well as to determine what file systems to exclude from listings of file
systems, such as when getfsstat(2) is
invoked.
mpo_check_proc_debug
Determine whether the subject credential can debug the passed process. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value
for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch,
EPERM for lack of privilege, or ESRCH to hide visibility of the target. This call may be made in
a number of situations, including use of the ptrace(2) and ktrace(2) APIs, as
well as for some types of procfs operations.
mpo_check_vnode_access
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Object; vnode | |
label |
Policy label for vp |
|
flags |
access(2) flags |
Determine how invocations of access(2) and related
calls by the subject credential should return when performed on the passed vnode using
the passed access flags. This should generally be implemented using the same semantics
used in mpo_check_vnode_open
. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value
for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label
mismatches or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_chdir
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
dvp |
Object; vnode to chdir(2) into | |
dlabel |
Policy label for dvp |
Determine whether the subject credential can change the process working directory to
the passed vnode. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_chroot
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
dvp |
Directory vnode | |
dlabel |
Policy label associated with dvp |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to chroot(2) into the
specified directory (dvp
).
mpo_check_vnode_create
int mpo_check_vnode_create
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *dvp, struct label *dlabel, struct componentname *cnp, struct vattr
*vap);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
dvp |
Object; vnode | |
dlabel |
Policy label for dvp |
|
cnp |
Component name for dvp |
|
vap |
vnode attributes for vap |
Determine whether the subject credential can create a vnode with the passed parent
directory, passed name information, and passed attribute information. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value
for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch,
or EPERM for lack of privilege. This call may be made in a
number of situations, including as a result of calls to open(2) with O_CREAT
, mknod(2), mkfifo(2), and
others.
mpo_check_vnode_delete
int mpo_check_vnode_delete
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *dvp, struct label *dlabel, struct vnode *vp, void *label, struct
componentname *cnp);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
dvp |
Parent directory vnode | |
dlabel |
Policy label for dvp |
|
vp |
Object; vnode to delete | |
label |
Policy label for vp |
|
cnp |
Component name for vp |
Determine whether the subject credential can delete a vnode from the passed parent
directory and passed name information. Return 0 for
success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure:
EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege. This call may be made in a number
of situations, including as a result of calls to unlink(2) and rmdir(2). Policies
implementing this entry point should also implement mpo_check_rename_to
to authorize deletion of objects as a result
of being the target of a rename.
mpo_check_vnode_deleteacl
int mpo_check_vnode_deleteacl
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *vp, struct label *label, acl_type_t type);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | Immutable |
vp |
Object; vnode | Locked |
label |
Policy label for vp |
|
type |
ACL type |
Determine whether the subject credential can delete the ACL of passed type from the
passed vnode. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_exec
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Object; vnode to execute | |
label |
Policy label for vp |
Determine whether the subject credential can execute the passed vnode. Determination
of execute privilege is made separately from decisions about any transitioning event.
Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_getacl
int mpo_check_vnode_getacl
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *vp, struct label *label, acl_type_t type);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Object; vnode | |
label |
Policy label for vp |
|
type |
ACL type |
Determine whether the subject credential can retrieve the ACL of passed type from the
passed vnode. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_getextattr
int mpo_check_vnode_getextattr
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *vp, struct label *label, int attrnamespace, const char *name, struct uio
*uio);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Object; vnode | |
label |
Policy label for vp |
|
attrnamespace |
Extended attribute namespace | |
name |
Extended attribute name | |
uio |
I/O structure pointer; see uio(9) |
Determine whether the subject credential can retrieve the extended attribute with the
passed namespace and name from the passed vnode. Policies implementing labeling using
extended attributes may be interested in special handling of operations on those extended
attributes. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_link
int mpo_check_vnode_link
(struct ucred *cred, struct
vnode *dvp, struct label *dlabel, struct vnode *vp, struct label *label, struct
componentname *cnp);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
dvp |
Directory vnode | |
dlabel |
Policy label associated with dvp |
|
vp |
Link destination vnode | |
label |
Policy label associated with vp |
|
cnp |
Component name for the link being created |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to create a link to the vnode vp
with the name specified by cnp
.
mpo_check_vnode_mmap
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Vnode to map | |
label |
Policy label associated with vp |
|
prot |
Mmap protections (see mmap(2)) |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to map the vnode vp
with the protections specified in prot
.
mpo_check_vnode_mmap_downgrade
void mpo_check_vnode_mmap_downgrade
(struct ucred
*cred, struct vnode *vp, struct label *label, int *prot);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
See Section 6.7.4.37. | |
vp |
||
label |
||
prot |
Mmap protections to be downgraded |
Downgrade the mmap protections based on the subject and object labels.
mpo_check_vnode_mprotect
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to set the specified memory
protections on memory mapped from the vnode vp
.
mpo_check_vnode_poll
int mpo_check_vnode_poll
(struct ucred *active_cred,
struct ucred *file_cred, struct vnode *vp, struct label *label);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
active_cred |
Subject credential | |
file_cred |
Credential associated with the struct file | |
vp |
Polled vnode | |
label |
Policy label associated with vp |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to poll the vnode vp
.
mpo_check_vnode_rename_from
int mpo_vnode_rename_from
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *dvp, struct label *dlabel, struct vnode *vp, struct label *label, struct
componentname *cnp);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
dvp |
Directory vnode | |
dlabel |
Policy label associated with dvp |
|
vp |
Vnode to be renamed | |
label |
Policy label associated with vp |
|
cnp |
Component name for vp |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to rename the vnode vp
to something else.
mpo_check_vnode_rename_to
int mpo_check_vnode_rename_to
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *dvp, struct label *dlabel, struct vnode *vp, struct label *label, int
samedir, struct componentname *cnp);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
dvp |
Directory vnode | |
dlabel |
Policy label associated with dvp |
|
vp |
Overwritten vnode | |
label |
Policy label associated with vp |
|
samedir |
Boolean; 1 if the source and destination directories are the same | |
cnp |
Destination component name |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to rename to the vnode vp
, into the directory dvp
, or to
the name represented by cnp
. If there is no existing file
to overwrite, vp
and label
will be NULL.
mpo_check_socket_listen
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
socket |
Object; socket | |
socketlabel |
Policy label for socket |
Determine whether the subject credential can listen on the passed socket. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value
for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch,
or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_lookup
int mpo_check_vnode_lookup
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *dvp, struct label *dlabel, struct componentname *cnp);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
dvp |
Object; vnode | |
dlabel |
Policy label for dvp |
|
cnp |
Component name being looked up |
Determine whether the subject credential can perform a lookup in the passed directory
vnode for the passed name. Return 0 for success, or an
errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_open
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Object; vnode | |
label |
Policy label for vp |
|
acc_mode |
open(2) access mode |
Determine whether the subject credential can perform an open operation on the passed vnode with the passed access mode. Return 0 for success, or an errno value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_readdir
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
dvp |
Object; directory vnode | |
dlabel |
Policy label for dvp |
Determine whether the subject credential can perform a readdir
operation on the passed directory vnode. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value
for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch,
or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_readlink
Determine whether the subject credential can perform a readlink
operation on the passed symlink vnode. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value
for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch,
or EPERM for lack of privilege. This call may be made in a
number of situations, including an explicit readlink
call
by the user process, or as a result of an implicit readlink
during a name lookup by the process.
mpo_check_vnode_revoke
Determine whether the subject credential can revoke access to the passed vnode. Return
0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label
mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_setacl
int mpo_check_vnode_setacl
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *vp, struct label *label, acl_type_t type, struct acl *acl);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Object; vnode | |
label |
Policy label for vp |
|
type |
ACL type | |
acl |
ACL |
Determine whether the subject credential can set the passed ACL of passed type on the
passed vnode. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_setextattr
int mpo_check_vnode_setextattr
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *vp, struct label *label, int attrnamespace, const char *name, struct uio
*uio);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Object; vnode | |
label |
Policy label for vp |
|
attrnamespace |
Extended attribute namespace | |
name |
Extended attribute name | |
uio |
I/O structure pointer; see uio(9) |
Determine whether the subject credential can set the extended attribute of passed name
and passed namespace on the passed vnode. Policies implementing security labels backed
into extended attributes may want to provide additional protections for those attributes.
Additionally, policies should avoid making decisions based on the data referenced from
uio
, as there is a potential race condition between this
check and the actual operation. The uio
may also be NULL if a delete operation is being performed. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value
for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch,
or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_setflags
int mpo_check_vnode_setflags
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *vp, struct label *label, u_long flags);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Object; vnode | |
label |
Policy label for vp |
|
flags |
File flags; see chflags(2) |
Determine whether the subject credential can set the passed flags on the passed vnode.
Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_setmode
int mpo_check_vnode_setmode
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *vp, struct label *label, mode_t mode);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Object; vnode | |
label |
Policy label for vp |
|
mode |
File mode; see chmod(2) |
Determine whether the subject credential can set the passed mode on the passed vnode.
Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_setowner
int mpo_check_vnode_setowner
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *vp, struct label *label, uid_t uid, gid_t gid);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Object; vnode | |
label |
Policy label for vp |
|
uid |
User ID | |
gid |
Group ID |
Determine whether the subject credential can set the passed uid and passed gid as file
uid and file gid on the passed vnode. The IDs may be set to (-1)
to request no update. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_vnode_setutimes
int mpo_check_vnode_setutimes
(struct ucred *cred,
struct vnode *vp, struct label *label, struct timespec atime, struct timespec
mtime);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Object; vp | |
label |
Policy label for vp |
|
atime |
Access time; see utimes(2) | |
mtime |
Modification time; see utimes(2) |
Determine whether the subject credential can set the passed access timestamps on the
passed vnode. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_proc_sched
Determine whether the subject credential can change the scheduling parameters of the
passed process. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, EPERM
for lack of privilege, or ESRCH to limit visibility.
See setpriority(2) for more information.
mpo_check_proc_signal
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
proc |
Object; process | |
signal |
Signal; see kill(2) |
Determine whether the subject credential can deliver the passed signal to the passed
process. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, EPERM
for lack of privilege, or ESRCH to limit visibility.
mpo_check_vnode_stat
Determine whether the subject credential can stat
the
passed vnode. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
See stat(2) for more information.
mpo_check_ifnet_transmit
int mpo_check_ifnet_transmit
(struct ucred *cred,
struct ifnet *ifnet, struct label *ifnetlabel, struct mbuf *mbuf, struct label
*mbuflabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
ifnet |
Network interface | |
ifnetlabel |
Policy label for ifnet |
|
mbuf |
Object; mbuf to be sent | |
mbuflabel |
Policy label for mbuf |
Determine whether the network interface can transmit the passed mbuf. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value
for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label mismatch,
or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_socket_deliver
int mpo_check_socket_deliver
(struct ucred *cred,
struct ifnet *ifnet, struct label *ifnetlabel, struct mbuf *mbuf, struct label
*mbuflabel);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
ifnet |
Network interface | |
ifnetlabel |
Policy label for ifnet |
|
mbuf |
Object; mbuf to be delivered | |
mbuflabel |
Policy label for mbuf |
Determine whether the socket may receive the datagram stored in the passed mbuf
header. Return 0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failures: EACCES for label mismatch, or EPERM for lack of privilege.
mpo_check_socket_visible
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | Immutable |
so |
Object; socket | |
socketlabel |
Policy label for so |
Determine whether the subject credential cred can "see" the passed socket (socket
) using system monitoring functions, such as those
employed by netstat(8) and sockstat(1). Return
0 for success, or an errno
value for failure. Suggested failure: EACCES for label
mismatches, EPERM for lack of privilege, or ESRCH to hide visibility.
mpo_check_system_acct
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
ucred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Accounting file; acct(5) | |
vlabel |
Label associated with vp |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to enable accounting, based on its label and the label of the accounting log file.
mpo_check_system_reboot
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
howto |
howto parameter from reboot(2) |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to reboot the system in the specified manner.
mpo_check_system_settime
Determine whether the user should be allowed to set the system clock.
mpo_check_system_swapon
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
vp |
Swap device | |
vlabel |
Label associated with vp |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to add vp
as a swap device.
mpo_check_system_sysctl
int mpo_check_system_sysctl
(struct ucred *cred, int
*name, u_int *namelen, void *old, size_t *oldlenp, int inkernel, void *new, size_t
newlen);
Parameter | Description | Locking |
---|---|---|
cred |
Subject credential | |
name |
See sysctl(3) | |
namelen |
||
old |
||
oldlenp |
||
inkernel |
Boolean; 1 if called from kernel | |
new |
See sysctl(3) | |
newlen |
Determine whether the subject should be allowed to make the specified sysctl(3) transaction.
Relabel events occur when a user process has requested that the label on an object be modified. A two-phase update occurs: first, an access control check will be performed to determine if the update is both valid and permitted, and then the update itself is performed via a separate entry point. Relabel entry points typically accept the object, object label reference, and an update label submitted by the process. Memory allocation during relabel is discouraged, as relabel calls are not permitted to fail (failure should be reported earlier in the relabel check).
The TrustedBSD MAC Framework includes a number of policy-agnostic elements, including MAC library interfaces for abstractly managing labels, modifications to the system credential management and login libraries to support the assignment of MAC labels to users, and a set of tools to monitor and modify labels on processes, files, and network interfaces. More details on the user architecture will be added to this section in the near future.
The TrustedBSD MAC Framework provides a number of library and system calls permitting applications to manage MAC labels on objects using a policy-agnostic interface. This permits applications to manipulate labels for a variety of policies without being written to support specific policies. These interfaces are used by general-purpose tools such as ifconfig(8), ls(1) and ps(1) to view labels on network interfaces, files, and processes. The APIs also support MAC management tools including getfmac(8), getpmac(8), setfmac(8), setfsmac(8), and setpmac(8). The MAC APIs are documented in mac(3).
Applications handle MAC labels in two forms: an internalized form used to return and set labels on processes and objects (mac_t), and externalized form based on C strings appropriate for storage in configuration files, display to the user, or input from the user. Each MAC label contains a number of elements, each consisting of a name and value pair. Policy modules in the kernel bind to specific names and interpret the values in policy-specific ways. In the externalized string form, labels are represented by a comma-delimited list of name and value pairs separated by the / character. Labels may be directly converted to and from text using provided APIs; when retrieving labels from the kernel, internalized label storage must first be prepared for the desired label element set. Typically, this is done in one of two ways: using mac_prepare(3) and an arbitrary list of desired label elements, or one of the variants of the call that loads a default element set from the mac.conf(5) configuration file. Per-object defaults permit application writers to usefully display labels associated with objects without being aware of the policies present in the system.
Note: Currently, direct manipulation of label elements other than by conversion to a text string, string editing, and conversion back to an internalized label is not supported by the MAC library. Such interfaces may be added in the future if they prove necessary for application writers.
The standard user context management interface, setusercontext(3), has been modified to retrieve MAC labels associated with a user's class from login.conf(5). These labels are then set along with other user context when either LOGIN_SETALL is specified, or when LOGIN_SETMAC is explicitly specified.
Note: It is expected that, in a future version of FreeBSD, the MAC label database will be separated from the login.conf user class abstraction, and be maintained in a separate database. However, the setusercontext(3) API should remain the same following such a change.
The TrustedBSD MAC framework permits kernel modules to augment the system security policy in a highly integrated manner. They may do this based on existing object properties, or based on label data that is maintained with the assistance of the MAC framework. The framework is sufficiently flexible to implement a variety of policy types, including information flow security policies such as MLS and Biba, as well as policies based on existing BSD credentials or file protections. Policy authors may wish to consult this documentation as well as existing security modules when implementing a new security service.
Physical memory is managed on a page-by-page basis through the vm_page_t structure. Pages of physical memory are categorized through the placement of their respective vm_page_t structures on one of several paging queues.
A page can be in a wired, active, inactive, cache, or free state. Except for the wired state, the page is typically placed in a doubly link list queue representing the state that it is in. Wired pages are not placed on any queue.
FreeBSD implements a more involved paging queue for cached and free pages in order to implement page coloring. Each of these states involves multiple queues arranged according to the size of the processor's L1 and L2 caches. When a new page needs to be allocated, FreeBSD attempts to obtain one that is reasonably well aligned from the point of view of the L1 and L2 caches relative to the VM object the page is being allocated for.
Additionally, a page may be held with a reference count or locked with a busy count. The VM system also implements an “ultimate locked” state for a page using the PG_BUSY bit in the page's flags.
In general terms, each of the paging queues operates in a LRU fashion. A page is typically placed in a wired or active state initially. When wired, the page is usually associated with a page table somewhere. The VM system ages the page by scanning pages in a more active paging queue (LRU) in order to move them to a less-active paging queue. Pages that get moved into the cache are still associated with a VM object but are candidates for immediate reuse. Pages in the free queue are truly free. FreeBSD attempts to minimize the number of pages in the free queue, but a certain minimum number of truly free pages must be maintained in order to accommodate page allocation at interrupt time.
If a process attempts to access a page that does not exist in its page table but does exist in one of the paging queues (such as the inactive or cache queues), a relatively inexpensive page reactivation fault occurs which causes the page to be reactivated. If the page does not exist in system memory at all, the process must block while the page is brought in from disk.
FreeBSD dynamically tunes its paging queues and attempts to maintain reasonable ratios of pages in the various queues as well as attempts to maintain a reasonable breakdown of clean vs. dirty pages. The amount of rebalancing that occurs depends on the system's memory load. This rebalancing is implemented by the pageout daemon and involves laundering dirty pages (syncing them with their backing store), noticing when pages are activity referenced (resetting their position in the LRU queues or moving them between queues), migrating pages between queues when the queues are out of balance, and so forth. FreeBSD's VM system is willing to take a reasonable number of reactivation page faults to determine how active or how idle a page actually is. This leads to better decisions being made as to when to launder or swap-out a page.
FreeBSD implements the idea of a generic “VM object”. VM objects can be associated with backing store of various types--unbacked, swap-backed, physical device-backed, or file-backed storage. Since the filesystem uses the same VM objects to manage in-core data relating to files, the result is a unified buffer cache.
VM objects can be shadowed. That is, they can be stacked on top of each other. For example, you might have a swap-backed VM object stacked on top of a file-backed VM object in order to implement a MAP_PRIVATE mmap()ing. This stacking is also used to implement various sharing properties, including copy-on-write, for forked address spaces.
It should be noted that a vm_page_t can only be associated with one VM object at a time. The VM object shadowing implements the perceived sharing of the same page across multiple instances.
vnode-backed VM objects, such as file-backed objects, generally need to maintain their own clean/dirty info independent from the VM system's idea of clean/dirty. For example, when the VM system decides to synchronize a physical page to its backing store, the VM system needs to mark the page clean before the page is actually written to its backing store. Additionally, filesystems need to be able to map portions of a file or file metadata into KVM in order to operate on it.
The entities used to manage this are known as filesystem buffers, struct buf's, or bp's. When a filesystem needs to operate on a portion of a VM object, it typically maps part of the object into a struct buf and the maps the pages in the struct buf into KVM. In the same manner, disk I/O is typically issued by mapping portions of objects into buffer structures and then issuing the I/O on the buffer structures. The underlying vm_page_t's are typically busied for the duration of the I/O. Filesystem buffers also have their own notion of being busy, which is useful to filesystem driver code which would rather operate on filesystem buffers instead of hard VM pages.
FreeBSD reserves a limited amount of KVM to hold mappings from struct bufs, but it should be made clear that this KVM is used solely to hold mappings and does not limit the ability to cache data. Physical data caching is strictly a function of vm_page_t's, not filesystem buffers. However, since filesystem buffers are used to placehold I/O, they do inherently limit the amount of concurrent I/O possible. However, as there are usually a few thousand filesystem buffers available, this is not usually a problem.
FreeBSD separates the physical page table topology from the VM system. All hard per-process page tables can be reconstructed on the fly and are usually considered throwaway. Special page tables such as those managing KVM are typically permanently preallocated. These page tables are not throwaway.
FreeBSD associates portions of vm_objects with address ranges in virtual memory through vm_map_t and vm_entry_t structures. Page tables are directly synthesized from the vm_map_t/vm_entry_t/ vm_object_t hierarchy. Recall that I mentioned that physical pages are only directly associated with a vm_object; that is not quite true. vm_page_t's are also linked into page tables that they are actively associated with. One vm_page_t can be linked into several pmaps, as page tables are called. However, the hierarchical association holds, so all references to the same page in the same object reference the same vm_page_t and thus give us buffer cache unification across the board.
FreeBSD uses KVM to hold various kernel structures. The single largest entity held in KVM is the filesystem buffer cache. That is, mappings relating to struct buf entities.
Unlike Linux, FreeBSD does not map all of physical memory into KVM. This means that FreeBSD can handle memory configurations up to 4G on 32 bit platforms. In fact, if the mmu were capable of it, FreeBSD could theoretically handle memory configurations up to 8TB on a 32 bit platform. However, since most 32 bit platforms are only capable of mapping 4GB of ram, this is a moot point.
KVM is managed through several mechanisms. The main mechanism used to manage KVM is the zone allocator. The zone allocator takes a chunk of KVM and splits it up into constant-sized blocks of memory in order to allocate a specific type of structure. You can use vmstat -m to get an overview of current KVM utilization broken down by zone.
A concerted effort has been made to make the FreeBSD kernel dynamically tune itself.
Typically you do not need to mess with anything beyond the maxusers
and NMBCLUSTERS
kernel config
options. That is, kernel compilation options specified in (typically) /usr/src/sys/i386/conf/CONFIG_FILE. A description of all available kernel
configuration options can be found in /usr/src/sys/i386/conf/LINT.
In a large system configuration you may wish to increase maxusers
. Values typically range from 10 to 128. Note that raising
maxusers
too high can cause the system to overflow available
KVM resulting in unpredictable operation. It is better to leave maxusers
at some reasonable number and add other options, such as
NMBCLUSTERS
, to increase specific resources.
If your system is going to use the network heavily, you may want to increase NMBCLUSTERS
. Typical values range from 1024 to 4096.
The NBUF parameter is also traditionally used to scale the system. This parameter determines the amount of KVA the system can use to map filesystem buffers for I/O. Note that this parameter has nothing whatsoever to do with the unified buffer cache! This parameter is dynamically tuned in 3.0-CURRENT and later kernels and should generally not be adjusted manually. We recommend that you not try to specify an NBUF parameter. Let the system pick it. Too small a value can result in extremely inefficient filesystem operation while too large a value can starve the page queues by causing too many pages to become wired down.
By default, FreeBSD kernels are not optimized. You can set debugging and optimization
flags with the makeoptions directive in the kernel
configuration. Note that you should not use -g
unless you can
accommodate the large (typically 7 MB+) kernels that result.
makeoptions DEBUG="-g" makeoptions COPTFLAGS="-O -pipe"
Sysctl provides a way to tune kernel parameters at run-time. You typically do not need to mess with any of the sysctl variables, especially the VM related ones.
Run time VM and system tuning is relatively straightforward. First, use Soft Updates on your UFS/FFS filesystems whenever possible. /usr/src/sys/ufs/ffs/README.softupdates contains instructions (and restrictions) on how to configure it.
Second, configure sufficient swap. You should have a swap partition configured on each physical disk, up to four, even on your “work” disks. You should have at least 2x the swap space as you have main memory, and possibly even more if you do not have a lot of memory. You should also size your swap partition based on the maximum memory configuration you ever intend to put on the machine so you do not have to repartition your disks later on. If you want to be able to accommodate a crash dump, your first swap partition must be at least as large as main memory and /var/crash must have sufficient free space to hold the dump.
NFS-based swap is perfectly acceptable on 4.X or later systems, but you must be aware that the NFS server will take the brunt of the paging load.
This document presents the current design and implementation of the SMPng Architecture. First, the basic primitives and tools are introduced. Next, a general architecture for the FreeBSD kernel's synchronization and execution model is laid out. Then, locking strategies for specific subsystems are discussed, documenting the approaches taken to introduce fine-grained synchronization and parallelism for each subsystem. Finally, detailed implementation notes are provided to motivate design choices, and make the reader aware of important implications involving the use of specific primitives.
This document is a work-in-progress, and will be updated to reflect on-going design and implementation activities associated with the SMPng Project. Many sections currently exist only in outline form, but will be fleshed out as work proceeds. Updates or suggestions regarding the document may be directed to the document editors.
The goal of SMPng is to allow concurrency in the kernel. The kernel is basically one rather large and complex program. To make the kernel multi-threaded we use some of the same tools used to make other programs multi-threaded. These include mutexes, shared/exclusive locks, semaphores, and condition variables. For the definitions of these and other SMP-related terms, please see the Glossary section of this article.
There are several existing treatments of memory barriers and atomic instructions, so this section will not include a lot of detail. To put it simply, one can not go around reading variables without a lock if a lock is used to protect writes to that variable. This becomes obvious when you consider that memory barriers simply determine relative order of memory operations; they do not make any guarantee about timing of memory operations. That is, a memory barrier does not force the contents of a CPU's local cache or store buffer to flush. Instead, the memory barrier at lock release simply ensures that all writes to the protected data will be visible to other CPU's or devices if the write to release the lock is visible. The CPU is free to keep that data in its cache or store buffer as long as it wants. However, if another CPU performs an atomic instruction on the same datum, the first CPU must guarantee that the updated value is made visible to the second CPU along with any other operations that memory barriers may require.
For example, assuming a simple model where data is considered visible when it is in main memory (or a global cache), when an atomic instruction is triggered on one CPU, other CPU's store buffers and caches must flush any writes to that same cache line along with any pending operations behind a memory barrier.
This requires one to take special care when using an item protected by atomic
instructions. For example, in the sleep mutex implementation, we have to use an atomic_cmpset
rather than an atomic_set
to turn on the MTX_CONTESTED
bit. The reason is that we read the value of mtx_lock
into a variable and then make a decision based on
that read. However, the value we read may be stale, or it may change while we are making
our decision. Thus, when the atomic_set
executed, it may
end up setting the bit on another value than the one we made the decision on. Thus, we
have to use an atomic_cmpset
to set the value only if the
value we made the decision on is up-to-date and valid.
Finally, atomic instructions only allow one item to be updated or read. If one needs to atomically update several items, then a lock must be used instead. For example, if two counters must be read and have values that are consistent relative to each other, then those counters must be protected by a lock rather than by separate atomic instructions.
Read locks do not need to be as strong as write locks. Both types of locks need to ensure that the data they are accessing is not stale. However, only write access requires exclusive access. Multiple threads can safely read a value. Using different types of locks for reads and writes can be implemented in a number of ways.
First, sx locks can be used in this manner by using an exclusive lock when writing and a shared lock when reading. This method is quite straightforward.
A second method is a bit more obscure. You can protect a datum with multiple locks.
Then for reading that data you simply need to have a read lock of one of the locks.
However, to write to the data, you need to have a write lock of all of the locks. This
can make writing rather expensive but can be useful when data is accessed in various
ways. For example, the parent process pointer is protected by both the proctree_lock
sx lock and the per-process mutex. Sometimes the
proc lock is easier as we are just checking to see who a parent of a process is that we
already have locked. However, other places such as inferior
need to walk the tree of processes via parent pointers and locking each process would be
prohibitive as well as a pain to guarantee that the condition you are checking remains
valid for both the check and the actions taken as a result of the check.
If you need a lock to check the state of a variable so that you can take an action based on the state you read, you can not just hold the lock while reading the variable and then drop the lock before you act on the value you read. Once you drop the lock, the variable can change rendering your decision invalid. Thus, you must hold the lock both while reading the variable and while performing the action as a result of the test.
Following the pattern of several other multi-threaded UNIX kernels, FreeBSD deals with interrupt handlers by giving them their own thread context. Providing a context for interrupt handlers allows them to block on locks. To help avoid latency, however, interrupt threads run at real-time kernel priority. Thus, interrupt handlers should not execute for very long to avoid starving other kernel threads. In addition, since multiple handlers may share an interrupt thread, interrupt handlers should not sleep or use a sleepable lock to avoid starving another interrupt handler.
The interrupt threads currently in FreeBSD are referred to as heavyweight interrupt threads. They are called this because switching to an interrupt thread involves a full context switch. In the initial implementation, the kernel was not preemptive and thus interrupts that interrupted a kernel thread would have to wait until the kernel thread blocked or returned to userland before they would have an opportunity to run.
To deal with the latency problems, the kernel in FreeBSD has been made preemptive. Currently, we only preempt a kernel thread when we release a sleep mutex or when an interrupt comes in. However, the plan is to make the FreeBSD kernel fully preemptive as described below.
Not all interrupt handlers execute in a thread context. Instead, some handlers execute
directly in primary interrupt context. These interrupt handlers are currently misnamed
“fast” interrupt handlers since the INTR_FAST
flag used in earlier versions of the kernel is used to mark these handlers. The only
interrupts which currently use these types of interrupt handlers are clock interrupts and
serial I/O device interrupts. Since these handlers do not have their own context, they
may not acquire blocking locks and thus may only use spin mutexes.
Finally, there is one optional optimization that can be added in MD code called lightweight context switches. Since an interrupt thread executes in a kernel context, it can borrow the vmspace of any process. Thus, in a lightweight context switch, the switch to the interrupt thread does not switch vmspaces but borrows the vmspace of the interrupted thread. In order to ensure that the vmspace of the interrupted thread does not disappear out from under us, the interrupted thread is not allowed to execute until the interrupt thread is no longer borrowing its vmspace. This can happen when the interrupt thread either blocks or finishes. If an interrupt thread blocks, then it will use its own context when it is made runnable again. Thus, it can release the interrupted thread.
The cons of this optimization are that they are very machine specific and complex and thus only worth the effort if their is a large performance improvement. At this point it is probably too early to tell, and in fact, will probably hurt performance as almost all interrupt handlers will immediately block on Giant and require a thread fix-up when they block. Also, an alternative method of interrupt handling has been proposed by Mike Smith that works like so:
Each interrupt handler has two parts: a predicate which runs in primary interrupt context and a handler which runs in its own thread context.
If an interrupt handler has a predicate, then when an interrupt is triggered, the predicate is run. If the predicate returns true then the interrupt is assumed to be fully handled and the kernel returns from the interrupt. If the predicate returns false or there is no predicate, then the threaded handler is scheduled to run.
Fitting light weight context switches into this scheme might prove rather complicated. Since we may want to change to this scheme at some point in the future, it is probably best to defer work on light weight context switches until we have settled on the final interrupt handling architecture and determined how light weight context switches might or might not fit into it.
Kernel preemption is fairly simple. The basic idea is that a CPU should always be doing the highest priority work available. Well, that is the ideal at least. There are a couple of cases where the expense of achieving the ideal is not worth being perfect.
Implementing full kernel preemption is very straightforward: when you schedule a thread to be executed by putting it on a run queue, you check to see if its priority is higher than the currently executing thread. If so, you initiate a context switch to that thread.
While locks can protect most data in the case of a preemption, not all of the kernel
is preemption safe. For example, if a thread holding a spin mutex preempted and the new
thread attempts to grab the same spin mutex, the new thread may spin forever as the
interrupted thread may never get a chance to execute. Also, some code such as the code to
assign an address space number for a process during exec
on
the Alpha needs to not be preempted as it supports the actual context switch code.
Preemption is disabled for these code sections by using a critical section.
The responsibility of the critical section API is to prevent context switches inside
of a critical section. With a fully preemptive kernel, every setrunqueue
of a thread other than the current thread is a
preemption point. One implementation is for critical_enter
to set a per-thread flag that is cleared by its counterpart. If setrunqueue
is called with this flag set, it does not preempt
regardless of the priority of the new thread relative to the current thread. However,
since critical sections are used in spin mutexes to prevent context switches and multiple
spin mutexes can be acquired, the critical section API must support nesting. For this
reason the current implementation uses a nesting count instead of a single per-thread
flag.
In order to minimize latency, preemptions inside of a critical section are deferred rather than dropped. If a thread that would normally be preempted to is made runnable while the current thread is in a critical section, then a per-thread flag is set to indicate that there is a pending preemption. When the outermost critical section is exited, the flag is checked. If the flag is set, then the current thread is preempted to allow the higher priority thread to run.
Interrupts pose a problem with regards to spin mutexes. If a low-level interrupt
handler needs a lock, it needs to not interrupt any code needing that lock to avoid
possible data structure corruption. Currently, providing this mechanism is piggybacked
onto critical section API by means of the cpu_critical_enter
and cpu_critical_exit
functions. Currently this API disables and
re-enables interrupts on all of FreeBSD's current platforms. This approach may not be
purely optimal, but it is simple to understand and simple to get right. Theoretically,
this second API need only be used for spin mutexes that are used in primary interrupt
context. However, to make the code simpler, it is used for all spin mutexes and even all
critical sections. It may be desirable to split out the MD API from the MI API and only
use it in conjunction with the MI API in the spin mutex implementation. If this approach
is taken, then the MD API likely would need a rename to show that it is a separate
API.
As mentioned earlier, a couple of trade-offs have been made to sacrifice cases where perfect preemption may not always provide the best performance.
The first trade-off is that the preemption code does not take other CPUs into account. Suppose we have a two CPU's A and B with the priority of A's thread as 4 and the priority of B's thread as 2. If CPU B makes a thread with priority 1 runnable, then in theory, we want CPU A to switch to the new thread so that we will be running the two highest priority runnable threads. However, the cost of determining which CPU to enforce a preemption on as well as actually signaling that CPU via an IPI along with the synchronization that would be required would be enormous. Thus, the current code would instead force CPU B to switch to the higher priority thread. Note that this still puts the system in a better position as CPU B is executing a thread of priority 1 rather than a thread of priority 2.
The second trade-off limits immediate kernel preemption to real-time priority kernel threads. In the simple case of preemption defined above, a thread is always preempted immediately (or as soon as a critical section is exited) if a higher priority thread is made runnable. However, many threads executing in the kernel only execute in a kernel context for a short time before either blocking or returning to userland. Thus, if the kernel preempts these threads to run another non-realtime kernel thread, the kernel may switch out the executing thread just before it is about to sleep or execute. The cache on the CPU must then adjust to the new thread. When the kernel returns to the preempted thread, it must refill all the cache information that was lost. In addition, two extra context switches are performed that could be avoided if the kernel deferred the preemption until the first thread blocked or returned to userland. Thus, by default, the preemption code will only preempt immediately if the higher priority thread is a real-time priority thread.
Turning on full kernel preemption for all kernel threads has value as a debugging aid since it exposes more race conditions. It is especially useful on UP systems were many races are hard to simulate otherwise. Thus, there is a kernel option FULL_PREEMPTION to enable preemption for all kernel threads that can be used for debugging purposes.
Simply put, a thread migrates when it moves from one CPU to another. In a
non-preemptive kernel this can only happen at well-defined points such as when calling
msleep
or returning to userland. However, in the preemptive
kernel, an interrupt can force a preemption and possible migration at any time. This can
have negative affects on per-CPU data since with the exception of curthread
and curpcb
the data can
change whenever you migrate. Since you can potentially migrate at any time this renders
unprotected per-CPU data access rather useless. Thus it is desirable to be able to
disable migration for sections of code that need per-CPU data to be stable.
Critical sections currently prevent migration since they do not allow context switches. However, this may be too strong of a requirement to enforce in some cases since a critical section also effectively blocks interrupt threads on the current processor. As a result, another API has been provided to allow the current thread to indicate that if it preempted it should not migrate to another CPU.
This API is known as thread pinning and is provided by the scheduler. The API consists
of two functions: sched_pin
and sched_unpin
. These functions manage a per-thread nesting count
td_pinned
. A thread is pinned when its nesting count is
greater than zero and a thread starts off unpinned with a nesting count of zero. Each
scheduler implementation is required to ensure that pinned threads are only executed on
the CPU that they were executing on when the sched_pin
was
first called. Since the nesting count is only written to by the thread itself and is only
read by other threads when the pinned thread is not executing but while sched_lock
is held, then td_pinned
does not need any locking. The sched_pin
function
increments the nesting count and sched_unpin
decrements the
nesting count. Note that these functions only operate on the current thread and bind the
current thread to the CPU it is executing on at the time. To bind an arbitrary thread to
a specific CPU, the sched_bind
and sched_unbind
functions should be used instead.
The timeout
kernel facility permits kernel services to
register functions for execution as part of the softclock
software interrupt. Events are scheduled based on a desired number of clock ticks, and
callbacks to the consumer-provided function will occur at approximately the right
time.
The global list of pending timeout events is protected by a global spin mutex, callout_lock
; all access to the timeout list must be performed
with this mutex held. When softclock
is woken up, it scans
the list of pending timeouts for those that should fire. In order to avoid lock order
reversal, the softclock
thread will release the callout_lock
mutex when invoking the provided timeout
callback function. If the CALLOUT_MPSAFE
flag was not set during registration, then Giant
will be grabbed before invoking the callout, and then released afterwards. The callout_lock
mutex will be re-grabbed before proceeding. The softclock
code is careful to leave the list in a consistent state
while releasing the mutex. If DIAGNOSTIC
is enabled, then
the time taken to execute each function is measured, and a warning is generated if it
exceeds a threshold.
struct ucred
is the kernel's internal credential
structure, and is generally used as the basis for process-driven access control within
the kernel. BSD-derived systems use a “copy-on-write” model for credential
data: multiple references may exist for a credential structure, and when a change needs
to be made, the structure is duplicated, modified, and then the reference replaced. Due
to wide-spread caching of the credential to implement access control on open, this
results in substantial memory savings. With a move to fine-grained SMP, this model also
saves substantially on locking operations by requiring that modification only occur on an
unshared credential, avoiding the need for explicit synchronization when consuming a
known-shared credential.
Credential structures with a single reference are considered mutable; shared
credential structures must not be modified or a race condition is risked. A mutex, cr_mtxp
protects the reference count of struct ucred
so as to maintain consistency. Any use of the
structure requires a valid reference for the duration of the use, or the structure may be
released out from under the illegitimate consumer.
The struct ucred
mutex is a leaf mutex and is
implemented via a mutex pool for performance reasons.
Usually, credentials are used in a read-only manner for access control decisions, and
in this case td_ucred
is generally preferred because it
requires no locking. When a process' credential is updated the proc lock must be held across the check and update operations thus
avoid races. The process credential p_ucred
must be used
for check and update operations to prevent time-of-check, time-of-use races.
If system call invocations will perform access control after an update to the process
credential, the value of td_ucred
must also be refreshed
to the current process value. This will prevent use of a stale credential following a
change. The kernel automatically refreshes the td_ucred
pointer in the thread structure from the process p_ucred
whenever a process enters the kernel, permitting use of a fresh credential for kernel
access control.
struct prison
stores administrative details pertinent
to the maintenance of jails created using the jail(2) API. This
includes the per-jail hostname, IP address, and related settings. This structure is
reference-counted since pointers to instances of the structure are shared by many
credential structures. A single mutex, pr_mtx
protects
read and write access to the reference count and all mutable variables inside the struct
jail. Some variables are set only when the jail is created, and a valid reference to the
struct prison
is sufficient to read these values. The
precise locking of each entry is documented via comments in sys/jail.h.
The TrustedBSD MAC Framework maintains data in a variety of kernel objects, in the
form of struct label
. In general, labels in kernel
objects are protected by the same lock as the remainder of the kernel object. For
example, the v_label
label in struct vnode
is protected by the vnode lock on the vnode.
In addition to labels maintained in standard kernel objects, the MAC Framework also
maintains a list of registered and active policies. The policy list is protected by a
global mutex (mac_policy_list_lock
) and a busy count (also
protected by the mutex). Since many access control checks may occur in parallel, entry to
the framework for a read-only access to the policy list requires holding the mutex while
incrementing (and later decrementing) the busy count. The mutex need not be held for the
duration of the MAC entry operation--some operations, such as label operations on file
system objects--are long-lived. To modify the policy list, such as during policy
registration and de-registration, the mutex must be held and the reference count must be
zero, to prevent modification of the list while it is in use.
A condition variable, mac_policy_list_not_busy
, is
available to threads that need to wait for the list to become unbusy, but this condition
variable must only be waited on if the caller is holding no other locks, or a lock order
violation may be possible. The busy count, in effect, acts as a form of shared/exclusive
lock over access to the framework: the difference is that, unlike with an sx lock,
consumers waiting for the list to become unbusy may be starved, rather than permitting
lock order problems with regards to the busy count and other locks that may be held on
entry to (or inside) the MAC Framework.
For the module subsystem there exists a single lock that is used to protect the shared
data. This lock is a shared/exclusive (SX) lock and has a good chance of needing to be
acquired (shared or exclusively), therefore there are a few macros that have been added
to make access to the lock more easy. These macros can be located in sys/module.h and are quite basic in terms of usage. The main
structures protected under this lock are the module_t
structures (when shared) and the global modulelist_t
structure, modules. One should review the related source code in kern/kern_module.c to further understand the locking strategy.
The newbus system will have one sx lock. Readers will hold a shared (read) lock (sx_slock(9)) and writers will hold an exclusive (write) lock (sx_xlock(9)). Internal functions will not do locking at all. Externally visible ones will lock as needed. Those items that do not matter if the race is won or lost will not be locked, since they tend to be read all over the place (e.g. device_get_softc(9)). There will be relatively few changes to the newbus data structures, so a single lock should be sufficient and not impose a performance penalty.
- process hierarchy
- proc locks, references
- thread-specific copies of proc entries to freeze during system calls, including td_ucred
- inter-process operations
- process groups and sessions
Lots of references to sched_lock
and notes pointing at
specific primitives and related magic elsewhere in the document.
The select
and poll
functions permit threads to block waiting on events on file descriptors--most frequently,
whether or not the file descriptors are readable or writable.
...
The SIGIO service permits processes to request the delivery of a SIGIO signal to its
process group when the read/write status of specified file descriptors changes. At most
one process or process group is permitted to register for SIGIO from any given kernel
object, and that process or group is referred to as the owner. Each object supporting
SIGIO registration contains pointer field that is NULL
if
the object is not registered, or points to a struct sigio
describing the registration. This field is protected by a global mutex, sigio_lock
. Callers to SIGIO maintenance functions must pass in
this field “by reference” so that local register copies of the field are not
made when unprotected by the lock.
One struct sigio
is allocated for each registered
object associated with any process or process group, and contains back-pointers to the
object, owner, signal information, a credential, and the general disposition of the
registration. Each process or progress group contains a list of registered struct sigio
structures, p_sigiolst
for processes, and pg_sigiolst
for process groups. These lists are protected by
the process or process group locks respectively. Most fields in each struct sigio
are constant for the duration of the registration,
with the exception of the sio_pgsigio
field which links
the struct sigio
into the process or process group list.
Developers implementing new kernel objects supporting SIGIO will, in general, want to
avoid holding structure locks while invoking SIGIO supporting functions, such as fsetown
or funsetown
to avoid
defining a lock order between structure locks and the global SIGIO lock. This is
generally possible through use of an elevated reference count on the structure, such as
reliance on a file descriptor reference to a pipe during a pipe operation.
The sysctl
MIB service is invoked from both within the
kernel and from userland applications using a system call. At least two issues are raised
in locking: first, the protection of the structures maintaining the namespace, and
second, interactions with kernel variables and functions that are accessed by the sysctl
interface. Since sysctl permits the direct export (and modification) of kernel statistics
and configuration parameters, the sysctl mechanism must become aware of appropriate
locking semantics for those variables. Currently, sysctl makes use of a single global sx
lock to serialize use of sysctl
; however, it is assumed to
operate under Giant and other protections are not provided. The remainder of this section
speculates on locking and semantic changes to sysctl.
- Need to change the order of operations for sysctl's that update values from read old, copyin and copyout, write new to copyin, lock, read old and write new, unlock, copyout. Normal sysctl's that just copyout the old value and set a new value that they copyin may still be able to follow the old model. However, it may be cleaner to use the second model for all of the sysctl handlers to avoid lock operations.
- To allow for the common case, a sysctl could embed a pointer to a mutex in the SYSCTL_FOO macros and in the struct. This would work for most sysctl's. For values protected by sx locks, spin mutexes, or other locking strategies besides a single sleep mutex, SYSCTL_PROC nodes could be used to get the locking right.
The taskqueue's interface has two basic locks associated with it in order to protect
the related shared data. The taskqueue_queues_mutex
is meant
to serve as a lock to protect the taskqueue_queues
TAILQ.
The other mutex lock associated with this system is the one in the struct taskqueue
data structure. The use of the synchronization
primitive here is to protect the integrity of the data in the struct taskqueue
. It should be noted that there are no separate
macros to assist the user in locking down his/her own work since these locks are most
likely not going to be used outside of kern/subr_taskqueue.c.
A sleep queue is a structure that holds the list of threads asleep on a wait channel. Each thread that is not asleep on a wait channel carries a sleep queue structure around with it. When a thread blocks on a wait channel, it donates its sleep queue structure to that wait channel. Sleep queues associated with a wait channel are stored in a hash table.
The sleep queue hash table holds sleep queues for wait channels that have at least one blocked thread. Each entry in the hash table is called a sleepqueue chain. The chain contains a linked list of sleep queues and a spin mutex. The spin mutex protects the list of sleep queues as well as the contents of the sleep queue structures on the list. Only one sleep queue is associated with a given wait channel. If multiple threads block on a wait channel than the sleep queues associated with all but the first thread are stored on a list of free sleep queues in the master sleep queue. When a thread is removed from the sleep queue it is given one of the sleep queue structures from the master queue's free list if it is not the only thread asleep on the queue. The last thread is given the master sleep queue when it is resumed. Since threads may be removed from the sleep queue in a different order than they are added, a thread may depart from a sleep queue with a different sleep queue structure than the one it arrived with.
The sleepq_lock
function locks the spin mutex of the
sleep queue chain that maps to a specific wait channel. The sleepq_lookup
function looks in the hash table for the master
sleep queue associated with a given wait channel. If no master sleep queue is found, it
returns NULL
. The sleepq_release
function unlocks the spin mutex associated with a
given wait channel.
A thread is added to a sleep queue via the sleepq_add
.
This function accepts the wait channel, a pointer to the mutex that protects the wait
channel, a wait message description string, and a mask of flags. The sleep queue chain
should be locked via sleepq_lock
before this function is
called. If no mutex protects the wait channel (or it is protected by Giant), then the
mutex pointer argument should be NULL
. The flags argument
contains a type field that indicates the kind of sleep queue that the thread is being
added to and a flag to indicate if the sleep is interruptible (SLEEPQ_INTERRUPTIBLE
). Currently there are only two types of
sleep queues: traditional sleep queues managed via the msleep
and wakeup
functions (SLEEPQ_MSLEEP
) and condition variable sleep queues (SLEEPQ_CONDVAR
). The sleep queue type and lock pointer argument
are used solely for internal assertion checking. Code that calls sleepq_add
should explicitly unlock any interlock protecting the
wait channel after the associated sleepqueue chain has been locked via sleepq_lock
and before blocking on the sleep queue via one of the
waiting functions.
A timeout for a sleep is set by invoking sleepq_set_timeout
. The function accepts the wait channel and the
timeout time as a relative tick count as its arguments. If a sleep should be interrupted
by arriving signals, the sleepq_catch_signals
function
should be called as well. This function accepts the wait channel as its only parameter.
If there is already a signal pending for this thread, then sleepq_catch_signals
will return a signal number; otherwise, it
will return 0.
Once a thread has been added to a sleep queue, it blocks using one of the sleepq_wait
functions. There are four wait functions depending on
whether or not the caller wishes to use a timeout or have the sleep aborted by caught
signals or an interrupt from the userland thread scheduler. The sleepq_wait
function simply waits until the current thread is
explicitly resumed by one of the wakeup functions. The sleepq_timedwait
function waits until either the thread is
explicitly resumed or the timeout set by an earlier call to sleepq_set_timeout
expires. The sleepq_wait_sig
function waits until either the thread is
explicitly resumed or its sleep is aborted. The sleepq_timedwait_sig
function waits until either the thread is
explicitly resumed, the timeout set by an earlier call to sleepq_set_timeout
expires, or the thread's sleep is aborted. All
of the wait functions accept the wait channel as their first parameter. In addition, the
sleepq_timedwait_sig
function accepts a second boolean
parameter to indicate if the earlier call to sleepq_catch_signals
found a pending signal.
If the thread is explicitly resumed or is aborted by a signal, then a value of zero is
returned by the wait function to indicate a successful sleep. If the thread is resumed by
either a timeout or an interrupt from the userland thread scheduler then an appropriate
errno value is returned instead. Note that since sleepq_wait
can only return 0 it does not return anything and the
caller should assume a successful sleep. Also, if a thread's sleep times out and is
aborted simultaneously then sleepq_timedwait_sig
will
return an error indicating that a timeout occurred. If an error value of 0 is returned
and either sleepq_wait_sig
or sleepq_timedwait_sig
was used to block, then the function sleepq_calc_signal_retval
should be called to check for any
pending signals and calculate an appropriate return value if any are found. The signal
number returned by the earlier call to sleepq_catch_signals
should be passed as the sole argument to sleepq_calc_signal_retval
.
Threads asleep on a wait channel are explicitly resumed by the sleepq_broadcast
and sleepq_signal
functions. Both functions accept the wait channel from which to resume threads, a
priority to raise resumed threads to, and a flags argument to indicate which type of
sleep queue is being resumed. The priority argument is treated as a minimum priority. If
a thread being resumed already has a higher priority (numerically lower) than the
priority argument then its priority is not adjusted. The flags argument is used for
internal assertions to ensure that sleep queues are not being treated as the wrong type.
For example, the condition variable functions should not resume threads on a traditional
sleep queue. The sleepq_broadcast
function resumes all
threads that are blocked on the specified wait channel while sleepq_signal
only resumes the highest priority thread blocked on
the wait channel. The sleep queue chain should first be locked via the sleepq_lock
function before calling these functions.
A sleeping thread may have its sleep interrupted by calling the sleepq_abort
function. This function must be called with sched_lock
held and the thread must be queued on a sleep queue. A
thread may also be removed from a specific sleep queue via the sleepq_remove
function. This function accepts both a thread and a
wait channel as an argument and only awakens the thread if it is on the sleep queue for
the specified wait channel. If the thread is not on a sleep queue or it is on a sleep
queue for a different wait channel, then this function does nothing.
- Compare/contrast with sleep queues.
- Lookup/wait/release. - Describe TDF_TSNOBLOCK race.
- Priority propagation.
- Should we require mutexes to be owned for mtx_destroy() since we can not safely assert that they are unowned by anyone else otherwise?
- Describe the races with contested mutexes
- Why it is safe to read mtx_lock of a contested mutex when holding the turnstile chain lock.
- Should we pass an interlock into sema_wait
?
- Should we have non-sleepable sx locks?
- Add some info about proper use of reference counts.
An operation is atomic if all of its effects are visible to other CPUs together when the proper access protocol is followed. In the degenerate case are atomic instructions provided directly by machine architectures. At a higher level, if several members of a structure are protected by a lock, then a set of operations are atomic if they are all performed while holding the lock without releasing the lock in between any of the operations.
See Also: operation.
A thread is blocked when it is waiting on a lock, resource, or condition. Unfortunately this term is a bit overloaded as a result.
See Also: sleep.
A section of code that is not allowed to be preempted. A critical section is entered and exited using the critical_enter(9) API.
Machine dependent.
See Also: MI.
A memory operation reads and/or writes to a memory location.
Machine independent.
See Also: MD.
Primary interrupt context refers to the code that runs when an interrupt occurs. This code can either run an interrupt handler directly or schedule an asynchronous interrupt thread to execute the interrupt handlers for a given interrupt source.
A high priority kernel thread. Currently, the only realtime priority kernel threads are interrupt threads.
See Also: thread.
A thread is asleep when it is blocked on a condition variable or a sleep queue via
msleep
or tsleep
.
See Also: block.
A sleepable lock is a lock that can be held by a thread which is asleep. Lockmgr locks and sx locks are currently the only sleepable locks in FreeBSD. Eventually, some sx locks such as the allproc and proctree locks may become non-sleepable locks.
See Also: sleep.
A kernel thread represented by a struct thread. Threads own locks and hold a single execution context.
A kernel virtual address that threads may sleep on.
This chapter provides a brief introduction to writing device drivers for FreeBSD. A device in this context is a term used mostly for hardware-related stuff that belongs to the system, like disks, printers, or a graphics display with its keyboard. A device driver is the software component of the operating system that controls a specific device. There are also so-called pseudo-devices where a device driver emulates the behavior of a device in software without any particular underlying hardware. Device drivers can be compiled into the system statically or loaded on demand through the dynamic kernel linker facility `kld'.
Most devices in a UNIX-like operating system are accessed through device-nodes, sometimes also called special files. These files are usually located under the directory /dev in the filesystem hierarchy. In releases of FreeBSD older than 5.0-RELEASE, where devfs(5) support is not integrated into FreeBSD, each device node must be created statically and independent of the existence of the associated device driver. Most device nodes on the system are created by running MAKEDEV.
Device drivers can roughly be broken down into two categories; character and network device drivers.
The kld interface allows system administrators to dynamically add and remove functionality from a running system. This allows device driver writers to load their new changes into a running kernel without constantly rebooting to test changes.
The kld interface is used through the following privileged commands:
kldload - loads a new kernel module
kldunload - unloads a kernel module
kldstat - lists the currently loaded modules
Skeleton Layout of a kernel module
/* * KLD Skeleton * Inspired by Andrew Reiter's Daemonnews article */ #include <sys/types.h> #include <sys/module.h> #include <sys/systm.h> /* uprintf */ #include <sys/errno.h> #include <sys/param.h> /* defines used in kernel.h */ #include <sys/kernel.h> /* types used in module initialization */ /* * Load handler that deals with the loading and unloading of a KLD. */ static int skel_loader(struct module *m, int what, void *arg) { int err = 0; switch (what) { case MOD_LOAD: /* kldload */ uprintf("Skeleton KLD loaded.\n"); break; case MOD_UNLOAD: uprintf("Skeleton KLD unloaded.\n"); break; default: err = EOPNOTSUPP; break; } return(err); } /* Declare this module to the rest of the kernel */ static moduledata_t skel_mod = { "skel", skel_loader, NULL }; DECLARE_MODULE(skeleton, skel_mod, SI_SUB_KLD, SI_ORDER_ANY);
FreeBSD provides a makefile include that you can use to quickly compile your kernel addition.
SRCS=skeleton.c KMOD=skeleton .include <bsd.kmod.mk>
Simply running make with this makefile will create a file skeleton.ko that can be loaded into your system by typing:
# kldload -v ./skeleton.ko
UNIX provides a common set of system calls for user applications to use. The upper layers of the kernel dispatch these calls to the corresponding device driver when a user accesses a device node. The /dev/MAKEDEV script makes most of the device nodes for your system but if you are doing your own driver development it may be necessary to create your own device nodes with mknod.
The mknod command requires four arguments to create a device node. You must specify the name of the device node, the type of device, the major number of the device, and the minor number of the device.
The device filesystem, or devfs, provides access to the kernel's device namespace in the global filesystem namespace. This eliminates the problems of potentially having a device driver without a static device node, or a device node without an installed device driver. Devfs is still a work in progress, but it is already working quite nicely.
A character device driver is one that transfers data directly to and from a user process. This is the most common type of device driver and there are plenty of simple examples in the source tree.
This simple example pseudo-device remembers whatever values you write to it and can then supply them back to you when you read from it. Two versions are shown, one for FreeBSD 4.X and one for FreeBSD 5.X.
Example 9-1. Example of a Sample Echo Pseudo-Device Driver for FreeBSD 4.X
/* * Simple `echo' pseudo-device KLD * * Murray Stokely */ #define MIN(a,b) (((a) < (b)) ? (a) : (b)) #include <sys/types.h> #include <sys/module.h> #include <sys/systm.h> /* uprintf */ #include <sys/errno.h> #include <sys/param.h> /* defines used in kernel.h */ #include <sys/kernel.h> /* types used in module initialization */ #include <sys/conf.h> /* cdevsw struct */ #include <sys/uio.h> /* uio struct */ #include <sys/malloc.h> #define BUFFERSIZE 256 /* Function prototypes */ d_open_t echo_open; d_close_t echo_close; d_read_t echo_read; d_write_t echo_write; /* Character device entry points */ static struct cdevsw echo_cdevsw = { echo_open, echo_close, echo_read, echo_write, noioctl, nopoll, nommap, nostrategy, "echo", 33, /* reserved for lkms - /usr/src/sys/conf/majors */ nodump, nopsize, D_TTY, -1 }; typedef struct s_echo { char msg[BUFFERSIZE]; int len; } t_echo; /* vars */ static dev_t sdev; static int count; static t_echo *echomsg; MALLOC_DECLARE(M_ECHOBUF); MALLOC_DEFINE(M_ECHOBUF, "echobuffer", "buffer for echo module"); /* * This function is called by the kld[un]load(2) system calls to * determine what actions to take when a module is loaded or unloaded. */ static int echo_loader(struct module *m, int what, void *arg) { int err = 0; switch (what) { case MOD_LOAD: /* kldload */ sdev = make_dev(&echo_cdevsw, 0, UID_ROOT, GID_WHEEL, 0600, "echo"); /* kmalloc memory for use by this driver */ MALLOC(echomsg, t_echo *, sizeof(t_echo), M_ECHOBUF, M_WAITOK); printf("Echo device loaded.\n"); break; case MOD_UNLOAD: destroy_dev(sdev); FREE(echomsg,M_ECHOBUF); printf("Echo device unloaded.\n"); break; default: err = EOPNOTSUPP; break; } return(err); } int echo_open(dev_t dev, int oflags, int devtype, struct proc *p) { int err = 0; uprintf("Opened device \"echo\" successfully.\n"); return(err); } int echo_close(dev_t dev, int fflag, int devtype, struct proc *p) { uprintf("Closing device \"echo.\"\n"); return(0); } /* * The read function just takes the buf that was saved via * echo_write() and returns it to userland for accessing. * uio(9) */ int echo_read(dev_t dev, struct uio *uio, int ioflag) { int err = 0; int amt; /* * How big is this read operation? Either as big as the user wants, * or as big as the remaining data */ amt = MIN(uio->uio_resid, (echomsg->len - uio->uio_offset > 0) ? echomsg->len - uio->uio_offset : 0); if ((err = uiomove(echomsg->msg + uio->uio_offset,amt,uio)) != 0) { uprintf("uiomove failed!\n"); } return(err); } /* * echo_write takes in a character string and saves it * to buf for later accessing. */ int echo_write(dev_t dev, struct uio *uio, int ioflag) { int err = 0; /* Copy the string in from user memory to kernel memory */ err = copyin(uio->uio_iov->iov_base, echomsg->msg, MIN(uio->uio_iov->iov_len, BUFFERSIZE - 1)); /* Now we need to null terminate, then record the length */ *(echomsg->msg + MIN(uio->uio_iov->iov_len, BUFFERSIZE - 1)) = 0; echomsg->len = MIN(uio->uio_iov->iov_len, BUFFERSIZE); if (err != 0) { uprintf("Write failed: bad address!\n"); } count++; return(err); } DEV_MODULE(echo,echo_loader,NULL);
Example 9-2. Example of a Sample Echo Pseudo-Device Driver for FreeBSD 5.X
/* * Simple `echo' pseudo-device KLD * * Murray Stokely * * Converted to 5.X by Søren (Xride) Straarup */ #include <sys/types.h> #include <sys/module.h> #include <sys/systm.h> /* uprintf */ #include <sys/errno.h> #include <sys/param.h> /* defines used in kernel.h */ #include <sys/kernel.h> /* types used in module initialization */ #include <sys/conf.h> /* cdevsw struct */ #include <sys/uio.h> /* uio struct */ #include <sys/malloc.h> #define BUFFERSIZE 256 /* Function prototypes */ static d_open_t echo_open; static d_close_t echo_close; static d_read_t echo_read; static d_write_t echo_write; /* Character device entry points */ static struct cdevsw echo_cdevsw = { .d_version = D_VERSION, .d_open = echo_open, .d_close = echo_close, .d_read = echo_read, .d_write = echo_write, .d_name = "echo", }; typedef struct s_echo { char msg[BUFFERSIZE]; int len; } t_echo; /* vars */ static struct cdev *echo_dev; static int count; static t_echo *echomsg; MALLOC_DECLARE(M_ECHOBUF); MALLOC_DEFINE(M_ECHOBUF, "echobuffer", "buffer for echo module"); /* * This function is called by the kld[un]load(2) system calls to * determine what actions to take when a module is loaded or unloaded. */ static int echo_loader(struct module *m, int what, void *arg) { int err = 0; switch (what) { case MOD_LOAD: /* kldload */ echo_dev = make_dev(&echo_cdevsw, 0, UID_ROOT, GID_WHEEL, 0600, "echo"); /* kmalloc memory for use by this driver */ echomsg = malloc(sizeof(t_echo), M_ECHOBUF, M_WAITOK); printf("Echo device loaded.\n"); break; case MOD_UNLOAD: destroy_dev(echo_dev); free(echomsg, M_ECHOBUF); printf("Echo device unloaded.\n"); break; default: err = EOPNOTSUPP; break; } return(err); } static int echo_open(struct cdev *dev, int oflags, int devtype, struct thread *p) { int err = 0; uprintf("Opened device \"echo\" successfully.\n"); return(err); } static int echo_close(struct cdev *dev, int fflag, int devtype, struct thread *p) { uprintf("Closing device \"echo.\"\n"); return(0); } /* * The read function just takes the buf that was saved via * echo_write() and returns it to userland for accessing. * uio(9) */ static int echo_read(struct cdev *dev, struct uio *uio, int ioflag) { int err = 0; int amt; /* * How big is this read operation? Either as big as the user wants, * or as big as the remaining data */ amt = MIN(uio->uio_resid, (echomsg->len - uio->uio_offset > 0) ? echomsg->len - uio->uio_offset : 0); if ((err = uiomove(echomsg->msg + uio->uio_offset, amt, uio)) != 0) { uprintf("uiomove failed!\n"); } return(err); } /* * echo_write takes in a character string and saves it * to buf for later accessing. */ static int echo_write(struct cdev *dev, struct uio *uio, int ioflag) { int err = 0; /* Copy the string in from user memory to kernel memory */ err = copyin(uio->uio_iov->iov_base, echomsg->msg, MIN(uio->uio_iov->iov_len, BUFFERSIZE - 1)); /* Now we need to null terminate, then record the length */ *(echomsg->msg + MIN(uio->uio_iov->iov_len, BUFFERSIZE - 1)) = 0; echomsg->len = MIN(uio->uio_iov->iov_len, BUFFERSIZE); if (err != 0) { uprintf("Write failed: bad address!\n"); } count++; return(err); } DEV_MODULE(echo,echo_loader,NULL);
To install this driver on FreeBSD 4.X you will first need to make a node on your filesystem with a command such as:
# mknod /dev/echo c 33 0
With this driver loaded you should now be able to type something like:
# echo -n "Test Data" > /dev/echo # cat /dev/echo Test Data
Real hardware devices are described in the next chapter.
Additional Resources
Dynamic Kernel Linker (KLD) Facility Programming Tutorial - Daemonnews October 2000
How to Write Kernel Drivers with NEWBUS - Daemonnews July 2000
Other UNIX systems may support a second type of disk device known as block devices. Block devices are disk devices for which the kernel provides caching. This caching makes block-devices almost unusable, or at least dangerously unreliable. The caching will reorder the sequence of write operations, depriving the application of the ability to know the exact disk contents at any one instant in time. This makes predictable and reliable crash recovery of on-disk data structures (filesystems, databases etc.) impossible. Since writes may be delayed, there is no way the kernel can report to the application which particular write operation encountered a write error, this further compounds the consistency problem. For this reason, no serious applications rely on block devices, and in fact, almost all applications which access disks directly take great pains to specify that character (or “raw”) devices should always be used. Because the implementation of the aliasing of each disk (partition) to two devices with different semantics significantly complicated the relevant kernel code FreeBSD dropped support for cached disk devices as part of the modernization of the disk I/O infrastructure.
Drivers for network devices do not use device nodes in order to be accessed. Their selection is based on other decisions made inside the kernel and instead of calling open(), use of a network device is generally introduced by using the system call socket(2).
For more information see ifnet(9), the source of the loopback device, and Bill Paul's network drivers.
This chapter introduces the issues relevant to writing a driver for an ISA device. The pseudo-code presented here is rather detailed and reminiscent of the real code but is still only pseudo-code. It avoids the details irrelevant to the subject of the discussion. The real-life examples can be found in the source code of real drivers. In particular the drivers ep and aha are good sources of information.
A typical ISA driver would need the following include files:
#include <sys/module.h> #include <sys/bus.h> #include <machine/bus.h> #include <machine/resource.h> #include <sys/rman.h> #include <isa/isavar.h> #include <isa/pnpvar.h>
They describe the things specific to the ISA and generic bus subsystem.
The bus subsystem is implemented in an object-oriented fashion, its main structures are accessed by associated method functions.
The list of bus methods implemented by an ISA driver is like one for any other bus. For a hypothetical driver named “xxx” they would be:
static void xxx_isa_identify (driver_t *, device_t);
Normally used for bus drivers, not device drivers. But for ISA devices this method may
have special use: if the device provides some device-specific (non-PnP) way to
auto-detect devices this routine may implement it.
static int xxx_isa_probe (device_t dev);
Probe for a
device at a known (or PnP) location. This routine can also accommodate device-specific
auto-detection of parameters for partially configured devices.
static int xxx_isa_attach (device_t dev);
Attach and
initialize device.
static int xxx_isa_detach (device_t dev);
Detach device
before unloading the driver module.
static int xxx_isa_shutdown (device_t dev);
Execute
shutdown of the device before system shutdown.
static int xxx_isa_suspend (device_t dev);
Suspend the
device before the system goes to the power-save state. May also abort transition to the
power-save state.
static int xxx_isa_resume (device_t dev);
Resume the
device activity after return from power-save state.
xxx_isa_probe()
and xxx_isa_attach()
are mandatory, the rest of the routines are
optional, depending on the device's needs.
The driver is linked to the system with the following set of descriptions.
/* table of supported bus methods */ static device_method_t xxx_isa_methods[] = { /* list all the bus method functions supported by the driver */ /* omit the unsupported methods */ DEVMETHOD(device_identify, xxx_isa_identify), DEVMETHOD(device_probe, xxx_isa_probe), DEVMETHOD(device_attach, xxx_isa_attach), DEVMETHOD(device_detach, xxx_isa_detach), DEVMETHOD(device_shutdown, xxx_isa_shutdown), DEVMETHOD(device_suspend, xxx_isa_suspend), DEVMETHOD(device_resume, xxx_isa_resume), { 0, 0 } }; static driver_t xxx_isa_driver = { "xxx", xxx_isa_methods, sizeof(struct xxx_softc), }; static devclass_t xxx_devclass; DRIVER_MODULE(xxx, isa, xxx_isa_driver, xxx_devclass, load_function, load_argument);
Here struct xxx_softc
is a device-specific structure
that contains private driver data and descriptors for the driver's resources. The bus
code automatically allocates one softc descriptor per device as needed.
If the driver is implemented as a loadable module then load_function()
is called to do driver-specific initialization or
clean-up when the driver is loaded or unloaded and load_argument is passed as one of its
arguments. If the driver does not support dynamic loading (in other words it must always
be linked into the kernel) then these values should be set to 0 and the last definition
would look like:
DRIVER_MODULE(xxx, isa, xxx_isa_driver, xxx_devclass, 0, 0);
If the driver is for a device which supports PnP then a table of supported PnP IDs must be defined. The table consists of a list of PnP IDs supported by this driver and human-readable descriptions of the hardware types and models having these IDs. It looks like:
static struct isa_pnp_id xxx_pnp_ids[] = { /* a line for each supported PnP ID */ { 0x12345678, "Our device model 1234A" }, { 0x12345679, "Our device model 1234B" }, { 0, NULL }, /* end of table */ };
If the driver does not support PnP devices it still needs an empty PnP ID table, like:
static struct isa_pnp_id xxx_pnp_ids[] = { { 0, NULL }, /* end of table */ };
Device_t
is the pointer type for the device structure.
Here we consider only the methods interesting from the device driver writer's standpoint.
The methods to manipulate values in the device structure are:
device_t device_get_parent(dev)
Get the parent bus of a
device.
driver_t device_get_driver(dev)
Get pointer to its
driver structure.
char *device_get_name(dev)
Get the driver name, such as
"xxx" for our example.
int device_get_unit(dev)
Get the unit number (units are
numbered from 0 for the devices associated with each driver).
char *device_get_nameunit(dev)
Get the device name
including the unit number, such as “xxx0”, “xxx1” and so on.
char *device_get_desc(dev)
Get the device description.
Normally it describes the exact model of device in human-readable form.
device_set_desc(dev, desc)
Set the description. This
makes the device description point to the string desc which may not be deallocated or
changed after that.
device_set_desc_copy(dev, desc)
Set the description. The
description is copied into an internal dynamically allocated buffer, so the string desc
may be changed afterwards without adverse effects.
void *device_get_softc(dev)
Get pointer to the device
descriptor (struct xxx_softc
) associated with this
device.
u_int32_t device_get_flags(dev)
Get the flags specified
for the device in the configuration file.
A convenience function device_printf(dev, fmt, ...)
may
be used to print the messages from the device driver. It automatically prepends the
unitname and colon to the message.
The device_t methods are implemented in the file kern/bus_subr.c.
The ISA devices are described in the kernel configuration file like:
device xxx0 at isa? port 0x300 irq 10 drq 5 iomem 0xd0000 flags 0x1 sensitive
The values of port, IRQ and so on are converted to the resource values associated with the device. They are optional, depending on the device's needs and abilities for auto-configuration. For example, some devices do not need DRQ at all and some allow the driver to read the IRQ setting from the device configuration ports. If a machine has multiple ISA buses the exact bus may be specified in the configuration line, like isa0 or isa1, otherwise the device would be searched for on all the ISA buses.
sensitive is a resource requesting that this device must be probed before all non-sensitive devices. It is supported but does not seem to be used in any current driver.
For legacy ISA devices in many cases the drivers are still able to detect the configuration parameters. But each device to be configured in the system must have a config line. If two devices of some type are installed in the system but there is only one configuration line for the corresponding driver, ie:
device xxx0 at isa?then only one device will be configured.
But for the devices supporting automatic identification by the means of Plug-n-Play or some proprietary protocol one configuration line is enough to configure all the devices in the system, like the one above or just simply:
device xxx at isa?
If a driver supports both auto-identified and legacy devices and both kinds are installed at once in one machine then it is enough to describe in the config file the legacy devices only. The auto-identified devices will be added automatically.
When an ISA bus is auto-configured the events happen as follows:
All the drivers' identify routines (including the PnP identify routine which identifies all the PnP devices) are called in random order. As they identify the devices they add them to the list on the ISA bus. Normally the drivers' identify routines associate their drivers with the new devices. The PnP identify routine does not know about the other drivers yet so it does not associate any with the new devices it adds.
The PnP devices are put to sleep using the PnP protocol to prevent them from being probed as legacy devices.
The probe routines of non-PnP devices marked as sensitive are called. If probe for a device went successfully, the attach routine is called for it.
The probe and attach routines of all non-PNP devices are called likewise.
The PnP devices are brought back from the sleep state and assigned the resources they request: I/O and memory address ranges, IRQs and DRQs, all of them not conflicting with the attached legacy devices.
Then for each PnP device the probe routines of all the present ISA drivers are called.
The first one that claims the device gets attached. It is possible that multiple drivers
would claim the device with different priority; in this case, the highest-priority driver
wins. The probe routines must call ISA_PNP_PROBE()
to
compare the actual PnP ID with the list of the IDs supported by the driver and if the ID
is not in the table return failure. That means that absolutely every driver, even the
ones not supporting any PnP devices must call ISA_PNP_PROBE()
, at least with an empty PnP ID table to return
failure on unknown PnP devices.
The probe routine returns a positive value (the error code) on error, zero or negative value on success.
The negative return values are used when a PnP device supports multiple interfaces. For example, an older compatibility interface and a newer advanced interface which are supported by different drivers. Then both drivers would detect the device. The driver which returns a higher value in the probe routine takes precedence (in other words, the driver returning 0 has highest precedence, returning -1 is next, returning -2 is after it and so on). In result the devices which support only the old interface will be handled by the old driver (which should return -1 from the probe routine) while the devices supporting the new interface as well will be handled by the new driver (which should return 0 from the probe routine). If multiple drivers return the same value then the one called first wins. So if a driver returns value 0 it may be sure that it won the priority arbitration.
The device-specific identify routines can also assign not a driver but a class of drivers to the device. Then all the drivers in the class are probed for this device, like the case with PnP. This feature is not implemented in any existing driver and is not considered further in this document.
Because the PnP devices are disabled when probing the legacy devices they will not be attached twice (once as legacy and once as PnP). But in case of device-dependent identify routines it is the responsibility of the driver to make sure that the same device will not be attached by the driver twice: once as legacy user-configured and once as auto-identified.
Another practical consequence for the auto-identified devices (both PnP and device-specific) is that the flags can not be passed to them from the kernel configuration file. So they must either not use the flags at all or use the flags from the device unit 0 for all the auto-identified devices or use the sysctl interface instead of flags.
Other unusual configurations may be accommodated by accessing the configuration
resources directly with functions of families resource_query_*()
and resource_*_value()
. Their implementations are located in kern/subr_bus.c. The old IDE disk driver i386/isa/wd.c contains examples of such use. But the standard means
of configuration must always be preferred. Leave parsing the configuration resources to
the bus configuration code.
The information that a user enters into the kernel configuration file is processed and
passed to the kernel as configuration resources. This information is parsed by the bus
configuration code and transformed into a value of structure device_t and the bus
resources associated with it. The drivers may access the configuration resources directly
using functions resource_*
for more complex cases of
configuration. However, generally this is neither needed nor recommended, so this issue
is not discussed further here.
The bus resources are associated with each device. They are identified by type and number within the type. For the ISA bus the following types are defined:
SYS_RES_IRQ - interrupt number
SYS_RES_DRQ - ISA DMA channel number
SYS_RES_MEMORY - range of device memory mapped into the system memory space
SYS_RES_IOPORT - range of device I/O registers
The enumeration within types starts from 0, so if a device has two memory regions it would have resources of type SYS_RES_MEMORY numbered 0 and 1. The resource type has nothing to do with the C language type, all the resource values have the C language type unsigned long and must be cast as necessary. The resource numbers do not have to be contiguous, although for ISA they normally would be. The permitted resource numbers for ISA devices are:
IRQ: 0-1 DRQ: 0-1 MEMORY: 0-3 IOPORT: 0-7
All the resources are represented as ranges, with a start value and count. For IRQ and DRQ resources the count would normally be equal to 1. The values for memory refer to the physical addresses.
Three types of activities can be performed on resources:
set/get
allocate/release
activate/deactivate
Setting sets the range used by the resource. Allocation reserves the requested range that no other driver would be able to reserve it (and checking that no other driver reserved this range already). Activation makes the resource accessible to the driver by doing whatever is necessary for that (for example, for memory it would be mapping into the kernel virtual address space).
The functions to manipulate resources are:
int bus_set_resource(device_t dev, int type, int rid, u_long
start, u_long count)
Set a range for a resource. Returns 0 if successful, error code otherwise. Normally, this function will return an error only if one of type, rid, start or count has a value that falls out of the permitted range.
dev - driver's device
type - type of resource, SYS_RES_*
rid - resource number (ID) within type
start, count - resource range
int bus_get_resource(device_t dev, int type, int rid, u_long
*startp, u_long *countp)
Get the range of resource. Returns 0 if successful, error code if the resource is not defined yet.
u_long bus_get_resource_start(device_t dev, int type, int rid)
u_long bus_get_resource_count (device_t dev, int type, int rid)
Convenience functions to get only the start or count. Return 0 in case of error, so if the resource start has 0 among the legitimate values it would be impossible to tell if the value is 0 or an error occurred. Luckily, no ISA resources for add-on drivers may have a start value equal to 0.
void bus_delete_resource(device_t dev, int type, int
rid)
Delete a resource, make it undefined.
struct resource * bus_alloc_resource(device_t dev, int type,
int *rid, u_long start, u_long end, u_long count, u_int flags)
Allocate a resource as a range of count values not allocated by anyone else, somewhere
between start and end. Alas, alignment is not supported. If the resource was not set yet
it is automatically created. The special values of start 0 and end ~0 (all ones) means
that the fixed values previously set by bus_set_resource()
must be used instead: start and count as themselves and end=(start+count), in this case
if the resource was not defined before then an error is returned. Although rid is passed
by reference it is not set anywhere by the resource allocation code of the ISA bus. (The
other buses may use a different approach and modify it).
Flags are a bitmap, the flags interesting for the caller are:
RF_ACTIVE - causes the resource to be automatically activated after allocation.
RF_SHAREABLE - resource may be shared at the same time by multiple drivers.
RF_TIMESHARE - resource may be time-shared by multiple drivers, i.e. allocated at the same time by many but activated only by one at any given moment of time.
Returns 0 on error. The allocated values may be obtained from the returned handle
using methods rhand_*()
.
int bus_release_resource(device_t dev, int type, int rid,
struct resource *r)
Release the resource, r is the handle returned by bus_alloc_resource()
. Returns 0 on success, error code
otherwise.
int bus_activate_resource(device_t dev, int type, int rid,
struct resource *r)
int bus_deactivate_resource(device_t
dev, int type, int rid, struct resource *r)
Activate or deactivate resource. Return 0 on success, error code otherwise. If the resource is time-shared and currently activated by another driver then EBUSY is returned.
int bus_setup_intr(device_t dev, struct resource *r, int flags,
driver_intr_t *handler, void *arg, void **cookiep)
int
bus_teardown_intr(device_t dev, struct resource *r, void *cookie)
Associate or de-associate the interrupt handler with a device. Return 0 on success, error code otherwise.
r - the activated resource handler describing the IRQ
flags - the interrupt priority level, one of:
INTR_TYPE_TTY
- terminals and other likewise
character-type devices. To mask them use spltty()
.
(INTR_TYPE_TTY | INTR_TYPE_FAST)
- terminal type devices
with small input buffer, critical to the data loss on input (such as the old-fashioned
serial ports). To mask them use spltty()
.
INTR_TYPE_BIO
- block-type devices, except those on the
CAM controllers. To mask them use splbio()
.
INTR_TYPE_CAM
- CAM (Common Access Method) bus
controllers. To mask them use splcam()
.
INTR_TYPE_NET
- network interface controllers. To mask
them use splimp()
.
INTR_TYPE_MISC
- miscellaneous devices. There is no
other way to mask them than by splhigh()
which masks all
interrupts.
When an interrupt handler executes all the other interrupts matching its priority level will be masked. The only exception is the MISC level for which no other interrupts are masked and which is not masked by any other interrupt.
handler - pointer to the handler
function, the type driver_intr_t is defined as void
driver_intr_t(void *)
arg - the argument passed to the handler to identify this particular device. It is cast from void* to any real type by the handler. The old convention for the ISA interrupt handlers was to use the unit number as argument, the new (recommended) convention is using a pointer to the device softc structure.
cookie[p] - the value received
from setup()
is used to identify the handler when passed to
teardown()
A number of methods are defined to operate on the resource handlers (struct resource *). Those of interest to the device driver writers are:
u_long rman_get_start(r) u_long rman_get_end(r)
Get the
start and end of allocated resource range.
void *rman_get_virtual(r)
Get the virtual address of
activated memory resource.
In many cases data is exchanged between the driver and the device through the memory. Two variants are possible:
(a) memory is located on the device card
(b) memory is the main memory of the computer
In case (a) the driver always copies the data back and forth between the on-card
memory and the main memory as necessary. To map the on-card memory into the kernel
virtual address space the physical address and length of the on-card memory must be
defined as a SYS_RES_MEMORY resource. That resource can then be
allocated and activated, and its virtual address obtained using rman_get_virtual()
. The older drivers used the function pmap_mapdev()
for this purpose, which should not be used directly
any more. Now it is one of the internal steps of resource activation.
Most of the ISA cards will have their memory configured for physical location somewhere in range 640KB-1MB. Some of the ISA cards require larger memory ranges which should be placed somewhere under 16MB (because of the 24-bit address limitation on the ISA bus). In that case if the machine has more memory than the start address of the device memory (in other words, they overlap) a memory hole must be configured at the address range used by devices. Many BIOSes allow configuration of a memory hole of 1MB starting at 14MB or 15MB. FreeBSD can handle the memory holes properly if the BIOS reports them properly (this feature may be broken on old BIOSes).
In case (b) just the address of the data is sent to the device, and the device uses DMA to actually access the data in the main memory. Two limitations are present: First, ISA cards can only access memory below 16MB. Second, the contiguous pages in virtual address space may not be contiguous in physical address space, so the device may have to do scatter/gather operations. The bus subsystem provides ready solutions for some of these problems, the rest has to be done by the drivers themselves.
Two structures are used for DMA memory allocation, bus_dma_tag_t
and bus_dmamap_t
. Tag
describes the properties required for the DMA memory. Map represents a memory block
allocated according to these properties. Multiple maps may be associated with the same
tag.
Tags are organized into a tree-like hierarchy with inheritance of the properties. A child tag inherits all the requirements of its parent tag, and may make them more strict but never more loose.
Normally one top-level tag (with no parent) is created for each device unit. If multiple memory areas with different requirements are needed for each device then a tag for each of them may be created as a child of the parent tag.
The tags can be used to create a map in two ways.
First, a chunk of contiguous memory conformant with the tag requirements may be allocated (and later may be freed). This is normally used to allocate relatively long-living areas of memory for communication with the device. Loading of such memory into a map is trivial: it is always considered as one chunk in the appropriate physical memory range.
Second, an arbitrary area of virtual memory may be loaded into a map. Each page of this memory will be checked for conformance to the map requirement. If it conforms then it is left at its original location. If it is not then a fresh conformant “bounce page” is allocated and used as intermediate storage. When writing the data from the non-conformant original pages they will be copied to their bounce pages first and then transferred from the bounce pages to the device. When reading the data would go from the device to the bounce pages and then copied to their non-conformant original pages. The process of copying between the original and bounce pages is called synchronization. This is normally used on a per-transfer basis: buffer for each transfer would be loaded, transfer done and buffer unloaded.
The functions working on the DMA memory are:
int bus_dma_tag_create(bus_dma_tag_t parent, bus_size_t
alignment, bus_size_t boundary, bus_addr_t lowaddr, bus_addr_t highaddr, bus_dma_filter_t
*filter, void *filterarg, bus_size_t maxsize, int nsegments, bus_size_t maxsegsz, int
flags, bus_dma_tag_t *dmat)
Create a new tag. Returns 0 on success, the error code otherwise.
parent - parent tag, or NULL to create a top-level tag.
alignment - required physical
alignment of the memory area to be allocated for this tag. Use value 1 for “no
specific alignment”. Applies only to the future bus_dmamem_alloc()
but not bus_dmamap_create()
calls.
boundary - physical address
boundary that must not be crossed when allocating the memory. Use value 0 for “no
boundary”. Applies only to the future bus_dmamem_alloc()
but not bus_dmamap_create()
calls. Must be power of 2. If the memory is
planned to be used in non-cascaded DMA mode (i.e. the DMA addresses will be supplied not
by the device itself but by the ISA DMA controller) then the boundary must be no larger
than 64KB (64*1024) due to the limitations of the DMA hardware.
lowaddr, highaddr - the names are slightly misleading; these values are used to limit the permitted range of physical addresses used to allocate the memory. The exact meaning varies depending on the planned future use:
For bus_dmamem_alloc()
all the addresses from 0 to
lowaddr-1 are considered permitted, the higher ones are forbidden.
For bus_dmamap_create()
all the addresses outside the
inclusive range [lowaddr; highaddr] are considered accessible. The addresses of pages
inside the range are passed to the filter function which decides if they are accessible.
If no filter function is supplied then all the range is considered unaccessible.
For the ISA devices the normal values (with no filter function) are:
lowaddr = BUS_SPACE_MAXADDR_24BIT
highaddr = BUS_SPACE_MAXADDR
filter, filterarg - the filter
function and its argument. If NULL is passed for filter then the whole range [lowaddr,
highaddr] is considered unaccessible when doing bus_dmamap_create()
. Otherwise the physical address of each
attempted page in range [lowaddr; highaddr] is passed to the filter function which
decides if it is accessible. The prototype of the filter function is: int filterfunc(void *arg, bus_addr_t paddr)
. It must return 0 if
the page is accessible, non-zero otherwise.
maxsize - the maximal size of memory (in bytes) that may be allocated through this tag. In case it is difficult to estimate or could be arbitrarily big, the value for ISA devices would be BUS_SPACE_MAXSIZE_24BIT.
nsegments - maximal number of scatter-gather segments supported by the device. If unrestricted then the value BUS_SPACE_UNRESTRICTED should be used. This value is recommended for the parent tags, the actual restrictions would then be specified for the descendant tags. Tags with nsegments equal to BUS_SPACE_UNRESTRICTED may not be used to actually load maps, they may be used only as parent tags. The practical limit for nsegments seems to be about 250-300, higher values will cause kernel stack overflow (the hardware can not normally support that many scatter-gather buffers anyway).
maxsegsz - maximal size of a scatter-gather segment supported by the device. The maximal value for ISA device would be BUS_SPACE_MAXSIZE_24BIT.
flags - a bitmap of flags. The only interesting flags are:
BUS_DMA_ALLOCNOW - requests to allocate all the potentially needed bounce pages when creating the tag.
BUS_DMA_ISA - mysterious flag used only on Alpha machines. It is not defined for the i386 machines. Probably it should be used by all the ISA drivers for Alpha machines but it looks like there are no such drivers yet.
dmat - pointer to the storage for the new tag to be returned.
int bus_dma_tag_destroy(bus_dma_tag_t dmat)
Destroy a tag. Returns 0 on success, the error code otherwise.
dmat - the tag to be destroyed.
int bus_dmamem_alloc(bus_dma_tag_t dmat, void** vaddr, int
flags, bus_dmamap_t *mapp)
Allocate an area of contiguous memory described by the tag. The size of memory to be
allocated is tag's maxsize. Returns 0 on success, the error code otherwise. The result
still has to be loaded by bus_dmamap_load()
before being
used to get the physical address of the memory.
dmat - the tag
vaddr - pointer to the storage for the kernel virtual address of the allocated area to be returned.
flags - a bitmap of flags. The only interesting flag is:
BUS_DMA_NOWAIT - if the memory is not immediately available return the error. If this flag is not set then the routine is allowed to sleep until the memory becomes available.
mapp - pointer to the storage for the new map to be returned.
void bus_dmamem_free(bus_dma_tag_t dmat, void *vaddr,
bus_dmamap_t map)
Free the memory allocated by bus_dmamem_alloc()
. At
present, freeing of the memory allocated with ISA restrictions is not implemented.
Because of this the recommended model of use is to keep and re-use the allocated areas
for as long as possible. Do not lightly free some area and then shortly allocate it
again. That does not mean that bus_dmamem_free()
should not
be used at all: hopefully it will be properly implemented soon.
dmat - the tag
vaddr - the kernel virtual address of the memory
map - the map of the memory (as
returned from bus_dmamem_alloc()
)
int bus_dmamap_create(bus_dma_tag_t dmat, int flags,
bus_dmamap_t *mapp)
Create a map for the tag, to be used in bus_dmamap_load()
later. Returns 0 on success, the error code
otherwise.
dmat - the tag
flags - theoretically, a bit map of flags. But no flags are defined yet, so at present it will be always 0.
mapp - pointer to the storage for the new map to be returned
int bus_dmamap_destroy(bus_dma_tag_t dmat, bus_dmamap_t
map)
Destroy a map. Returns 0 on success, the error code otherwise.
dmat - the tag to which the map is associated
map - the map to be destroyed
int bus_dmamap_load(bus_dma_tag_t dmat, bus_dmamap_t map, void
*buf, bus_size_t buflen, bus_dmamap_callback_t *callback, void *callback_arg, int
flags)
Load a buffer into the map (the map must be previously created by bus_dmamap_create()
or bus_dmamem_alloc()
). All the pages of the buffer are checked for
conformance to the tag requirements and for those not conformant the bounce pages are
allocated. An array of physical segment descriptors is built and passed to the callback
routine. This callback routine is then expected to handle it in some way. The number of
bounce buffers in the system is limited, so if the bounce buffers are needed but not
immediately available the request will be queued and the callback will be called when the
bounce buffers will become available. Returns 0 if the callback was executed immediately
or “EINPROGRESS” if the request was queued for
future execution. In the latter case the synchronization with queued callback routine is
the responsibility of the driver.
dmat - the tag
map - the map
buf - kernel virtual address of the buffer
buflen - length of the buffer
callback, callback_arg
- the callback function and its argument
The prototype of callback function is:
void callback(void *arg, bus_dma_segment_t *seg, int nseg, int
error)
arg - the same as callback_arg
passed to bus_dmamap_load()
seg - array of the segment descriptors
nseg - number of descriptors in array
error - indication of the segment number overflow: if it is set to “EFBIG” then the buffer did not fit into the maximal number of segments permitted by the tag. In this case only the permitted number of descriptors will be in the array. Handling of this situation is up to the driver: depending on the desired semantics it can either consider this an error or split the buffer in two and handle the second part separately
Each entry in the segments array contains the fields:
ds_addr - physical bus address of the segment
ds_len - length of the segment
void bus_dmamap_unload(bus_dma_tag_t dmat, bus_dmamap_t
map)
unload the map.
dmat - tag
map - loaded map
void bus_dmamap_sync (bus_dma_tag_t dmat, bus_dmamap_t map,
bus_dmasync_op_t op)
Synchronise a loaded buffer with its bounce pages before and after physical transfer to or from device. This is the function that does all the necessary copying of data between the original buffer and its mapped version. The buffers must be synchronized both before and after doing the transfer.
dmat - tag
map - loaded map
op - type of synchronization operation to perform:
BUS_DMASYNC_PREREAD
- before reading from device into
buffer
BUS_DMASYNC_POSTREAD
- after reading from device into
buffer
BUS_DMASYNC_PREWRITE
- before writing the buffer to
device
BUS_DMASYNC_POSTWRITE
- after writing the buffer to
device
As of now PREREAD and POSTWRITE are null operations but that may change in the future,
so they must not be ignored in the driver. Synchronization is not needed for the memory
obtained from bus_dmamem_alloc()
.
Before calling the callback function from bus_dmamap_load()
the segment array is stored in the stack. And
it gets pre-allocated for the maximal number of segments allowed by the tag. Because of
this the practical limit for the number of segments on i386 architecture is about 250-300
(the kernel stack is 4KB minus the size of the user structure, size of a segment array
entry is 8 bytes, and some space must be left). Because the array is allocated based on
the maximal number this value must not be set higher than really needed. Fortunately, for
most of hardware the maximal supported number of segments is much lower. But if the
driver wants to handle buffers with a very large number of scatter-gather segments it
should do that in portions: load part of the buffer, transfer it to the device, load next
part of the buffer, and so on.
Another practical consequence is that the number of segments may limit the size of the buffer. If all the pages in the buffer happen to be physically non-contiguous then the maximal supported buffer size for that fragmented case would be (nsegments * page_size). For example, if a maximal number of 10 segments is supported then on i386 maximal guaranteed supported buffer size would be 40K. If a higher size is desired then special tricks should be used in the driver.
If the hardware does not support scatter-gather at all or the driver wants to support some buffer size even if it is heavily fragmented then the solution is to allocate a contiguous buffer in the driver and use it as intermediate storage if the original buffer does not fit.
Below are the typical call sequences when using a map depend on the use of the map. The characters -> are used to show the flow of time.
For a buffer which stays practically fixed during all the time between attachment and detachment of a device:
bus_dmamem_alloc -> bus_dmamap_load -> ...use buffer... -> -> bus_dmamap_unload -> bus_dmamem_free
For a buffer that changes frequently and is passed from outside the driver:
bus_dmamap_create -> -> bus_dmamap_load -> bus_dmamap_sync(PRE...) -> do transfer -> -> bus_dmamap_sync(POST...) -> bus_dmamap_unload -> ... -> bus_dmamap_load -> bus_dmamap_sync(PRE...) -> do transfer -> -> bus_dmamap_sync(POST...) -> bus_dmamap_unload -> -> bus_dmamap_destroy
When loading a map created by bus_dmamem_alloc()
the
passed address and size of the buffer must be the same as used in bus_dmamem_alloc()
. In this case it is guaranteed that the whole
buffer will be mapped as one segment (so the callback may be based on this assumption)
and the request will be executed immediately (EINPROGRESS will never be returned). All
the callback needs to do in this case is to save the physical address.
A typical example would be:
static void alloc_callback(void *arg, bus_dma_segment_t *seg, int nseg, int error) { *(bus_addr_t *)arg = seg[0].ds_addr; } ... int error; struct somedata { .... }; struct somedata *vsomedata; /* virtual address */ bus_addr_t psomedata; /* physical bus-relative address */ bus_dma_tag_t tag_somedata; bus_dmamap_t map_somedata; ... error=bus_dma_tag_create(parent_tag, alignment, boundary, lowaddr, highaddr, /*filter*/ NULL, /*filterarg*/ NULL, /*maxsize*/ sizeof(struct somedata), /*nsegments*/ 1, /*maxsegsz*/ sizeof(struct somedata), /*flags*/ 0, &tag_somedata); if(error) return error; error = bus_dmamem_alloc(tag_somedata, &vsomedata, /* flags*/ 0, &map_somedata); if(error) return error; bus_dmamap_load(tag_somedata, map_somedata, (void *)vsomedata, sizeof (struct somedata), alloc_callback, (void *) &psomedata, /*flags*/0);
Looks a bit long and complicated but that is the way to do it. The practical consequence is: if multiple memory areas are allocated always together it would be a really good idea to combine them all into one structure and allocate as one (if the alignment and boundary limitations permit).
When loading an arbitrary buffer into the map created by bus_dmamap_create()
special measures must be taken to synchronize
with the callback in case it would be delayed. The code would look like:
{ int s; int error; s = splsoftvm(); error = bus_dmamap_load( dmat, dmamap, buffer_ptr, buffer_len, callback, /*callback_arg*/ buffer_descriptor, /*flags*/0); if (error == EINPROGRESS) { /* * Do whatever is needed to ensure synchronization * with callback. Callback is guaranteed not to be started * until we do splx() or tsleep(). */ } splx(s); }
Two possible approaches for the processing of requests are:
1. If requests are completed by marking them explicitly as done (such as the CAM requests) then it would be simpler to put all the further processing into the callback driver which would mark the request when it is done. Then not much extra synchronization is needed. For the flow control reasons it may be a good idea to freeze the request queue until this request gets completed.
2. If requests are completed when the function returns (such as classic read or write
requests on character devices) then a synchronization flag should be set in the buffer
descriptor and tsleep()
called. Later when the callback
gets called it will do its processing and check this synchronization flag. If it is set
then the callback should issue a wakeup. In this approach the callback function could
either do all the needed processing (just like the previous case) or simply save the
segments array in the buffer descriptor. Then after callback completes the calling
function could use this saved segments array and do all the processing.
The Direct Memory Access (DMA) is implemented in the ISA bus through the DMA controller (actually, two of them but that is an irrelevant detail). To make the early ISA devices simple and cheap the logic of the bus control and address generation was concentrated in the DMA controller. Fortunately, FreeBSD provides a set of functions that mostly hide the annoying details of the DMA controller from the device drivers.
The simplest case is for the fairly intelligent devices. Like the bus master devices on PCI they can generate the bus cycles and memory addresses all by themselves. The only thing they really need from the DMA controller is bus arbitration. So for this purpose they pretend to be cascaded slave DMA controllers. And the only thing needed from the system DMA controller is to enable the cascaded mode on a DMA channel by calling the following function when attaching the driver:
void isa_dmacascade(int channel_number)
All the further activity is done by programming the device. When detaching the driver no DMA-related functions need to be called.
For the simpler devices things get more complicated. The functions used are:
int isa_dma_acquire(int chanel_number)
Reserve a DMA channel. Returns 0 on success or EBUSY if the channel was already reserved by this or a different driver. Most of the ISA devices are not able to share DMA channels anyway, so normally this function is called when attaching a device. This reservation was made redundant by the modern interface of bus resources but still must be used in addition to the latter. If not used then later, other DMA routines will panic.
int isa_dma_release(int chanel_number)
Release a previously reserved DMA channel. No transfers must be in progress when the channel is released (in addition the device must not try to initiate transfer after the channel is released).
void isa_dmainit(int chan, u_int bouncebufsize)
Allocate a bounce buffer for use with the specified channel. The requested size of the
buffer can not exceed 64KB. This bounce buffer will be automatically used later if a
transfer buffer happens to be not physically contiguous or outside of the memory
accessible by the ISA bus or crossing the 64KB boundary. If the transfers will be always
done from buffers which conform to these conditions (such as those allocated by bus_dmamem_alloc()
with proper limitations) then isa_dmainit()
does not have to be called. But it is quite
convenient to transfer arbitrary data using the DMA controller. The bounce buffer will
automatically care of the scatter-gather issues.
chan - channel number
bouncebufsize - size of the bounce buffer in bytes
void isa_dmastart(int flags, caddr_t addr, u_int nbytes, int
chan)
Prepare to start a DMA transfer. This function must be called to set up the DMA
controller before actually starting transfer on the device. It checks that the buffer is
contiguous and falls into the ISA memory range, if not then the bounce buffer is
automatically used. If bounce buffer is required but not set up by isa_dmainit()
or too small for the requested transfer size then
the system will panic. In case of a write request with bounce buffer the data will be
automatically copied to the bounce buffer.
flags - a bitmask determining the type of operation to be done. The direction bits B_READ and B_WRITE are mutually exclusive.
B_READ - read from the ISA bus into memory
B_WRITE - write from the memory to the ISA bus
B_RAW - if set then the DMA controller will remember the buffer and after the end of
transfer will automatically re-initialize itself to repeat transfer of the same buffer
again (of course, the driver may change the data in the buffer before initiating another
transfer in the device). If not set then the parameters will work only for one transfer,
and isa_dmastart()
will have to be called again before
initiating the next transfer. Using B_RAW makes sense only if the bounce buffer is not
used.
addr - virtual address of the buffer
nbytes - length of the buffer. Must be less or equal to 64KB. Length of 0 is not allowed: the DMA controller will understand it as 64KB while the kernel code will understand it as 0 and that would cause unpredictable effects. For channels number 4 and higher the length must be even because these channels transfer 2 bytes at a time. In case of an odd length the last byte will not be transferred.
chan - channel number
void isa_dmadone(int flags, caddr_t addr, int nbytes, int
chan)
Synchronize the memory after device reports that transfer is done. If that was a read
operation with a bounce buffer then the data will be copied from the bounce buffer to the
original buffer. Arguments are the same as for isa_dmastart()
. Flag B_RAW is permitted but it does not affect
isa_dmadone()
in any way.
int isa_dmastatus(int channel_number)
Returns the number of bytes left in the current transfer to be transferred. In case
the flag B_READ was set in isa_dmastart()
the number
returned will never be equal to zero. At the end of transfer it will be automatically
reset back to the length of buffer. The normal use is to check the number of bytes left
after the device signals that the transfer is completed. If the number of bytes is not 0
then something probably went wrong with that transfer.
int isa_dmastop(int channel_number)
Aborts the current transfer and returns the number of bytes left untransferred.
This function probes if a device is present. If the driver supports auto-detection of some part of device configuration (such as interrupt vector or memory address) this auto-detection must be done in this routine.
As for any other bus, if the device cannot be detected or is detected but failed the self-test or some other problem happened then it returns a positive value of error. The value “ENXIO” must be returned if the device is not present. Other error values may mean other conditions. Zero or negative values mean success. Most of the drivers return zero as success.
The negative return values are used when a PnP device supports multiple interfaces. For example, an older compatibility interface and a newer advanced interface which are supported by different drivers. Then both drivers would detect the device. The driver which returns a higher value in the probe routine takes precedence (in other words, the driver returning 0 has highest precedence, one returning -1 is next, one returning -2 is after it and so on). In result the devices which support only the old interface will be handled by the old driver (which should return -1 from the probe routine) while the devices supporting the new interface as well will be handled by the new driver (which should return 0 from the probe routine).
The device descriptor struct xxx_softc is allocated by the system before calling the
probe routine. If the probe routine returns an error the descriptor will be automatically
deallocated by the system. So if a probing error occurs the driver must make sure that
all the resources it used during probe are deallocated and that nothing keeps the
descriptor from being safely deallocated. If the probe completes successfully the
descriptor will be preserved by the system and later passed to the routine xxx_isa_attach()
. If a driver returns a negative value it can not
be sure that it will have the highest priority and its attach routine will be called. So
in this case it also must release all the resources before returning and if necessary
allocate them again in the attach routine. When xxx_isa_probe()
returns 0 releasing the resources before
returning is also a good idea and a well-behaved driver should do so. But in cases where
there is some problem with releasing the resources the driver is allowed to keep
resources between returning 0 from the probe routine and execution of the attach
routine.
A typical probe routine starts with getting the device descriptor and unit:
struct xxx_softc *sc = device_get_softc(dev); int unit = device_get_unit(dev); int pnperror; int error = 0; sc->dev = dev; /* link it back */ sc->unit = unit;
Then check for the PnP devices. The check is carried out by a table containing the list of PnP IDs supported by this driver and human-readable descriptions of the device models corresponding to these IDs.
pnperror=ISA_PNP_PROBE(device_get_parent(dev), dev, xxx_pnp_ids); if(pnperror == ENXIO) return ENXIO;
The logic of ISA_PNP_PROBE is the following: If this card (device unit) was not
detected as PnP then ENOENT will be returned. If it was detected as PnP but its detected
ID does not match any of the IDs in the table then ENXIO is returned. Finally, if it has
PnP support and it matches on of the IDs in the table, 0 is returned and the appropriate
description from the table is set by device_set_desc()
.
If a driver supports only PnP devices then the condition would look like:
if(pnperror != 0) return pnperror;
No special treatment is required for the drivers which do not support PnP because they pass an empty PnP ID table and will always get ENXIO if called on a PnP card.
The probe routine normally needs at least some minimal set of resources, such as I/O port number to find the card and probe it. Depending on the hardware the driver may be able to discover the other necessary resources automatically. The PnP devices have all the resources pre-set by the PnP subsystem, so the driver does not need to discover them by itself.
Typically the minimal information required to get access to the device is the I/O port number. Then some devices allow to get the rest of information from the device configuration registers (though not all devices do that). So first we try to get the port start value:
sc->port0 = bus_get_resource_start(dev, SYS_RES_IOPORT, 0 /*rid*/); if(sc->port0 == 0) return ENXIO;
The base port address is saved in the structure softc for future use. If it will be used very often then calling the resource function each time would be prohibitively slow. If we do not get a port we just return an error. Some device drivers can instead be clever and try to probe all the possible ports, like this:
/* table of all possible base I/O port addresses for this device */ static struct xxx_allports { u_short port; /* port address */ short used; /* flag: if this port is already used by some unit */ } xxx_allports = { { 0x300, 0 }, { 0x320, 0 }, { 0x340, 0 }, { 0, 0 } /* end of table */ }; ... int port, i; ... port = bus_get_resource_start(dev, SYS_RES_IOPORT, 0 /*rid*/); if(port !=0 ) { for(i=0; xxx_allports[i].port!=0; i++) { if(xxx_allports[i].used || xxx_allports[i].port != port) continue; /* found it */ xxx_allports[i].used = 1; /* do probe on a known port */ return xxx_really_probe(dev, port); } return ENXIO; /* port is unknown or already used */ } /* we get here only if we need to guess the port */ for(i=0; xxx_allports[i].port!=0; i++) { if(xxx_allports[i].used) continue; /* mark as used - even if we find nothing at this port * at least we won't probe it in future */ xxx_allports[i].used = 1; error = xxx_really_probe(dev, xxx_allports[i].port); if(error == 0) /* found a device at that port */ return 0; } /* probed all possible addresses, none worked */ return ENXIO;
Of course, normally the driver's identify()
routine
should be used for such things. But there may be one valid reason why it may be better to
be done in probe()
: if this probe would drive some other
sensitive device crazy. The probe routines are ordered with consideration of the sensitive flag: the sensitive devices get probed first and the rest
of the devices later. But the identify()
routines are
called before any probes, so they show no respect to the sensitive devices and may upset
them.
Now, after we got the starting port we need to set the port count (except for PnP devices) because the kernel does not have this information in the configuration file.
if(pnperror /* only for non-PnP devices */ && bus_set_resource(dev, SYS_RES_IOPORT, 0, sc->port0, XXX_PORT_COUNT)<0) return ENXIO;
Finally allocate and activate a piece of port address space (special values of start
and end mean “use those we set by bus_set_resource()
”):
sc->port0_rid = 0; sc->port0_r = bus_alloc_resource(dev, SYS_RES_IOPORT, &sc->port0_rid, /*start*/ 0, /*end*/ ~0, /*count*/ 0, RF_ACTIVE); if(sc->port0_r == NULL) return ENXIO;
Now having access to the port-mapped registers we can poke the device in some way and check if it reacts like it is expected to. If it does not then there is probably some other device or no device at all at this address.
Normally drivers do not set up the interrupt handlers until the attach routine.
Instead they do probes in the polling mode using the DELAY()
function for timeout. The probe routine must never hang
forever, all the waits for the device must be done with timeouts. If the device does not
respond within the time it is probably broken or misconfigured and the driver must return
error. When determining the timeout interval give the device some extra time to be on the
safe side: although DELAY()
is supposed to delay for the
same amount of time on any machine it has some margin of error, depending on the exact
CPU.
If the probe routine really wants to check that the interrupts really work it may configure and probe the interrupts too. But that is not recommended.
/* implemented in some very device-specific way */ if(error = xxx_probe_ports(sc)) goto bad; /* will deallocate the resources before returning */
The function xxx_probe_ports()
may also set the device
description depending on the exact model of device it discovers. But if there is only one
supported device model this can be as well done in a hardcoded way. Of course, for the
PnP devices the PnP support sets the description from the table automatically.
if(pnperror) device_set_desc(dev, "Our device model 1234");
Then the probe routine should either discover the ranges of all the resources by reading the device configuration registers or make sure that they were set explicitly by the user. We will consider it with an example of on-board memory. The probe routine should be as non-intrusive as possible, so allocation and check of functionality of the rest of resources (besides the ports) would be better left to the attach routine.
The memory address may be specified in the kernel configuration file or on some devices it may be pre-configured in non-volatile configuration registers. If both sources are available and different, which one should be used? Probably if the user bothered to set the address explicitly in the kernel configuration file they know what they are doing and this one should take precedence. An example of implementation could be:
/* try to find out the config address first */ sc->mem0_p = bus_get_resource_start(dev, SYS_RES_MEMORY, 0 /*rid*/); if(sc->mem0_p == 0) { /* nope, not specified by user */ sc->mem0_p = xxx_read_mem0_from_device_config(sc); if(sc->mem0_p == 0) /* can't get it from device config registers either */ goto bad; } else { if(xxx_set_mem0_address_on_device(sc) < 0) goto bad; /* device does not support that address */ } /* just like the port, set the memory size, * for some devices the memory size would not be constant * but should be read from the device configuration registers instead * to accommodate different models of devices. Another option would * be to let the user set the memory size as "msize" configuration * resource which will be automatically handled by the ISA bus. */ if(pnperror) { /* only for non-PnP devices */ sc->mem0_size = bus_get_resource_count(dev, SYS_RES_MEMORY, 0 /*rid*/); if(sc->mem0_size == 0) /* not specified by user */ sc->mem0_size = xxx_read_mem0_size_from_device_config(sc); if(sc->mem0_size == 0) { /* suppose this is a very old model of device without * auto-configuration features and the user gave no preference, * so assume the minimalistic case * (of course, the real value will vary with the driver) */ sc->mem0_size = 8*1024; } if(xxx_set_mem0_size_on_device(sc) < 0) goto bad; /* device does not support that size */ if(bus_set_resource(dev, SYS_RES_MEMORY, /*rid*/0, sc->mem0_p, sc->mem0_size)<0) goto bad; } else { sc->mem0_size = bus_get_resource_count(dev, SYS_RES_MEMORY, 0 /*rid*/); }
Resources for IRQ and DRQ are easy to check by analogy.
If all went well then release all the resources and return success.
xxx_free_resources(sc); return 0;
Finally, handle the troublesome situations. All the resources should be deallocated before returning. We make use of the fact that before the structure softc is passed to us it gets zeroed out, so we can find out if some resource was allocated: then its descriptor is non-zero.
bad: xxx_free_resources(sc); if(error) return error; else /* exact error is unknown */ return ENXIO;
That would be all for the probe routine. Freeing of resources is done from multiple places, so it is moved to a function which may look like:
static void xxx_free_resources(sc) struct xxx_softc *sc; { /* check every resource and free if not zero */ /* interrupt handler */ if(sc->intr_r) { bus_teardown_intr(sc->dev, sc->intr_r, sc->intr_cookie); bus_release_resource(sc->dev, SYS_RES_IRQ, sc->intr_rid, sc->intr_r); sc->intr_r = 0; } /* all kinds of memory maps we could have allocated */ if(sc->data_p) { bus_dmamap_unload(sc->data_tag, sc->data_map); sc->data_p = 0; } if(sc->data) { /* sc->data_map may be legitimately equal to 0 */ /* the map will also be freed */ bus_dmamem_free(sc->data_tag, sc->data, sc->data_map); sc->data = 0; } if(sc->data_tag) { bus_dma_tag_destroy(sc->data_tag); sc->data_tag = 0; } ... free other maps and tags if we have them ... if(sc->parent_tag) { bus_dma_tag_destroy(sc->parent_tag); sc->parent_tag = 0; } /* release all the bus resources */ if(sc->mem0_r) { bus_release_resource(sc->dev, SYS_RES_MEMORY, sc->mem0_rid, sc->mem0_r); sc->mem0_r = 0; } ... if(sc->port0_r) { bus_release_resource(sc->dev, SYS_RES_IOPORT, sc->port0_rid, sc->port0_r); sc->port0_r = 0; } }
The attach routine actually connects the driver to the system if the probe routine returned success and the system had chosen to attach that driver. If the probe routine returned 0 then the attach routine may expect to receive the device structure softc intact, as it was set by the probe routine. Also if the probe routine returns 0 it may expect that the attach routine for this device shall be called at some point in the future. If the probe routine returns a negative value then the driver may make none of these assumptions.
The attach routine returns 0 if it completed successfully or error code otherwise.
The attach routine starts just like the probe routine, with getting some frequently used data into more accessible variables.
struct xxx_softc *sc = device_get_softc(dev); int unit = device_get_unit(dev); int error = 0;
Then allocate and activate all the necessary resources. Because normally the port range will be released before returning from probe, it has to be allocated again. We expect that the probe routine had properly set all the resource ranges, as well as saved them in the structure softc. If the probe routine had left some resource allocated then it does not need to be allocated again (which would be considered an error).
sc->port0_rid = 0; sc->port0_r = bus_alloc_resource(dev, SYS_RES_IOPORT, &sc->port0_rid, /*start*/ 0, /*end*/ ~0, /*count*/ 0, RF_ACTIVE); if(sc->port0_r == NULL) return ENXIO; /* on-board memory */ sc->mem0_rid = 0; sc->mem0_r = bus_alloc_resource(dev, SYS_RES_MEMORY, &sc->mem0_rid, /*start*/ 0, /*end*/ ~0, /*count*/ 0, RF_ACTIVE); if(sc->mem0_r == NULL) goto bad; /* get its virtual address */ sc->mem0_v = rman_get_virtual(sc->mem0_r);
The DMA request channel (DRQ) is allocated likewise. To initialize it use functions of
the isa_dma*()
family. For example:
isa_dmacascade(sc->drq0);
The interrupt request line (IRQ) is a bit special. Besides allocation the driver's interrupt handler should be associated with it. Historically in the old ISA drivers the argument passed by the system to the interrupt handler was the device unit number. But in modern drivers the convention suggests passing the pointer to structure softc. The important reason is that when the structures softc are allocated dynamically then getting the unit number from softc is easy while getting softc from the unit number is difficult. Also this convention makes the drivers for different buses look more uniform and allows them to share the code: each bus gets its own probe, attach, detach and other bus-specific routines while the bulk of the driver code may be shared among them.
sc->intr_rid = 0; sc->intr_r = bus_alloc_resource(dev, SYS_RES_MEMORY, &sc->intr_rid, /*start*/ 0, /*end*/ ~0, /*count*/ 0, RF_ACTIVE); if(sc->intr_r == NULL) goto bad; /* * XXX_INTR_TYPE is supposed to be defined depending on the type of * the driver, for example as INTR_TYPE_CAM for a CAM driver */ error = bus_setup_intr(dev, sc->intr_r, XXX_INTR_TYPE, (driver_intr_t *) xxx_intr, (void *) sc, &sc->intr_cookie); if(error) goto bad;
If the device needs to make DMA to the main memory then this memory should be allocated like described before:
error=bus_dma_tag_create(NULL, /*alignment*/ 4, /*boundary*/ 0, /*lowaddr*/ BUS_SPACE_MAXADDR_24BIT, /*highaddr*/ BUS_SPACE_MAXADDR, /*filter*/ NULL, /*filterarg*/ NULL, /*maxsize*/ BUS_SPACE_MAXSIZE_24BIT, /*nsegments*/ BUS_SPACE_UNRESTRICTED, /*maxsegsz*/ BUS_SPACE_MAXSIZE_24BIT, /*flags*/ 0, &sc->parent_tag); if(error) goto bad; /* many things get inherited from the parent tag * sc->data is supposed to point to the structure with the shared data, * for example for a ring buffer it could be: * struct { * u_short rd_pos; * u_short wr_pos; * char bf[XXX_RING_BUFFER_SIZE] * } *data; */ error=bus_dma_tag_create(sc->parent_tag, 1, 0, BUS_SPACE_MAXADDR, 0, /*filter*/ NULL, /*filterarg*/ NULL, /*maxsize*/ sizeof(* sc->data), /*nsegments*/ 1, /*maxsegsz*/ sizeof(* sc->data), /*flags*/ 0, &sc->data_tag); if(error) goto bad; error = bus_dmamem_alloc(sc->data_tag, &sc->data, /* flags*/ 0, &sc->data_map); if(error) goto bad; /* xxx_alloc_callback() just saves the physical address at * the pointer passed as its argument, in this case &sc->data_p. * See details in the section on bus memory mapping. * It can be implemented like: * * static void * xxx_alloc_callback(void *arg, bus_dma_segment_t *seg, * int nseg, int error) * { * *(bus_addr_t *)arg = seg[0].ds_addr; * } */ bus_dmamap_load(sc->data_tag, sc->data_map, (void *)sc->data, sizeof (* sc->data), xxx_alloc_callback, (void *) &sc->data_p, /*flags*/0);
After all the necessary resources are allocated the device should be initialized. The initialization may include testing that all the expected features are functional.
if(xxx_initialize(sc) < 0) goto bad;
The bus subsystem will automatically print on the console the device description set by probe. But if the driver wants to print some extra information about the device it may do so, for example:
device_printf(dev, "has on-card FIFO buffer of %d bytes\n", sc->fifosize);
If the initialization routine experiences any problems then printing messages about them before returning error is also recommended.
The final step of the attach routine is attaching the device to its functional subsystem in the kernel. The exact way to do it depends on the type of the driver: a character device, a block device, a network device, a CAM SCSI bus device and so on.
If all went well then return success.
error = xxx_attach_subsystem(sc); if(error) goto bad; return 0;
Finally, handle the troublesome situations. All the resources should be deallocated before returning an error. We make use of the fact that before the structure softc is passed to us it gets zeroed out, so we can find out if some resource was allocated: then its descriptor is non-zero.
bad: xxx_free_resources(sc); if(error) return error; else /* exact error is unknown */ return ENXIO;
That would be all for the attach routine.
If this function is present in the driver and the driver is compiled as a loadable module then the driver gets the ability to be unloaded. This is an important feature if the hardware supports hot plug. But the ISA bus does not support hot plug, so this feature is not particularly important for the ISA devices. The ability to unload a driver may be useful when debugging it, but in many cases installation of the new version of the driver would be required only after the old version somehow wedges the system and a reboot will be needed anyway, so the efforts spent on writing the detach routine may not be worth it. Another argument that unloading would allow upgrading the drivers on a production machine seems to be mostly theoretical. Installing a new version of a driver is a dangerous operation which should never be performed on a production machine (and which is not permitted when the system is running in secure mode). Still, the detach routine may be provided for the sake of completeness.
The detach routine returns 0 if the driver was successfully detached or the error code otherwise.
The logic of detach is a mirror of the attach. The first thing to do is to detach the driver from its kernel subsystem. If the device is currently open then the driver has two choices: refuse to be detached or forcibly close and proceed with detach. The choice used depends on the ability of the particular kernel subsystem to do a forced close and on the preferences of the driver's author. Generally the forced close seems to be the preferred alternative.
struct xxx_softc *sc = device_get_softc(dev); int error; error = xxx_detach_subsystem(sc); if(error) return error;
Next the driver may want to reset the hardware to some consistent state. That includes stopping any ongoing transfers, disabling the DMA channels and interrupts to avoid memory corruption by the device. For most of the drivers this is exactly what the shutdown routine does, so if it is included in the driver we can just call it.
xxx_isa_shutdown(dev);
And finally release all the resources and return success.
xxx_free_resources(sc); return 0;
This routine is called when the system is about to be shut down. It is expected to bring the hardware to some consistent state. For most of the ISA devices no special action is required, so the function is not really necessary because the device will be re-initialized on reboot anyway. But some devices have to be shut down with a special procedure, to make sure that they will be properly detected after soft reboot (this is especially true for many devices with proprietary identification protocols). In any case disabling DMA and interrupts in the device registers and stopping any ongoing transfers is a good idea. The exact action depends on the hardware, so we do not consider it here in any detail.
The interrupt handler is called when an interrupt is received which may be from this particular device. The ISA bus does not support interrupt sharing (except in some special cases) so in practice if the interrupt handler is called then the interrupt almost for sure came from its device. Still, the interrupt handler must poll the device registers and make sure that the interrupt was generated by its device. If not it should just return.
The old convention for the ISA drivers was getting the device unit number as an
argument. This is obsolete, and the new drivers receive whatever argument was specified
for them in the attach routine when calling bus_setup_intr()
. By the new convention it should be the pointer
to the structure softc. So the interrupt handler commonly starts as:
static void xxx_intr(struct xxx_softc *sc) {
It runs at the interrupt priority level specified by the interrupt type parameter of
bus_setup_intr()
. That means that all the other interrupts
of the same type as well as all the software interrupts are disabled.
To avoid races it is commonly written as a loop:
while(xxx_interrupt_pending(sc)) { xxx_process_interrupt(sc); xxx_acknowledge_interrupt(sc); }
The interrupt handler has to acknowledge interrupt to the device only but not to the interrupt controller, the system takes care of the latter.
This chapter will talk about the FreeBSD mechanisms for writing a device driver for a device on a PCI bus.
Information here about how the PCI bus code iterates through the unattached devices and see if a newly loaded kld will attach to any of them.
/* * Simple KLD to play with the PCI functions. * * Murray Stokely */ #include <sys/param.h> /* defines used in kernel.h */ #include <sys/module.h> #include <sys/systm.h> #include <sys/errno.h> #include <sys/kernel.h> /* types used in module initialization */ #include <sys/conf.h> /* cdevsw struct */ #include <sys/uio.h> /* uio struct */ #include <sys/malloc.h> #include <sys/bus.h> /* structs, prototypes for pci bus stuff */ #include <machine/bus.h> #include <sys/rman.h> #include <machine/resource.h> #include <dev/pci/pcivar.h> /* For pci_get macros! */ #include <dev/pci/pcireg.h> /* The softc holds our per-instance data. */ struct mypci_softc { device_t my_dev; struct cdev *my_cdev; }; /* Function prototypes */ static d_open_t mypci_open; static d_close_t mypci_close; static d_read_t mypci_read; static d_write_t mypci_write; /* Character device entry points */ static struct cdevsw mypci_cdevsw = { .d_version = D_VERSION, .d_open = mypci_open, .d_close = mypci_close, .d_read = mypci_read, .d_write = mypci_write, .d_name = "mypci", }; /* * In the cdevsw routines, we find our softc by using the si_drv1 member * of struct cdev. We set this variable to point to our softc in our * attach routine when we create the /dev entry. */ int mypci_open(struct cdev *dev, int oflags, int devtype, d_thread_t *td) { struct mypci_softc *sc; /* Look up our softc. */ sc = dev->si_drv1; device_printf(sc->my_dev, "Opened successfully.\n"); return (0); } int mypci_close(struct cdev *dev, int fflag, int devtype, d_thread_t *td) { struct mypci_softc *sc; /* Look up our softc. */ sc = dev->si_drv1; device_printf(sc->my_dev, "Closed.\n"); return (0); } int mypci_read(struct cdev *dev, struct uio *uio, int ioflag) { struct mypci_softc *sc; /* Look up our softc. */ sc = dev->si_drv1; device_printf(sc->my_dev, "Asked to read %d bytes.\n", uio->uio_resid); return (0); } int mypci_write(struct cdev *dev, struct uio *uio, int ioflag) { struct mypci_softc *sc; /* Look up our softc. */ sc = dev->si_drv1; device_printf(sc->my_dev, "Asked to write %d bytes.\n", uio->uio_resid); return (0); } /* PCI Support Functions */ /* * Compare the device ID of this device against the IDs that this driver * supports. If there is a match, set the description and return success. */ static int mypci_probe(device_t dev) { device_printf(dev, "MyPCI Probe\nVendor ID : 0x%x\nDevice ID : 0x%x\n", pci_get_vendor(dev), pci_get_device(dev)); if (pci_get_vendor(dev) == 0x11c1) { printf("We've got the Winmodem, probe successful!\n"); device_set_desc(dev, "WinModem"); return (BUS_PROBE_DEFAULT); } return (ENXIO); } /* Attach function is only called if the probe is successful. */ static int mypci_attach(device_t dev) { struct mypci_softc *sc; printf("MyPCI Attach for : deviceID : 0x%x\n", pci_get_devid(dev)); /* Look up our softc and initialize its fields. */ sc = device_get_softc(dev); sc->my_dev = dev; /* * Create a /dev entry for this device. The kernel will assign us * a major number automatically. We use the unit number of this * device as the minor number and name the character device * "mypci<unit>". */ sc->my_cdev = make_dev(&mypci_cdevsw, device_get_unit(dev), UID_ROOT, GID_WHEEL, 0600, "mypci%u", device_get_unit(dev)); sc->my_cdev->si_drv1 = sc; printf("Mypci device loaded.\n"); return (0); } /* Detach device. */ static int mypci_detach(device_t dev) { struct mypci_softc *sc; /* Teardown the state in our softc created in our attach routine. */ sc = device_get_softc(dev); destroy_dev(sc->my_cdev); printf("Mypci detach!\n"); return (0); } /* Called during system shutdown after sync. */ static int mypci_shutdown(device_t dev) { printf("Mypci shutdown!\n"); return (0); } /* * Device suspend routine. */ static int mypci_suspend(device_t dev) { printf("Mypci suspend!\n"); return (0); } /* * Device resume routine. */ static int mypci_resume(device_t dev) { printf("Mypci resume!\n"); return (0); } static device_method_t mypci_methods[] = { /* Device interface */ DEVMETHOD(device_probe, mypci_probe), DEVMETHOD(device_attach, mypci_attach), DEVMETHOD(device_detach, mypci_detach), DEVMETHOD(device_shutdown, mypci_shutdown), DEVMETHOD(device_suspend, mypci_suspend), DEVMETHOD(device_resume, mypci_resume), { 0, 0 } }; static devclass_t mypci_devclass; DEFINE_CLASS_0(mypci, mypci_driver, mypci_methods, sizeof(struct mypci_softc)); DRIVER_MODULE(mypci, pci, mypci_driver, mypci_devclass, 0, 0);
# Makefile for mypci driver KMOD= mypci SRCS= mypci.c SRCS+= device_if.h bus_if.h pci_if.h .include <bsd.kmod.mk>
If you place the above source file and Makefile into a directory, you may run make to compile the sample driver. Additionally, you may run make load to load the driver into the currently running kernel and make unload to unload the driver after it is loaded.
FreeBSD provides an object-oriented mechanism for requesting resources from a parent bus. Almost all devices will be a child member of some sort of bus (PCI, ISA, USB, SCSI, etc) and these devices need to acquire resources from their parent bus (such as memory segments, interrupt lines, or DMA channels).
To do anything particularly useful with a PCI device you will need to obtain the Base Address Registers (BARs) from the
PCI Configuration space. The PCI-specific details of obtaining the BAR are abstracted in
the bus_alloc_resource()
function.
For example, a typical driver might have something similar to this in the attach()
function:
sc->bar0id = PCIR_BAR(0); sc->bar0res = bus_alloc_resource(dev, SYS_RES_MEMORY, &sc->bar0id, 0, ~0, 1, RF_ACTIVE); if (sc->bar0res == NULL) { printf("Memory allocation of PCI base register 0 failed!\n"); error = ENXIO; goto fail1; } sc->bar1id = PCIR_BAR(1); sc->bar1res = bus_alloc_resource(dev, SYS_RES_MEMORY, &sc->bar1id, 0, ~0, 1, RF_ACTIVE); if (sc->bar1res == NULL) { printf("Memory allocation of PCI base register 1 failed!\n"); error = ENXIO; goto fail2; } sc->bar0_bt = rman_get_bustag(sc->bar0res); sc->bar0_bh = rman_get_bushandle(sc->bar0res); sc->bar1_bt = rman_get_bustag(sc->bar1res); sc->bar1_bh = rman_get_bushandle(sc->bar1res);
Handles for each base address register are kept in the softc
structure so that they can be used to write to the device
later.
These handles can then be used to read or write from the device registers with the
bus_space_*
functions. For example, a driver might contain
a shorthand function to read from a board specific register like this:
uint16_t board_read(struct ni_softc *sc, uint16_t address) { return bus_space_read_2(sc->bar1_bt, sc->bar1_bh, address); }
Similarly, one could write to the registers with:
void board_write(struct ni_softc *sc, uint16_t address, uint16_t value) { bus_space_write_2(sc->bar1_bt, sc->bar1_bh, address, value); }
These functions exist in 8bit, 16bit, and 32bit versions and you should use bus_space_{read|write}_{1|2|4}
accordingly.
Note: In FreeBSD 7.0 and later, you can use the
bus_*
functions instead ofbus_space_*
. Thebus_*
functions take a struct resource * pointer instead of a bus tag and handle. Thus, you could drop the bus tag and bus handle members from thesoftc
and rewrite theboard_read()
function as:uint16_t board_read(struct ni_softc *sc, uint16_t address) { return (bus_read(sc->bar1res, address)); }
Interrupts are allocated from the object-oriented bus code in a way similar to the memory resources. First an IRQ resource must be allocated from the parent bus, and then the interrupt handler must be set up to deal with this IRQ.
Again, a sample from a device attach()
function says
more than words.
/* Get the IRQ resource */ sc->irqid = 0x0; sc->irqres = bus_alloc_resource(dev, SYS_RES_IRQ, &(sc->irqid), 0, ~0, 1, RF_SHAREABLE | RF_ACTIVE); if (sc->irqres == NULL) { printf("IRQ allocation failed!\n"); error = ENXIO; goto fail3; } /* Now we should set up the interrupt handler */ error = bus_setup_intr(dev, sc->irqres, INTR_TYPE_MISC, my_handler, sc, &(sc->handler)); if (error) { printf("Couldn't set up irq\n"); goto fail4; }
Some care must be taken in the detach routine of the driver. You must quiesce the
device's interrupt stream, and remove the interrupt handler. Once bus_teardown_intr()
has returned, you know that your interrupt
handler will no longer be called and that all threads that might have been executing this
interrupt handler have returned. Since this function can sleep, you must not hold any
mutexes when calling this function.
This section is obsolete, and present only for historical reasons. The proper methods
for dealing with these issues is to use the bus_space_dma*()
functions instead. This paragraph can be removed
when this section is updated to reflect that usage. However, at the moment, the API is in
a bit of flux, so once that settles down, it would be good to update this section to
reflect that.
On the PC, peripherals that want to do bus-mastering DMA must deal with physical
addresses. This is a problem since FreeBSD uses virtual memory and deals almost
exclusively with virtual addresses. Fortunately, there is a function, vtophys()
to help.
#include <vm/vm.h> #include <vm/pmap.h> #define vtophys(virtual_address) (...)
The solution is a bit different on the alpha however, and what we really want is a
function called vtobus()
.
#if defined(__alpha__) #define vtobus(va) alpha_XXX_dmamap((vm_offset_t)va) #else #define vtobus(va) vtophys(va) #endif
It is very important to deallocate all of the resources that were allocated during
attach()
. Care must be taken to deallocate the correct
stuff even on a failure condition so that the system will remain usable while your driver
dies.
This document assumes that the reader has a general understanding of device drivers in FreeBSD and of the SCSI protocol. Much of the information in this document was extracted from the drivers:
ncr (/sys/pci/ncr.c) by Wolfgang Stanglmeier and Stefan Esser
sym (/sys/dev/sym/sym_hipd.c) by Gerard Roudier
aic7xxx (/sys/dev/aic7xxx/aic7xxx.c) by Justin T. Gibbs
and from the CAM code itself (by Justin T. Gibbs, see /sys/cam/*). When some solution looked the most logical and was essentially verbatim extracted from the code by Justin T. Gibbs, I marked it as “recommended”.
The document is illustrated with examples in pseudo-code. Although sometimes the examples have many details and look like real code, it is still pseudo-code. It was written to demonstrate the concepts in an understandable way. For a real driver other approaches may be more modular and efficient. It also abstracts from the hardware details, as well as issues that would cloud the demonstrated concepts or that are supposed to be described in the other chapters of the developers handbook. Such details are commonly shown as calls to functions with descriptive names, comments or pseudo-statements. Fortunately real life full-size examples with all the details can be found in the real drivers.
CAM stands for Common Access Method. It is a generic way to address the I/O buses in a SCSI-like way. This allows a separation of the generic device drivers from the drivers controlling the I/O bus: for example the disk driver becomes able to control disks on both SCSI, IDE, and/or any other bus so the disk driver portion does not have to be rewritten (or copied and modified) for every new I/O bus. Thus the two most important active entities are:
Peripheral Modules - a driver for peripheral devices (disk, tape, CD-ROM, etc.)
SCSI Interface Modules (SIM) - a Host Bus Adapter drivers for connecting to an I/O bus such as SCSI or IDE.
A peripheral driver receives requests from the OS, converts them to a sequence of SCSI commands and passes these SCSI commands to a SCSI Interface Module. The SCSI Interface Module is responsible for passing these commands to the actual hardware (or if the actual hardware is not SCSI but, for example, IDE then also converting the SCSI commands to the native commands of the hardware).
Because we are interested in writing a SCSI adapter driver here, from this point on we will consider everything from the SIM standpoint.
A typical SIM driver needs to include the following CAM-related header files:
#include <cam/cam.h> #include <cam/cam_ccb.h> #include <cam/cam_sim.h> #include <cam/cam_xpt_sim.h> #include <cam/cam_debug.h> #include <cam/scsi/scsi_all.h>
The first thing each SIM driver must do is register itself with the CAM subsystem.
This is done during the driver's xxx_attach()
function
(here and further xxx_ is used to denote the unique driver name prefix). The xxx_attach()
function itself is called by the system bus
auto-configuration code which we do not describe here.
This is achieved in multiple steps: first it is necessary to allocate the queue of requests associated with this SIM:
struct cam_devq *devq; if(( devq = cam_simq_alloc(SIZE) )==NULL) { error; /* some code to handle the error */ }
Here SIZE is the size of the queue to be allocated, maximal number of requests it could contain. It is the number of requests that the SIM driver can handle in parallel on one SCSI card. Commonly it can be calculated as:
SIZE = NUMBER_OF_SUPPORTED_TARGETS * MAX_SIMULTANEOUS_COMMANDS_PER_TARGET
Next we create a descriptor of our SIM:
struct cam_sim *sim; if(( sim = cam_sim_alloc(action_func, poll_func, driver_name, softc, unit, max_dev_transactions, max_tagged_dev_transactions, devq) )==NULL) { cam_simq_free(devq); error; /* some code to handle the error */ }
Note that if we are not able to create a SIM descriptor we free the devq
also because we can do nothing else with it and we want to
conserve memory.
If a SCSI card has multiple SCSI buses on it then each bus requires its own cam_sim
structure.
An interesting question is what to do if a SCSI card has more than one SCSI bus, do we
need one devq
structure per card or per SCSI bus? The
answer given in the comments to the CAM code is: either way, as the driver's author
prefers.
The arguments are:
action_func
- pointer to the driver's xxx_action
function.
poll_func
- pointer to the driver's xxx_poll()
driver_name - the name of the actual driver, such as “ncr” or “wds”.
softc
- pointer to the driver's internal descriptor
for this SCSI card. This pointer will be used by the driver in future to get private
data.
unit - the controller unit number, for example for controller “wds0” this number will be 0
max_dev_transactions - maximal number of simultaneous transactions per SCSI target in the non-tagged mode. This value will be almost universally equal to 1, with possible exceptions only for the non-SCSI cards. Also the drivers that hope to take advantage by preparing one transaction while another one is executed may set it to 2 but this does not seem to be worth the complexity.
max_tagged_dev_transactions - the same thing, but in the tagged mode. Tags are the SCSI way to initiate multiple transactions on a device: each transaction is assigned a unique tag and the transaction is sent to the device. When the device completes some transaction it sends back the result together with the tag so that the SCSI adapter (and the driver) can tell which transaction was completed. This argument is also known as the maximal tag depth. It depends on the abilities of the SCSI adapter.
Finally we register the SCSI buses associated with our SCSI adapter:
if(xpt_bus_register(sim, bus_number) != CAM_SUCCESS) { cam_sim_free(sim, /*free_devq*/ TRUE); error; /* some code to handle the error */ }
If there is one devq
structure per SCSI bus (i.e. we
consider a card with multiple buses as multiple cards with one bus each) then the bus
number will always be 0, otherwise each bus on the SCSI card should be get a distinct
number. Each bus needs its own separate structure cam_sim.
After that our controller is completely hooked to the CAM system. The value of devq
can be discarded now: sim will be passed as an argument in
all further calls from CAM and devq can be derived from it.
CAM provides the framework for such asynchronous events. Some events originate from the lower levels (the SIM drivers), some events originate from the peripheral drivers, some events originate from the CAM subsystem itself. Any driver can register callbacks for some types of the asynchronous events, so that it would be notified if these events occur.
A typical example of such an event is a device reset. Each transaction and event identifies the devices to which it applies by the means of “path”. The target-specific events normally occur during a transaction with this device. So the path from that transaction may be re-used to report this event (this is safe because the event path is copied in the event reporting routine but not deallocated nor passed anywhere further). Also it is safe to allocate paths dynamically at any time including the interrupt routines, although that incurs certain overhead, and a possible problem with this approach is that there may be no free memory at that time. For a bus reset event we need to define a wildcard path including all devices on the bus. So we can create the path for the future bus reset events in advance and avoid problems with the future memory shortage:
struct cam_path *path; if(xpt_create_path(&path, /*periph*/NULL, cam_sim_path(sim), CAM_TARGET_WILDCARD, CAM_LUN_WILDCARD) != CAM_REQ_CMP) { xpt_bus_deregister(cam_sim_path(sim)); cam_sim_free(sim, /*free_devq*/TRUE); error; /* some code to handle the error */ } softc->wpath = path; softc->sim = sim;
As you can see the path includes:
ID of the peripheral driver (NULL here because we have none)
ID of the SIM driver (cam_sim_path(sim)
)
SCSI target number of the device (CAM_TARGET_WILDCARD means “all devices”)
SCSI LUN number of the subdevice (CAM_LUN_WILDCARD means “all LUNs”)
If the driver can not allocate this path it will not be able to work normally, so in that case we dismantle that SCSI bus.
And we save the path pointer in the softc
structure
for future use. After that we save the value of sim (or we can also discard it on the
exit from xxx_probe()
if we wish).
That is all for a minimalistic initialization. To do things right there is one more issue left.
For a SIM driver there is one particularly interesting event: when a target device is considered lost. In this case resetting the SCSI negotiations with this device may be a good idea. So we register a callback for this event with CAM. The request is passed to CAM by requesting CAM action on a CAM control block for this type of request:
struct ccb_setasync csa; xpt_setup_ccb(&csa.ccb_h, path, /*priority*/5); csa.ccb_h.func_code = XPT_SASYNC_CB; csa.event_enable = AC_LOST_DEVICE; csa.callback = xxx_async; csa.callback_arg = sim; xpt_action((union ccb *)&csa);
Now we take a look at the xxx_action()
and xxx_poll()
driver entry points.
Do some action on request of the CAM subsystem. Sim describes the SIM for the request, CCB is the request itself. CCB stands for “CAM Control Block”. It is a union of many specific instances, each describing arguments for some type of transactions. All of these instances share the CCB header where the common part of arguments is stored.
CAM supports the SCSI controllers working in both initiator (“normal”) mode and target (simulating a SCSI device) mode. Here we only consider the part relevant to the initiator mode.
There are a few function and macros (in other words, methods) defined to access the public data in the struct sim:
cam_sim_path(sim)
- the path ID (see above)
cam_sim_name(sim)
- the name of the sim
cam_sim_softc(sim)
- the pointer to the softc (driver
private data) structure
cam_sim_unit(sim)
- the unit number
cam_sim_bus(sim)
- the bus ID
To identify the device, xxx_action()
can get the unit
number and pointer to its structure softc using these functions.
The type of request is stored in ccb->ccb_h.func_code
. So generally xxx_action()
consists of a big switch:
struct xxx_softc *softc = (struct xxx_softc *) cam_sim_softc(sim); struct ccb_hdr *ccb_h = &ccb->ccb_h; int unit = cam_sim_unit(sim); int bus = cam_sim_bus(sim); switch(ccb_h->func_code) { case ...: ... default: ccb_h->status = CAM_REQ_INVALID; xpt_done(ccb); break; }
As can be seen from the default case (if an unknown command was received) the return
code of the command is set into ccb->ccb_h.status
and
the completed CCB is returned back to CAM by calling xpt_done(ccb)
.
xpt_done()
does not have to be called from xxx_action()
: For example an I/O request may be enqueued inside
the SIM driver and/or its SCSI controller. Then when the device would post an interrupt
signaling that the processing of this request is complete xpt_done()
may be called from the interrupt handling routine.
Actually, the CCB status is not only assigned as a return code but a CCB has some
status all the time. Before CCB is passed to the xxx_action()
routine it gets the status CCB_REQ_INPROG meaning
that it is in progress. There are a surprising number of status values defined in /sys/cam/cam.h which should be able to represent the status of a
request in great detail. More interesting yet, the status is in fact a “bitwise
or” of an enumerated status value (the lower 6 bits) and possible additional
flag-like bits (the upper bits). The enumerated values will be discussed later in more
detail. The summary of them can be found in the Errors Summary section. The possible
status flags are:
CAM_DEV_QFRZN - if the SIM
driver gets a serious error (for example, the device does not respond to the selection or
breaks the SCSI protocol) when processing a CCB it should freeze the request queue by
calling xpt_freeze_simq()
, return the other enqueued but
not processed yet CCBs for this device back to the CAM queue, then set this flag for the
troublesome CCB and call xpt_done()
. This flag causes the
CAM subsystem to unfreeze the queue after it handles the error.
CAM_AUTOSNS_VALID - if the device returned an error condition and the flag CAM_DIS_AUTOSENSE is not set in CCB the SIM driver must execute the REQUEST SENSE command automatically to extract the sense (extended error information) data from the device. If this attempt was successful the sense data should be saved in the CCB and this flag set.
CAM_RELEASE_SIMQ - like
CAM_DEV_QFRZN but used in case there is some problem (or resource shortage) with the SCSI
controller itself. Then all the future requests to the controller should be stopped by
xpt_freeze_simq()
. The controller queue will be restarted
after the SIM driver overcomes the shortage and informs CAM by returning some CCB with
this flag set.
CAM_SIM_QUEUED - when SIM puts a CCB into its request queue this flag should be set (and removed when this CCB gets dequeued before being returned back to CAM). This flag is not used anywhere in the CAM code now, so its purpose is purely diagnostic.
The function xxx_action()
is not allowed to sleep, so
all the synchronization for resource access must be done using SIM or device queue
freezing. Besides the aforementioned flags the CAM subsystem provides functions xpt_release_simq()
and xpt_release_devq()
to unfreeze the queues directly, without
passing a CCB to CAM.
The CCB header contains the following fields:
path - path ID for the request
target_id - target device ID for the request
target_lun - LUN ID of the target device
timeout - timeout interval for this command, in milliseconds
timeout_ch - a convenience place for the SIM driver to store the timeout handle (the CAM subsystem itself does not make any assumptions about it)
flags - various bits of information about the request spriv_ptr0, spriv_ptr1 - fields reserved for private use by the SIM driver (such as linking to the SIM queues or SIM private control blocks); actually, they exist as unions: spriv_ptr0 and spriv_ptr1 have the type (void *), spriv_field0 and spriv_field1 have the type unsigned long, sim_priv.entries[0].bytes and sim_priv.entries[1].bytes are byte arrays of the size consistent with the other incarnations of the union and sim_priv.bytes is one array, twice bigger.
The recommended way of using the SIM private fields of CCB is to define some meaningful names for them and use these meaningful names in the driver, like:
#define ccb_some_meaningful_name sim_priv.entries[0].bytes #define ccb_hcb spriv_ptr1 /* for hardware control block */
The most common initiator mode requests are:
XPT_SCSI_IO - execute an I/O transaction
The instance “struct ccb_scsiio csio” of the union ccb is used to transfer the arguments. They are:
cdb_io - pointer to the SCSI command buffer or the buffer itself
cdb_len - SCSI command length
data_ptr - pointer to the data buffer (gets a bit complicated if scatter/gather is used)
dxfer_len - length of the data to transfer
sglist_cnt - counter of the scatter/gather segments
scsi_status - place to return the SCSI status
sense_data - buffer for the SCSI sense information if the command returns an error (the SIM driver is supposed to run the REQUEST SENSE command automatically in this case if the CCB flag CAM_DIS_AUTOSENSE is not set)
sense_len - the length of that buffer (if it happens to be higher than size of sense_data the SIM driver must silently assume the smaller value) resid, sense_resid - if the transfer of data or SCSI sense returned an error these are the returned counters of the residual (not transferred) data. They do not seem to be especially meaningful, so in a case when they are difficult to compute (say, counting bytes in the SCSI controller's FIFO buffer) an approximate value will do as well. For a successfully completed transfer they must be set to zero.
tag_action - the kind of tag to use:
CAM_TAG_ACTION_NONE - do not use tags for this transaction
MSG_SIMPLE_Q_TAG, MSG_HEAD_OF_Q_TAG, MSG_ORDERED_Q_TAG - value equal to the appropriate tag message (see /sys/cam/scsi/scsi_message.h); this gives only the tag type, the SIM driver must assign the tag value itself
The general logic of handling this request is the following:
The first thing to do is to check for possible races, to make sure that the command did not get aborted when it was sitting in the queue:
struct ccb_scsiio *csio = &ccb->csio; if ((ccb_h->status & CAM_STATUS_MASK) != CAM_REQ_INPROG) { xpt_done(ccb); return; }
Also we check that the device is supported at all by our controller:
if(ccb_h->target_id > OUR_MAX_SUPPORTED_TARGET_ID || cch_h->target_id == OUR_SCSI_CONTROLLERS_OWN_ID) { ccb_h->status = CAM_TID_INVALID; xpt_done(ccb); return; } if(ccb_h->target_lun > OUR_MAX_SUPPORTED_LUN) { ccb_h->status = CAM_LUN_INVALID; xpt_done(ccb); return; }
Then allocate whatever data structures (such as card-dependent hardware control block) we need to process this request. If we can not then freeze the SIM queue and remember that we have a pending operation, return the CCB back and ask CAM to re-queue it. Later when the resources become available the SIM queue must be unfrozen by returning a ccb with the CAM_SIMQ_RELEASE bit set in its status. Otherwise, if all went well, link the CCB with the hardware control block (HCB) and mark it as queued.
struct xxx_hcb *hcb = allocate_hcb(softc, unit, bus); if(hcb == NULL) { softc->flags |= RESOURCE_SHORTAGE; xpt_freeze_simq(sim, /*count*/1); ccb_h->status = CAM_REQUEUE_REQ; xpt_done(ccb); return; } hcb->ccb = ccb; ccb_h->ccb_hcb = (void *)hcb; ccb_h->status |= CAM_SIM_QUEUED;
Extract the target data from CCB into the hardware control block. Check if we are asked to assign a tag and if yes then generate an unique tag and build the SCSI tag messages. The SIM driver is also responsible for negotiations with the devices to set the maximal mutually supported bus width, synchronous rate and offset.
hcb->target = ccb_h->target_id; hcb->lun = ccb_h->target_lun; generate_identify_message(hcb); if( ccb_h->tag_action != CAM_TAG_ACTION_NONE ) generate_unique_tag_message(hcb, ccb_h->tag_action); if( !target_negotiated(hcb) ) generate_negotiation_messages(hcb);
Then set up the SCSI command. The command storage may be specified in the CCB in many interesting ways, specified by the CCB flags. The command buffer can be contained in CCB or pointed to, in the latter case the pointer may be physical or virtual. Since the hardware commonly needs physical address we always convert the address to the physical one.
A NOT-QUITE RELATED NOTE: Normally this is done by a call to vtophys()
, but for the PCI device (which account for most of the
SCSI controllers now) drivers' portability to the Alpha architecture the conversion must
be done by vtobus()
instead due to special Alpha quirks.
[IMHO it would be much better to have two separate functions, vtop()
and ptobus()
then vtobus()
would be a simple superposition of them.] In case if a
physical address is requested it is OK to return the CCB with the status “CAM_REQ_INVALID”, the current drivers do that. But it is
also possible to compile the Alpha-specific piece of code, as in this example (there
should be a more direct way to do that, without conditional compilation in the drivers).
If necessary a physical address can be also converted or mapped back to a virtual address
but with big pain, so we do not do that.
if(ccb_h->flags & CAM_CDB_POINTER) { /* CDB is a pointer */ if(!(ccb_h->flags & CAM_CDB_PHYS)) { /* CDB pointer is virtual */ hcb->cmd = vtobus(csio->cdb_io.cdb_ptr); } else { /* CDB pointer is physical */ #if defined(__alpha__) hcb->cmd = csio->cdb_io.cdb_ptr | alpha_XXX_dmamap_or ; #else hcb->cmd = csio->cdb_io.cdb_ptr ; #endif } } else { /* CDB is in the ccb (buffer) */ hcb->cmd = vtobus(csio->cdb_io.cdb_bytes); } hcb->cmdlen = csio->cdb_len;
Now it is time to set up the data. Again, the data storage may be specified in the CCB in many interesting ways, specified by the CCB flags. First we get the direction of the data transfer. The simplest case is if there is no data to transfer:
int dir = (ccb_h->flags & CAM_DIR_MASK); if (dir == CAM_DIR_NONE) goto end_data;
Then we check if the data is in one chunk or in a scatter-gather list, and the addresses are physical or virtual. The SCSI controller may be able to handle only a limited number of chunks of limited length. If the request hits this limitation we return an error. We use a special function to return the CCB to handle in one place the HCB resource shortages. The functions to add chunks are driver-dependent, and here we leave them without detailed implementation. See description of the SCSI command (CDB) handling for the details on the address-translation issues. If some variation is too difficult or impossible to implement with a particular card it is OK to return the status “CAM_REQ_INVALID”. Actually, it seems like the scatter-gather ability is not used anywhere in the CAM code now. But at least the case for a single non-scattered virtual buffer must be implemented, it is actively used by CAM.
int rv; initialize_hcb_for_data(hcb); if((!(ccb_h->flags & CAM_SCATTER_VALID)) { /* single buffer */ if(!(ccb_h->flags & CAM_DATA_PHYS)) { rv = add_virtual_chunk(hcb, csio->data_ptr, csio->dxfer_len, dir); } } else { rv = add_physical_chunk(hcb, csio->data_ptr, csio->dxfer_len, dir); } } else { int i; struct bus_dma_segment *segs; segs = (struct bus_dma_segment *)csio->data_ptr; if ((ccb_h->flags & CAM_SG_LIST_PHYS) != 0) { /* The SG list pointer is physical */ rv = setup_hcb_for_physical_sg_list(hcb, segs, csio->sglist_cnt); } else if (!(ccb_h->flags & CAM_DATA_PHYS)) { /* SG buffer pointers are virtual */ for (i = 0; i < csio->sglist_cnt; i++) { rv = add_virtual_chunk(hcb, segs[i].ds_addr, segs[i].ds_len, dir); if (rv != CAM_REQ_CMP) break; } } else { /* SG buffer pointers are physical */ for (i = 0; i < csio->sglist_cnt; i++) { rv = add_physical_chunk(hcb, segs[i].ds_addr, segs[i].ds_len, dir); if (rv != CAM_REQ_CMP) break; } } } if(rv != CAM_REQ_CMP) { /* we expect that add_*_chunk() functions return CAM_REQ_CMP * if they added a chunk successfully, CAM_REQ_TOO_BIG if * the request is too big (too many bytes or too many chunks), * CAM_REQ_INVALID in case of other troubles */ free_hcb_and_ccb_done(hcb, ccb, rv); return; } end_data:
If disconnection is disabled for this CCB we pass this information to the hcb:
if(ccb_h->flags & CAM_DIS_DISCONNECT) hcb_disable_disconnect(hcb);
If the controller is able to run REQUEST SENSE command all by itself then the value of the flag CAM_DIS_AUTOSENSE should also be passed to it, to prevent automatic REQUEST SENSE if the CAM subsystem does not want it.
The only thing left is to set up the timeout, pass our hcb to the hardware and return, the rest will be done by the interrupt handler (or timeout handler).
ccb_h->timeout_ch = timeout(xxx_timeout, (caddr_t) hcb, (ccb_h->timeout * hz) / 1000); /* convert milliseconds to ticks */ put_hcb_into_hardware_queue(hcb); return;
And here is a possible implementation of the function returning CCB:
static void free_hcb_and_ccb_done(struct xxx_hcb *hcb, union ccb *ccb, u_int32_t status) { struct xxx_softc *softc = hcb->softc; ccb->ccb_h.ccb_hcb = 0; if(hcb != NULL) { untimeout(xxx_timeout, (caddr_t) hcb, ccb->ccb_h.timeout_ch); /* we're about to free a hcb, so the shortage has ended */ if(softc->flags & RESOURCE_SHORTAGE) { softc->flags &= ~RESOURCE_SHORTAGE; status |= CAM_RELEASE_SIMQ; } free_hcb(hcb); /* also removes hcb from any internal lists */ } ccb->ccb_h.status = status | (ccb->ccb_h.status & ~(CAM_STATUS_MASK|CAM_SIM_QUEUED)); xpt_done(ccb); }
XPT_RESET_DEV - send the SCSI “BUS DEVICE RESET” message to a device
There is no data transferred in CCB except the header and the most interesting argument of it is target_id. Depending on the controller hardware a hardware control block just like for the XPT_SCSI_IO request may be constructed (see XPT_SCSI_IO request description) and sent to the controller or the SCSI controller may be immediately programmed to send this RESET message to the device or this request may be just not supported (and return the status “CAM_REQ_INVALID”). Also on completion of the request all the disconnected transactions for this target must be aborted (probably in the interrupt routine).
Also all the current negotiations for the target are lost on reset, so they might be cleaned too. Or they clearing may be deferred, because anyway the target would request re-negotiation on the next transaction.
XPT_RESET_BUS - send the RESET signal to the SCSI bus
No arguments are passed in the CCB, the only interesting argument is the SCSI bus indicated by the struct sim pointer.
A minimalistic implementation would forget the SCSI negotiations for all the devices on the bus and return the status CAM_REQ_CMP.
The proper implementation would in addition actually reset the SCSI bus (possible also reset the SCSI controller) and mark all the CCBs being processed, both those in the hardware queue and those being disconnected, as done with the status CAM_SCSI_BUS_RESET. Like:
int targ, lun; struct xxx_hcb *h, *hh; struct ccb_trans_settings neg; struct cam_path *path; /* The SCSI bus reset may take a long time, in this case its completion * should be checked by interrupt or timeout. But for simplicity * we assume here that it is really fast. */ reset_scsi_bus(softc); /* drop all enqueued CCBs */ for(h = softc->first_queued_hcb; h != NULL; h = hh) { hh = h->next; free_hcb_and_ccb_done(h, h->ccb, CAM_SCSI_BUS_RESET); } /* the clean values of negotiations to report */ neg.bus_width = 8; neg.sync_period = neg.sync_offset = 0; neg.valid = (CCB_TRANS_BUS_WIDTH_VALID | CCB_TRANS_SYNC_RATE_VALID | CCB_TRANS_SYNC_OFFSET_VALID); /* drop all disconnected CCBs and clean negotiations */ for(targ=0; targ <= OUR_MAX_SUPPORTED_TARGET; targ++) { clean_negotiations(softc, targ); /* report the event if possible */ if(xpt_create_path(&path, /*periph*/NULL, cam_sim_path(sim), targ, CAM_LUN_WILDCARD) == CAM_REQ_CMP) { xpt_async(AC_TRANSFER_NEG, path, &neg); xpt_free_path(path); } for(lun=0; lun <= OUR_MAX_SUPPORTED_LUN; lun++) for(h = softc->first_discon_hcb[targ][lun]; h != NULL; h = hh) { hh=h->next; free_hcb_and_ccb_done(h, h->ccb, CAM_SCSI_BUS_RESET); } } ccb->ccb_h.status = CAM_REQ_CMP; xpt_done(ccb); /* report the event */ xpt_async(AC_BUS_RESET, softc->wpath, NULL); return;
Implementing the SCSI bus reset as a function may be a good idea because it would be re-used by the timeout function as a last resort if the things go wrong.
XPT_ABORT - abort the specified CCB
The arguments are transferred in the instance “struct ccb_abort cab” of the union ccb. The only argument field in it is:
abort_ccb - pointer to the CCB to be aborted
If the abort is not supported just return the status CAM_UA_ABORT. This is also the easy way to minimally implement this call, return CAM_UA_ABORT in any case.
The hard way is to implement this request honestly. First check that abort applies to a SCSI transaction:
struct ccb *abort_ccb; abort_ccb = ccb->cab.abort_ccb; if(abort_ccb->ccb_h.func_code != XPT_SCSI_IO) { ccb->ccb_h.status = CAM_UA_ABORT; xpt_done(ccb); return; }
Then it is necessary to find this CCB in our queue. This can be done by walking the list of all our hardware control blocks in search for one associated with this CCB:
struct xxx_hcb *hcb, *h; hcb = NULL; /* We assume that softc->first_hcb is the head of the list of all * HCBs associated with this bus, including those enqueued for * processing, being processed by hardware and disconnected ones. */ for(h = softc->first_hcb; h != NULL; h = h->next) { if(h->ccb == abort_ccb) { hcb = h; break; } } if(hcb == NULL) { /* no such CCB in our queue */ ccb->ccb_h.status = CAM_PATH_INVALID; xpt_done(ccb); return; } hcb=found_hcb;
Now we look at the current processing status of the HCB. It may be either sitting in the queue waiting to be sent to the SCSI bus, being transferred right now, or disconnected and waiting for the result of the command, or actually completed by hardware but not yet marked as done by software. To make sure that we do not get in any races with hardware we mark the HCB as being aborted, so that if this HCB is about to be sent to the SCSI bus the SCSI controller will see this flag and skip it.
int hstatus; /* shown as a function, in case special action is needed to make * this flag visible to hardware */ set_hcb_flags(hcb, HCB_BEING_ABORTED); abort_again: hstatus = get_hcb_status(hcb); switch(hstatus) { case HCB_SITTING_IN_QUEUE: remove_hcb_from_hardware_queue(hcb); /* FALLTHROUGH */ case HCB_COMPLETED: /* this is an easy case */ free_hcb_and_ccb_done(hcb, abort_ccb, CAM_REQ_ABORTED); break;
If the CCB is being transferred right now we would like to signal to the SCSI controller in some hardware-dependent way that we want to abort the current transfer. The SCSI controller would set the SCSI ATTENTION signal and when the target responds to it send an ABORT message. We also reset the timeout to make sure that the target is not sleeping forever. If the command would not get aborted in some reasonable time like 10 seconds the timeout routine would go ahead and reset the whole SCSI bus. Because the command will be aborted in some reasonable time we can just return the abort request now as successfully completed, and mark the aborted CCB as aborted (but not mark it as done yet).
case HCB_BEING_TRANSFERRED: untimeout(xxx_timeout, (caddr_t) hcb, abort_ccb->ccb_h.timeout_ch); abort_ccb->ccb_h.timeout_ch = timeout(xxx_timeout, (caddr_t) hcb, 10 * hz); abort_ccb->ccb_h.status = CAM_REQ_ABORTED; /* ask the controller to abort that HCB, then generate * an interrupt and stop */ if(signal_hardware_to_abort_hcb_and_stop(hcb) < 0) { /* oops, we missed the race with hardware, this transaction * got off the bus before we aborted it, try again */ goto abort_again; } break;
If the CCB is in the list of disconnected then set it up as an abort request and re-queue it at the front of hardware queue. Reset the timeout and report the abort request to be completed.
case HCB_DISCONNECTED: untimeout(xxx_timeout, (caddr_t) hcb, abort_ccb->ccb_h.timeout_ch); abort_ccb->ccb_h.timeout_ch = timeout(xxx_timeout, (caddr_t) hcb, 10 * hz); put_abort_message_into_hcb(hcb); put_hcb_at_the_front_of_hardware_queue(hcb); break; } ccb->ccb_h.status = CAM_REQ_CMP; xpt_done(ccb); return;
That is all for the ABORT request, although there is one more issue. Because the ABORT message cleans all the ongoing transactions on a LUN we have to mark all the other active transactions on this LUN as aborted. That should be done in the interrupt routine, after the transaction gets aborted.
Implementing the CCB abort as a function may be quite a good idea, this function can be re-used if an I/O transaction times out. The only difference would be that the timed out transaction would return the status CAM_CMD_TIMEOUT for the timed out request. Then the case XPT_ABORT would be small, like that:
case XPT_ABORT: struct ccb *abort_ccb; abort_ccb = ccb->cab.abort_ccb; if(abort_ccb->ccb_h.func_code != XPT_SCSI_IO) { ccb->ccb_h.status = CAM_UA_ABORT; xpt_done(ccb); return; } if(xxx_abort_ccb(abort_ccb, CAM_REQ_ABORTED) < 0) /* no such CCB in our queue */ ccb->ccb_h.status = CAM_PATH_INVALID; else ccb->ccb_h.status = CAM_REQ_CMP; xpt_done(ccb); return;
XPT_SET_TRAN_SETTINGS - explicitly set values of SCSI transfer settings
The arguments are transferred in the instance “struct ccb_trans_setting cts” of the union ccb:
valid - a bitmask showing which settings should be updated:
CCB_TRANS_SYNC_RATE_VALID - synchronous transfer rate
CCB_TRANS_SYNC_OFFSET_VALID - synchronous offset
CCB_TRANS_BUS_WIDTH_VALID - bus width
CCB_TRANS_DISC_VALID - set enable/disable disconnection
CCB_TRANS_TQ_VALID - set enable/disable tagged queuing
flags - consists of two parts, binary arguments and identification of sub-operations. The binary arguments are:
CCB_TRANS_DISC_ENB - enable disconnection
CCB_TRANS_TAG_ENB - enable tagged queuing
the sub-operations are:
CCB_TRANS_CURRENT_SETTINGS - change the current negotiations
CCB_TRANS_USER_SETTINGS - remember the desired user values sync_period, sync_offset - self-explanatory, if sync_offset==0 then the asynchronous mode is requested bus_width - bus width, in bits (not bytes)
Two sets of negotiated parameters are supported, the user settings and the current settings. The user settings are not really used much in the SIM drivers, this is mostly just a piece of memory where the upper levels can store (and later recall) its ideas about the parameters. Setting the user parameters does not cause re-negotiation of the transfer rates. But when the SCSI controller does a negotiation it must never set the values higher than the user parameters, so it is essentially the top boundary.
The current settings are, as the name says, current. Changing them means that the parameters must be re-negotiated on the next transfer. Again, these “new current settings” are not supposed to be forced on the device, just they are used as the initial step of negotiations. Also they must be limited by actual capabilities of the SCSI controller: for example, if the SCSI controller has 8-bit bus and the request asks to set 16-bit wide transfers this parameter must be silently truncated to 8-bit transfers before sending it to the device.
One caveat is that the bus width and synchronous parameters are per target while the disconnection and tag enabling parameters are per lun.
The recommended implementation is to keep 3 sets of negotiated (bus width and synchronous transfer) parameters:
user - the user set, as above
current - those actually in effect
goal - those requested by setting of the “current” parameters
The code looks like:
struct ccb_trans_settings *cts; int targ, lun; int flags; cts = &ccb->cts; targ = ccb_h->target_id; lun = ccb_h->target_lun; flags = cts->flags; if(flags & CCB_TRANS_USER_SETTINGS) { if(flags & CCB_TRANS_SYNC_RATE_VALID) softc->user_sync_period[targ] = cts->sync_period; if(flags & CCB_TRANS_SYNC_OFFSET_VALID) softc->user_sync_offset[targ] = cts->sync_offset; if(flags & CCB_TRANS_BUS_WIDTH_VALID) softc->user_bus_width[targ] = cts->bus_width; if(flags & CCB_TRANS_DISC_VALID) { softc->user_tflags[targ][lun] &= ~CCB_TRANS_DISC_ENB; softc->user_tflags[targ][lun] |= flags & CCB_TRANS_DISC_ENB; } if(flags & CCB_TRANS_TQ_VALID) { softc->user_tflags[targ][lun] &= ~CCB_TRANS_TQ_ENB; softc->user_tflags[targ][lun] |= flags & CCB_TRANS_TQ_ENB; } } if(flags & CCB_TRANS_CURRENT_SETTINGS) { if(flags & CCB_TRANS_SYNC_RATE_VALID) softc->goal_sync_period[targ] = max(cts->sync_period, OUR_MIN_SUPPORTED_PERIOD); if(flags & CCB_TRANS_SYNC_OFFSET_VALID) softc->goal_sync_offset[targ] = min(cts->sync_offset, OUR_MAX_SUPPORTED_OFFSET); if(flags & CCB_TRANS_BUS_WIDTH_VALID) softc->goal_bus_width[targ] = min(cts->bus_width, OUR_BUS_WIDTH); if(flags & CCB_TRANS_DISC_VALID) { softc->current_tflags[targ][lun] &= ~CCB_TRANS_DISC_ENB; softc->current_tflags[targ][lun] |= flags & CCB_TRANS_DISC_ENB; } if(flags & CCB_TRANS_TQ_VALID) { softc->current_tflags[targ][lun] &= ~CCB_TRANS_TQ_ENB; softc->current_tflags[targ][lun] |= flags & CCB_TRANS_TQ_ENB; } } ccb->ccb_h.status = CAM_REQ_CMP; xpt_done(ccb); return;
Then when the next I/O request will be processed it will check if it has to re-negotiate, for example by calling the function target_negotiated(hcb). It can be implemented like this:
int target_negotiated(struct xxx_hcb *hcb) { struct softc *softc = hcb->softc; int targ = hcb->targ; if( softc->current_sync_period[targ] != softc->goal_sync_period[targ] || softc->current_sync_offset[targ] != softc->goal_sync_offset[targ] || softc->current_bus_width[targ] != softc->goal_bus_width[targ] ) return 0; /* FALSE */ else return 1; /* TRUE */ }
After the values are re-negotiated the resulting values must be assigned to both
current and goal parameters, so for future I/O transactions the current and goal
parameters would be the same and target_negotiated()
would
return TRUE. When the card is initialized (in xxx_attach()
)
the current negotiation values must be initialized to narrow asynchronous mode, the goal
and current values must be initialized to the maximal values supported by controller.
XPT_GET_TRAN_SETTINGS - get values of SCSI transfer settings
This operations is the reverse of XPT_SET_TRAN_SETTINGS. Fill up the CCB instance “struct ccb_trans_setting cts” with data as requested by the flags CCB_TRANS_CURRENT_SETTINGS or CCB_TRANS_USER_SETTINGS (if both are set then the existing drivers return the current settings). Set all the bits in the valid field.
XPT_CALC_GEOMETRY - calculate logical (BIOS) geometry of the disk
The arguments are transferred in the instance “struct ccb_calc_geometry ccg” of the union ccb:
block_size - input, block (A.K.A sector) size in bytes
volume_size - input, volume size in bytes
cylinders - output, logical cylinders
heads - output, logical heads
secs_per_track - output, logical sectors per track
If the returned geometry differs much enough from what the SCSI controller BIOS thinks and a disk on this SCSI controller is used as bootable the system may not be able to boot. The typical calculation example taken from the aic7xxx driver is:
struct ccb_calc_geometry *ccg; u_int32_t size_mb; u_int32_t secs_per_cylinder; int extended; ccg = &ccb->ccg; size_mb = ccg->volume_size / ((1024L * 1024L) / ccg->block_size); extended = check_cards_EEPROM_for_extended_geometry(softc); if (size_mb > 1024 && extended) { ccg->heads = 255; ccg->secs_per_track = 63; } else { ccg->heads = 64; ccg->secs_per_track = 32; } secs_per_cylinder = ccg->heads * ccg->secs_per_track; ccg->cylinders = ccg->volume_size / secs_per_cylinder; ccb->ccb_h.status = CAM_REQ_CMP; xpt_done(ccb); return;
This gives the general idea, the exact calculation depends on the quirks of the particular BIOS. If BIOS provides no way set the “extended translation” flag in EEPROM this flag should normally be assumed equal to 1. Other popular geometries are:
128 heads, 63 sectors - Symbios controllers 16 heads, 63 sectors - old controllers
Some system BIOSes and SCSI BIOSes fight with each other with variable success, for example a combination of Symbios 875/895 SCSI and Phoenix BIOS can give geometry 128/63 after power up and 255/63 after a hard reset or soft reboot.
XPT_PATH_INQ - path inquiry, in other words get the SIM driver and SCSI controller (also known as HBA - Host Bus Adapter) properties
The properties are returned in the instance “struct ccb_pathinq cpi” of the union ccb:
version_num - the SIM driver version number, now all drivers use 1
hba_inquiry - bitmask of features supported by the controller:
PI_MDP_ABLE - supports MDP message (something from SCSI3?)
PI_WIDE_32 - supports 32 bit wide SCSI
PI_WIDE_16 - supports 16 bit wide SCSI
PI_SDTR_ABLE - can negotiate synchronous transfer rate
PI_LINKED_CDB - supports linked commands
PI_TAG_ABLE - supports tagged commands
PI_SOFT_RST - supports soft reset alternative (hard reset and soft reset are mutually exclusive within a SCSI bus)
target_sprt - flags for target mode support, 0 if unsupported
hba_misc - miscellaneous controller features:
PIM_SCANHILO - bus scans from high ID to low ID
PIM_NOREMOVE - removable devices not included in scan
PIM_NOINITIATOR - initiator role not supported
PIM_NOBUSRESET - user has disabled initial BUS RESET
hba_eng_cnt - mysterious HBA engine count, something related to compression, now is always set to 0
vuhba_flags - vendor-unique flags, unused now
max_target - maximal supported target ID (7 for 8-bit bus, 15 for 16-bit bus, 127 for Fibre Channel)
max_lun - maximal supported LUN ID (7 for older SCSI controllers, 63 for newer ones)
async_flags - bitmask of installed Async handler, unused now
hpath_id - highest Path ID in the subsystem, unused now
unit_number - the controller unit number, cam_sim_unit(sim)
bus_id - the bus number, cam_sim_bus(sim)
initiator_id - the SCSI ID of the controller itself
base_transfer_speed - nominal transfer speed in KB/s for asynchronous narrow transfers, equals to 3300 for SCSI
sim_vid - SIM driver's vendor id, a zero-terminated string of maximal length SIM_IDLEN including the terminating zero
hba_vid - SCSI controller's vendor id, a zero-terminated string of maximal length HBA_IDLEN including the terminating zero
dev_name - device driver name, a zero-terminated string of maximal length DEV_IDLEN including the terminating zero, equal to cam_sim_name(sim)
The recommended way of setting the string fields is using strncpy, like:
strncpy(cpi->dev_name, cam_sim_name(sim), DEV_IDLEN);
After setting the values set the status to CAM_REQ_CMP and mark the CCB as done.
The poll function is used to simulate the interrupts when the interrupt subsystem is
not functioning (for example, when the system has crashed and is creating the system
dump). The CAM subsystem sets the proper interrupt level before calling the poll routine.
So all it needs to do is to call the interrupt routine (or the other way around, the poll
routine may be doing the real action and the interrupt routine would just call the poll
routine). Why bother about a separate function then? Because of different calling
conventions. The xxx_poll
routine gets the struct cam_sim
pointer as its argument when the PCI interrupt routine by common convention gets pointer
to the struct xxx_softc
and the ISA interrupt routine
gets just the device unit number. So the poll routine would normally look as:
static void xxx_poll(struct cam_sim *sim) { xxx_intr((struct xxx_softc *)cam_sim_softc(sim)); /* for PCI device */ }
or
static void xxx_poll(struct cam_sim *sim) { xxx_intr(cam_sim_unit(sim)); /* for ISA device */ }
If an asynchronous event callback has been set up then the callback function should be defined.
static void ahc_async(void *callback_arg, u_int32_t code, struct cam_path *path, void *arg)
callback_arg - the value supplied when registering the callback
code - identifies the type of event
path - identifies the devices to which the event applies
arg - event-specific argument
Implementation for a single type of event, AC_LOST_DEVICE, looks like:
struct xxx_softc *softc; struct cam_sim *sim; int targ; struct ccb_trans_settings neg; sim = (struct cam_sim *)callback_arg; softc = (struct xxx_softc *)cam_sim_softc(sim); switch (code) { case AC_LOST_DEVICE: targ = xpt_path_target_id(path); if(targ <= OUR_MAX_SUPPORTED_TARGET) { clean_negotiations(softc, targ); /* send indication to CAM */ neg.bus_width = 8; neg.sync_period = neg.sync_offset = 0; neg.valid = (CCB_TRANS_BUS_WIDTH_VALID | CCB_TRANS_SYNC_RATE_VALID | CCB_TRANS_SYNC_OFFSET_VALID); xpt_async(AC_TRANSFER_NEG, path, &neg); } break; default: break; }
The exact type of the interrupt routine depends on the type of the peripheral bus (PCI, ISA and so on) to which the SCSI controller is connected.
The interrupt routines of the SIM drivers run at the interrupt level splcam. So splcam()
should be used in the driver to synchronize activity
between the interrupt routine and the rest of the driver (for a multiprocessor-aware
driver things get yet more interesting but we ignore this case here). The pseudo-code in
this document happily ignores the problems of synchronization. The real code must not
ignore them. A simple-minded approach is to set splcam()
on
the entry to the other routines and reset it on return thus protecting them by one big
critical section. To make sure that the interrupt level will be always restored a wrapper
function can be defined, like:
static void xxx_action(struct cam_sim *sim, union ccb *ccb) { int s; s = splcam(); xxx_action1(sim, ccb); splx(s); } static void xxx_action1(struct cam_sim *sim, union ccb *ccb) { ... process the request ... }
This approach is simple and robust but the problem with it is that interrupts may get
blocked for a relatively long time and this would negatively affect the system's
performance. On the other hand the functions of the spl()
family have rather high overhead, so vast amount of tiny critical sections may not be
good either.
The conditions handled by the interrupt routine and the details depend very much on the hardware. We consider the set of “typical” conditions.
First, we check if a SCSI reset was encountered on the bus (probably caused by another SCSI controller on the same SCSI bus). If so we drop all the enqueued and disconnected requests, report the events and re-initialize our SCSI controller. It is important that during this initialization the controller will not issue another reset or else two controllers on the same SCSI bus could ping-pong resets forever. The case of fatal controller error/hang could be handled in the same place, but it will probably need also sending RESET signal to the SCSI bus to reset the status of the connections with the SCSI devices.
int fatal=0; struct ccb_trans_settings neg; struct cam_path *path; if( detected_scsi_reset(softc) || (fatal = detected_fatal_controller_error(softc)) ) { int targ, lun; struct xxx_hcb *h, *hh; /* drop all enqueued CCBs */ for(h = softc->first_queued_hcb; h != NULL; h = hh) { hh = h->next; free_hcb_and_ccb_done(h, h->ccb, CAM_SCSI_BUS_RESET); } /* the clean values of negotiations to report */ neg.bus_width = 8; neg.sync_period = neg.sync_offset = 0; neg.valid = (CCB_TRANS_BUS_WIDTH_VALID | CCB_TRANS_SYNC_RATE_VALID | CCB_TRANS_SYNC_OFFSET_VALID); /* drop all disconnected CCBs and clean negotiations */ for(targ=0; targ <= OUR_MAX_SUPPORTED_TARGET; targ++) { clean_negotiations(softc, targ); /* report the event if possible */ if(xpt_create_path(&path, /*periph*/NULL, cam_sim_path(sim), targ, CAM_LUN_WILDCARD) == CAM_REQ_CMP) { xpt_async(AC_TRANSFER_NEG, path, &neg); xpt_free_path(path); } for(lun=0; lun <= OUR_MAX_SUPPORTED_LUN; lun++) for(h = softc->first_discon_hcb[targ][lun]; h != NULL; h = hh) { hh=h->next; if(fatal) free_hcb_and_ccb_done(h, h->ccb, CAM_UNREC_HBA_ERROR); else free_hcb_and_ccb_done(h, h->ccb, CAM_SCSI_BUS_RESET); } } /* report the event */ xpt_async(AC_BUS_RESET, softc->wpath, NULL); /* re-initialization may take a lot of time, in such case * its completion should be signaled by another interrupt or * checked on timeout - but for simplicity we assume here that * it is really fast */ if(!fatal) { reinitialize_controller_without_scsi_reset(softc); } else { reinitialize_controller_with_scsi_reset(softc); } schedule_next_hcb(softc); return; }
If interrupt is not caused by a controller-wide condition then probably something has happened to the current hardware control block. Depending on the hardware there may be other non-HCB-related events, we just do not consider them here. Then we analyze what happened to this HCB:
struct xxx_hcb *hcb, *h, *hh; int hcb_status, scsi_status; int ccb_status; int targ; int lun_to_freeze; hcb = get_current_hcb(softc); if(hcb == NULL) { /* either stray interrupt or something went very wrong * or this is something hardware-dependent */ handle as necessary; return; } targ = hcb->target; hcb_status = get_status_of_current_hcb(softc);
First we check if the HCB has completed and if so we check the returned SCSI status.
if(hcb_status == COMPLETED) { scsi_status = get_completion_status(hcb);
Then look if this status is related to the REQUEST SENSE command and if so handle it in a simple way.
if(hcb->flags & DOING_AUTOSENSE) { if(scsi_status == GOOD) { /* autosense was successful */ hcb->ccb->ccb_h.status |= CAM_AUTOSNS_VALID; free_hcb_and_ccb_done(hcb, hcb->ccb, CAM_SCSI_STATUS_ERROR); } else { autosense_failed: free_hcb_and_ccb_done(hcb, hcb->ccb, CAM_AUTOSENSE_FAIL); } schedule_next_hcb(softc); return; }
Else the command itself has completed, pay more attention to details. If auto-sense is not disabled for this CCB and the command has failed with sense data then run REQUEST SENSE command to receive that data.
hcb->ccb->csio.scsi_status = scsi_status; calculate_residue(hcb); if( (hcb->ccb->ccb_h.flags & CAM_DIS_AUTOSENSE)==0 && ( scsi_status == CHECK_CONDITION || scsi_status == COMMAND_TERMINATED) ) { /* start auto-SENSE */ hcb->flags |= DOING_AUTOSENSE; setup_autosense_command_in_hcb(hcb); restart_current_hcb(softc); return; } if(scsi_status == GOOD) free_hcb_and_ccb_done(hcb, hcb->ccb, CAM_REQ_CMP); else free_hcb_and_ccb_done(hcb, hcb->ccb, CAM_SCSI_STATUS_ERROR); schedule_next_hcb(softc); return; }
One typical thing would be negotiation events: negotiation messages received from a SCSI target (in answer to our negotiation attempt or by target's initiative) or the target is unable to negotiate (rejects our negotiation messages or does not answer them).
switch(hcb_status) { case TARGET_REJECTED_WIDE_NEG: /* revert to 8-bit bus */ softc->current_bus_width[targ] = softc->goal_bus_width[targ] = 8; /* report the event */ neg.bus_width = 8; neg.valid = CCB_TRANS_BUS_WIDTH_VALID; xpt_async(AC_TRANSFER_NEG, hcb->ccb.ccb_h.path_id, &neg); continue_current_hcb(softc); return; case TARGET_ANSWERED_WIDE_NEG: { int wd; wd = get_target_bus_width_request(softc); if(wd <= softc->goal_bus_width[targ]) { /* answer is acceptable */ softc->current_bus_width[targ] = softc->goal_bus_width[targ] = neg.bus_width = wd; /* report the event */ neg.valid = CCB_TRANS_BUS_WIDTH_VALID; xpt_async(AC_TRANSFER_NEG, hcb->ccb.ccb_h.path_id, &neg); } else { prepare_reject_message(hcb); } } continue_current_hcb(softc); return; case TARGET_REQUESTED_WIDE_NEG: { int wd; wd = get_target_bus_width_request(softc); wd = min (wd, OUR_BUS_WIDTH); wd = min (wd, softc->user_bus_width[targ]); if(wd != softc->current_bus_width[targ]) { /* the bus width has changed */ softc->current_bus_width[targ] = softc->goal_bus_width[targ] = neg.bus_width = wd; /* report the event */ neg.valid = CCB_TRANS_BUS_WIDTH_VALID; xpt_async(AC_TRANSFER_NEG, hcb->ccb.ccb_h.path_id, &neg); } prepare_width_nego_rsponse(hcb, wd); } continue_current_hcb(softc); return; }
Then we handle any errors that could have happened during auto-sense in the same simple-minded way as before. Otherwise we look closer at the details again.
if(hcb->flags & DOING_AUTOSENSE) goto autosense_failed; switch(hcb_status) {
The next event we consider is unexpected disconnect. Which is considered normal after an ABORT or BUS DEVICE RESET message and abnormal in other cases.
case UNEXPECTED_DISCONNECT: if(requested_abort(hcb)) { /* abort affects all commands on that target+LUN, so * mark all disconnected HCBs on that target+LUN as aborted too */ for(h = softc->first_discon_hcb[hcb->target][hcb->lun]; h != NULL; h = hh) { hh=h->next; free_hcb_and_ccb_done(h, h->ccb, CAM_REQ_ABORTED); } ccb_status = CAM_REQ_ABORTED; } else if(requested_bus_device_reset(hcb)) { int lun; /* reset affects all commands on that target, so * mark all disconnected HCBs on that target+LUN as reset */ for(lun=0; lun <= OUR_MAX_SUPPORTED_LUN; lun++) for(h = softc->first_discon_hcb[hcb->target][lun]; h != NULL; h = hh) { hh=h->next; free_hcb_and_ccb_done(h, h->ccb, CAM_SCSI_BUS_RESET); } /* send event */ xpt_async(AC_SENT_BDR, hcb->ccb->ccb_h.path_id, NULL); /* this was the CAM_RESET_DEV request itself, it is completed */ ccb_status = CAM_REQ_CMP; } else { calculate_residue(hcb); ccb_status = CAM_UNEXP_BUSFREE; /* request the further code to freeze the queue */ hcb->ccb->ccb_h.status |= CAM_DEV_QFRZN; lun_to_freeze = hcb->lun; } break;
If the target refuses to accept tags we notify CAM about that and return back all commands for this LUN:
case TAGS_REJECTED: /* report the event */ neg.flags = 0 & ~CCB_TRANS_TAG_ENB; neg.valid = CCB_TRANS_TQ_VALID; xpt_async(AC_TRANSFER_NEG, hcb->ccb.ccb_h.path_id, &neg); ccb_status = CAM_MSG_REJECT_REC; /* request the further code to freeze the queue */ hcb->ccb->ccb_h.status |= CAM_DEV_QFRZN; lun_to_freeze = hcb->lun; break;
Then we check a number of other conditions, with processing basically limited to setting the CCB status:
case SELECTION_TIMEOUT: ccb_status = CAM_SEL_TIMEOUT; /* request the further code to freeze the queue */ hcb->ccb->ccb_h.status |= CAM_DEV_QFRZN; lun_to_freeze = CAM_LUN_WILDCARD; break; case PARITY_ERROR: ccb_status = CAM_UNCOR_PARITY; break; case DATA_OVERRUN: case ODD_WIDE_TRANSFER: ccb_status = CAM_DATA_RUN_ERR; break; default: /* all other errors are handled in a generic way */ ccb_status = CAM_REQ_CMP_ERR; /* request the further code to freeze the queue */ hcb->ccb->ccb_h.status |= CAM_DEV_QFRZN; lun_to_freeze = CAM_LUN_WILDCARD; break; }
Then we check if the error was serious enough to freeze the input queue until it gets proceeded and do so if it is:
if(hcb->ccb->ccb_h.status & CAM_DEV_QFRZN) { /* freeze the queue */ xpt_freeze_devq(ccb->ccb_h.path, /*count*/1); /* re-queue all commands for this target/LUN back to CAM */ for(h = softc->first_queued_hcb; h != NULL; h = hh) { hh = h->next; if(targ == h->targ && (lun_to_freeze == CAM_LUN_WILDCARD || lun_to_freeze == h->lun) ) free_hcb_and_ccb_done(h, h->ccb, CAM_REQUEUE_REQ); } } free_hcb_and_ccb_done(hcb, hcb->ccb, ccb_status); schedule_next_hcb(softc); return;
This concludes the generic interrupt handling although specific controllers may require some additions.
When executing an I/O request many things may go wrong. The reason of error can be reported in the CCB status with great detail. Examples of use are spread throughout this document. For completeness here is the summary of recommended responses for the typical error conditions:
CAM_RESRC_UNAVAIL - some resource is temporarily unavailable and the SIM driver cannot generate an event when it will become available. An example of this resource would be some intra-controller hardware resource for which the controller does not generate an interrupt when it becomes available.
CAM_UNCOR_PARITY - unrecovered parity error occurred
CAM_DATA_RUN_ERR - data overrun or unexpected data phase (going in other direction than specified in CAM_DIR_MASK) or odd transfer length for wide transfer
CAM_SEL_TIMEOUT - selection timeout occurred (target does not respond)
CAM_CMD_TIMEOUT - command timeout occurred (the timeout function ran)
CAM_SCSI_STATUS_ERROR - the device returned error
CAM_AUTOSENSE_FAIL - the device returned error and the REQUEST SENSE COMMAND failed
CAM_MSG_REJECT_REC - MESSAGE REJECT message was received
CAM_SCSI_BUS_RESET - received SCSI bus reset
CAM_REQ_CMP_ERR - “impossible” SCSI phase occurred or something else as weird or just a generic error if further detail is not available
CAM_UNEXP_BUSFREE - unexpected disconnect occurred
CAM_BDR_SENT - BUS DEVICE RESET message was sent to the target
CAM_UNREC_HBA_ERROR - unrecoverable Host Bus Adapter Error
CAM_REQ_TOO_BIG - the request was too large for this controller
CAM_REQUEUE_REQ - this request should be re-queued to preserve transaction ordering. This typically occurs when the SIM recognizes an error that should freeze the queue and must place other queued requests for the target at the sim level back into the XPT queue. Typical cases of such errors are selection timeouts, command timeouts and other like conditions. In such cases the troublesome command returns the status indicating the error, the and the other commands which have not be sent to the bus yet get re-queued.
CAM_LUN_INVALID - the LUN ID in the request is not supported by the SCSI controller
CAM_TID_INVALID - the target ID in the request is not supported by the SCSI controller
When the timeout for an HCB expires that request should be aborted, just like with an XPT_ABORT request. The only difference is that the returned status of aborted request should be CAM_CMD_TIMEOUT instead of CAM_REQ_ABORTED (that is why implementation of the abort better be done as a function). But there is one more possible problem: what if the abort request itself will get stuck? In this case the SCSI bus should be reset, just like with an XPT_RESET_BUS request (and the idea about implementing it as a function called from both places applies here too). Also we should reset the whole SCSI bus if a device reset request got stuck. So after all the timeout function would look like:
static void xxx_timeout(void *arg) { struct xxx_hcb *hcb = (struct xxx_hcb *)arg; struct xxx_softc *softc; struct ccb_hdr *ccb_h; softc = hcb->softc; ccb_h = &hcb->ccb->ccb_h; if(hcb->flags & HCB_BEING_ABORTED || ccb_h->func_code == XPT_RESET_DEV) { xxx_reset_bus(softc); } else { xxx_abort_ccb(hcb->ccb, CAM_CMD_TIMEOUT); } }
When we abort a request all the other disconnected requests to the same target/LUN get aborted too. So there appears a question, should we return them with status CAM_REQ_ABORTED or CAM_CMD_TIMEOUT? The current drivers use CAM_CMD_TIMEOUT. This seems logical because if one request got timed out then probably something really bad is happening to the device, so if they would not be disturbed they would time out by themselves.
The Universal Serial Bus (USB) is a new way of attaching devices to personal computers. The bus architecture features two-way communication and has been developed as a response to devices becoming smarter and requiring more interaction with the host. USB support is included in all current PC chipsets and is therefore available in all recently built PCs. Apple's introduction of the USB-only iMac has been a major incentive for hardware manufacturers to produce USB versions of their devices. The future PC specifications specify that all legacy connectors on PCs should be replaced by one or more USB connectors, providing generic plug and play capabilities. Support for USB hardware was available at a very early stage in NetBSD and was developed by Lennart Augustsson for the NetBSD project. The code has been ported to FreeBSD and we are currently maintaining a shared code base. For the implementation of the USB subsystem a number of features of USB are important.
Lennart Augustsson has done most of the implementation of the USB support for the NetBSD project. Many thanks for this incredible amount of work. Many thanks also to Ardy and Dirk for their comments and proofreading of this paper.
Devices connect to ports on the computer directly or on devices called hubs, forming a treelike device structure.
The devices can be connected and disconnected at run time.
Devices can suspend themselves and trigger resumes of the host system
As the devices can be powered from the bus, the host software has to keep track of power budgets for each hub.
Different quality of service requirements by the different device types together with the maximum of 126 devices that can be connected to the same bus, require proper scheduling of transfers on the shared bus to take full advantage of the 12Mbps bandwidth available. (over 400Mbps with USB 2.0)
Devices are intelligent and contain easily accessible information about themselves
The development of drivers for the USB subsystem and devices connected to it is supported by the specifications that have been developed and will be developed. These specifications are publicly available from the USB home pages. Apple has been very strong in pushing for standards based drivers, by making drivers for the generic classes available in their operating system MacOS and discouraging the use of separate drivers for each new device. This chapter tries to collate essential information for a basic understanding of the present implementation of the USB stack in FreeBSD/NetBSD. It is recommended however to read it together with the relevant specifications mentioned in the references below.
The USB support in FreeBSD can be split into three layers. The lowest layer contains the host controller driver, providing a generic interface to the hardware and its scheduling facilities. It supports initialisation of the hardware, scheduling of transfers and handling of completed and/or failed transfers. Each host controller driver implements a virtual hub providing hardware independent access to the registers controlling the root ports on the back of the machine.
The middle layer handles the device connection and disconnection, basic initialisation of the device, driver selection, the communication channels (pipes) and does resource management. This services layer also controls the default pipes and the device requests transferred over them.
The top layer contains the individual drivers supporting specific (classes of) devices. These drivers implement the protocol that is used over the pipes other than the default pipe. They also implement additional functionality to make the device available to other parts of the kernel or userland. They use the USB driver interface (USBDI) exposed by the services layer.
The host controller (HC) controls the transmission of packets on the bus. Frames of 1 millisecond are used. At the start of each frame the host controller generates a Start of Frame (SOF) packet.
The SOF packet is used to synchronise to the start of the frame and to keep track of the frame number. Within each frame packets are transferred, either from host to device (out) or from device to host (in). Transfers are always initiated by the host (polled transfers). Therefore there can only be one host per USB bus. Each transfer of a packet has a status stage in which the recipient of the data can return either ACK (acknowledge reception), NAK (retry), STALL (error condition) or nothing (garbled data stage, device not available or disconnected). Section 8.5 of the USB specification explains the details of packets in more detail. Four different types of transfers can occur on a USB bus: control, bulk, interrupt and isochronous. The types of transfers and their characteristics are described below (`Pipes' subsection).
Large transfers between the device on the USB bus and the device driver are split up into multiple packets by the host controller or the HC driver.
Device requests (control transfers) to the default endpoints are special. They consist of two or three phases: SETUP, DATA (optional) and STATUS. The set-up packet is sent to the device. If there is a data phase, the direction of the data packet(s) is given in the set-up packet. The direction in the status phase is the opposite of the direction during the data phase, or IN if there was no data phase. The host controller hardware also provides registers with the current status of the root ports and the changes that have occurred since the last reset of the status change register. Access to these registers is provided through a virtualised hub as suggested in the USB specification [ 2]. The virtual hub must comply with the hub device class given in chapter 11 of that specification. It must provide a default pipe through which device requests can be sent to it. It returns the standard andhub class specific set of descriptors. It should also provide an interrupt pipe that reports changes happening at its ports. There are currently two specifications for host controllers available: Universal Host Controller Interface (UHCI; Intel) and Open Host Controller Interface (OHCI; Compaq, Microsoft, National Semiconductor). The UHCI specification has been designed to reduce hardware complexity by requiring the host controller driver to supply a complete schedule of the transfers for each frame. OHCI type controllers are much more independent by providing a more abstract interface doing a lot of work themselves.
The UHCI host controller maintains a framelist with 1024 pointers to per frame data structures. It understands two different data types: transfer descriptors (TD) and queue heads (QH). Each TD represents a packet to be communicated to or from a device endpoint. QHs are a means to groupTDs (and QHs) together.
Each transfer consists of one or more packets. The UHCI driver splits large transfers into multiple packets. For every transfer, apart from isochronous transfers, a QH is allocated. For every type of transfer these QHs are collected at a QH for that type. Isochronous transfers have to be executed first because of the fixed latency requirement and are directly referred to by the pointer in the framelist. The last isochronous TD refers to the QH for interrupt transfers for that frame. All QHs for interrupt transfers point at the QH for control transfers, which in turn points at the QH for bulk transfers. The following diagram gives a graphical overview of this:
This results in the following schedule being run in each frame. After fetching the pointer for the current frame from the framelist the controller first executes the TDs for all the isochronous packets in that frame. The last of these TDs refers to the QH for the interrupt transfers for thatframe. The host controller will then descend from that QH to the QHs for the individual interrupt transfers. After finishing that queue, the QH for the interrupt transfers will refer the controller to the QH for all control transfers. It will execute all the subqueues scheduled there, followed by all the transfers queued at the bulk QH. To facilitate the handling of finished or failed transfers different types of interrupts are generated by the hardware at the end of each frame. In the last TD for a transfer the Interrupt-On Completion bit is set by the HC driver to flag an interrupt when the transfer has completed. An error interrupt is flagged if a TD reaches its maximum error count. If the short packet detect bit is set in a TD and less than the set packet length is transferred this interrupt is flagged to notify the controller driver of the completed transfer. It is the host controller driver's task to find out which transfer has completed or produced an error. When called the interrupt service routine will locate all the finished transfers and call their callbacks.
See for a more elaborate description the UHCI specification.
Programming an OHCI host controller is much simpler. The controller assumes that a set of endpoints is available, and is aware of scheduling priorities and the ordering of the types of transfers in a frame. The main data structure used by the host controller is the endpoint descriptor (ED) to which a queue of transfer descriptors (TDs) is attached. The ED contains the maximum packet size allowed for an endpoint and the controller hardware does the splitting into packets. The pointers to the data buffers are updated after each transfer and when the start and end pointer are equal, the TD is retired to the done-queue. The four types of endpoints have their own queues. Control and bulk endpoints are queued each at their own queue. Interrupt EDs are queued in a tree, with the level in the tree defining the frequency at which they run.
framelist interruptisochronous control bulk
The schedule being run by the host controller in each frame looks as follows. The controller will first run the non-periodic control and bulk queues, up to a time limit set by the HC driver. Then the interrupt transfers for that frame number are run, by using the lower five bits of the frame number as an index into level 0 of the tree of interrupts EDs. At the end of this tree the isochronous EDs are connected and these are traversed subsequently. The isochronous TDs contain the frame number of the first frame the transfer should be run in. After all the periodic transfers have been run, the control and bulk queues are traversed again. Periodically the interrupt service routine is called to process the done queue and call the callbacks for each transfer and reschedule interrupt and isochronous endpoints.
See for a more elaborate description the OHCI specification. Services layer The middle layer provides access to the device in a controlled way and maintains resources in use by the different drivers and the services layer. The layer takes care of the following aspects:
The device configuration information
The pipes to communicate with a device
Probing and attaching and detaching form a device.
Each device provides different levels of configuration information. Each device has one or more configurations, of which one is selected during probe/attach. A configuration provides power and bandwidth requirements. Within each configuration there can be multiple interfaces. A device interface is a collection of endpoints. For example USB speakers can have an interface for the audio data (Audio Class) and an interface for the knobs, dials and buttons (HID Class). All interfaces in a configuration are active at the same time and can be attached to by different drivers. Each interface can have alternates, providing different quality of service parameters. In for example cameras this is used to provide different frame sizes and numbers of frames per second.
Within each interface 0 or more endpoints can be specified. Endpoints are the unidirectional access points for communicating with a device. They provide buffers to temporarily store incoming or outgoing data from the device. Each endpoint has a unique address within a configuration, the endpoint's number plus its direction. The default endpoint, endpoint 0, is not part of any interface and available in all configurations. It is managed by the services layer and not directly available to device drivers.
Level 0 Level 1 Level 2 Slot 0
Slot 3 Slot 2 Slot 1
(Only 4 out of 32 slots shown)
This hierarchical configuration information is described in the device by a standard set of descriptors (see section 9.6 of the USB specification [ 2]). They can be requested through the Get Descriptor Request. The services layer caches these descriptors to avoid unnecessary transfers on the USB bus. Access to the descriptors is provided through function calls.
Device descriptors: General information about the device, like Vendor, Product and Revision Id, supported device class, subclass and protocol if applicable, maximum packet size for the default endpoint, etc.
Configuration descriptors: The number of interfaces in this configuration, suspend and resume functionality supported and power requirements.
Interface descriptors: interface class, subclass and protocol if applicable, number of alternate settings for the interface and the number of endpoints.
Endpoint descriptors: Endpoint address, direction and type, maximum packet size supported and polling frequency if type is interrupt endpoint. There is no descriptor for the default endpoint (endpoint 0) and it is never counted in an interface descriptor.
String descriptors: In the other descriptors string indices are supplied for some fields.These can be used to retrieve descriptive strings, possibly in multiple languages.
Class specifications can add their own descriptor types that are available through the GetDescriptor Request.
Pipes Communication to end points on a device flows through so-called pipes. Drivers submit transfers to endpoints to a pipe and provide a callback to be called on completion or failure of the transfer (asynchronous transfers) or wait for completion (synchronous transfer). Transfers to an endpoint are serialised in the pipe. A transfer can either complete, fail or time-out (if a time-out has been set). There are two types of time-outs for transfers. Time-outs can happen due to time-out on the USBbus (milliseconds). These time-outs are seen as failures and can be due to disconnection of the device. A second form of time-out is implemented in software and is triggered when a transfer does not complete within a specified amount of time (seconds). These are caused by a device acknowledging negatively (NAK) the transferred packets. The cause for this is the device not being ready to receive data, buffer under- or overrun or protocol errors.
If a transfer over a pipe is larger than the maximum packet size specified in the associated endpoint descriptor, the host controller (OHCI) or the HC driver (UHCI) will split the transfer into packets of maximum packet size, with the last packet possibly smaller than the maximum packet size.
Sometimes it is not a problem for a device to return less data than requested. For example abulk-in-transfer to a modem might request 200 bytes of data, but the modem has only 5 bytes available at that time. The driver can set the short packet (SPD) flag. It allows the host controller to accept a packet even if the amount of data transferred is less than requested. This flag is only valid for in-transfers, as the amount of data to be sent to a device is always known beforehand. If an unrecoverable error occurs in a device during a transfer the pipe is stalled. Before any more data is accepted or sent the driver needs to resolve the cause of the stall and clear the endpoint stall condition through send the clear endpoint halt device request over the default pipe. The default endpoint should never stall.
There are four different types of endpoints and corresponding pipes: - Control pipe / default pipe: There is one control pipe per device, connected to the default endpoint (endpoint 0). The pipe carries the device requests and associated data. The difference between transfers over the default pipe and other pipes is that the protocol for the transfers is described in the USB specification [ 2]. These requests are used to reset and configure the device. A basic set of commands that must be supported by each device is provided in chapter 9 of the USB specification [ 2]. The commands supported on this pipe can be extended by a device class specification to support additional functionality.
Bulk pipe: This is the USB equivalent to a raw transmission medium.
Interrupt pipe: The host sends a request for data to the device and if the device has nothing to send, it will NAK the data packet. Interrupt transfers are scheduled at a frequency specified when creating the pipe.
Isochronous pipe: These pipes are intended for isochronous data, for example video or audio streams, with fixed latency, but no guaranteed delivery. Some support for pipes of this type is available in the current implementation. Packets in control, bulk and interrupt transfers are retried if an error occurs during transmission or the device acknowledges the packet negatively (NAK) due to for example lack of buffer space to store the incoming data. Isochronous packets are however not retried in case of failed delivery or NAK of a packet as this might violate the timing constraints.
The availability of the necessary bandwidth is calculated during the creation of the pipe. Transfers are scheduled within frames of 1 millisecond. The bandwidth allocation within a frame is prescribed by the USB specification, section 5.6 [ 2]. Isochronous and interrupt transfers are allowed to consume up to 90% of the bandwidth within a frame. Packets for control and bulk transfers are scheduled after all isochronous and interrupt packets and will consume all the remaining bandwidth.
More information on scheduling of transfers and bandwidth reclamation can be found in chapter 5of the USB specification [ 2], section 1.3 of the UHCI specification [ 3] and section 3.4.2 of the OHCI specification [4].
After the notification by the hub that a new device has been connected, the service layer switches on the port, providing the device with 100 mA of current. At this point the device is in its default state and listening to device address 0. The services layer will proceed to retrieve the various descriptors through the default pipe. After that it will send a Set Address request to move the device away from the default device address (address 0). Multiple device drivers might be able to support the device. For example a modem driver might be able to support an ISDN TA through the AT compatibility interface. A driver for that specific model of the ISDN adapter might however be able to provide much better support for this device. To support this flexibility, the probes return priorities indicating their level of support. Support for a specific revision of a product ranks the highest and the generic driver the lowest priority. It might also be that multiple drivers could attach to one device if there are multiple interfaces within one configuration. Each driver only needs to support a subset of the interfaces.
The probing for a driver for a newly attached device checks first for device specific drivers. If not found, the probe code iterates over all supported configurations until a driver attaches in a configuration. To support devices with multiple drivers on different interfaces, the probe iterates over all interfaces in a configuration that have not yet been claimed by a driver. Configurations that exceed the power budget for the hub are ignored. During attach the driver should initialise the device to its proper state, but not reset it, as this will make the device disconnect itself from the bus and restart the probing process for it. To avoid consuming unnecessary bandwidth should not claim the interrupt pipe at attach time, but should postpone allocating the pipe until the file is opened and the data is actually used. When the file is closed the pipe should be closed again, even though the device might still be attached.
A device driver should expect to receive errors during any transaction with the device. The design of USB supports and encourages the disconnection of devices at any point in time. Drivers should make sure that they do the right thing when the device disappears.
Furthermore a device that has been disconnected and reconnected will not be reattached at the same device instance. This might change in the future when more devices support serial numbers (see the device descriptor) or other means of defining an identity for a device have been developed.
The disconnection of a device is signaled by a hub in the interrupt packet delivered to the hub driver. The status change information indicates which port has seen a connection change. The device detach method for all device drivers for the device connected on that port are called and the structures cleaned up. If the port status indicates that in the mean time a device has been connected to that port, the procedure for probing and attaching the device will be started. A device reset will produce a disconnect-connect sequence on the hub and will be handled as described above.
The protocol used over pipes other than the default pipe is undefined by the USB specification. Information on this can be found from various sources. The most accurate source is the developer's section on the USB home pages [ 1]. From these pages a growing number of deviceclass specifications are available. These specifications specify what a compliant device should look like from a driver perspective, basic functionality it needs to provide and the protocol that is to be used over the communication channels. The USB specification [ 2] includes the description of the Hub Class. A class specification for Human Interface Devices (HID) has been created to cater for keyboards, tablets, bar-code readers, buttons, knobs, switches, etc. A third example is the class specification for mass storage devices. For a full list of device classes see the developers section on the USB home pages [ 1].
For many devices the protocol information has not yet been published however. Information on the protocol being used might be available from the company making the device. Some companies will require you to sign a Non -Disclosure Agreement (NDA) before giving you the specifications. This in most cases precludes making the driver open source.
Another good source of information is the Linux driver sources, as a number of companies have started to provide drivers for Linux for their devices. It is always a good idea to contact the authors of those drivers for their source of information.
Example: Human Interface Devices The specification for the Human Interface Devices like keyboards, mice, tablets, buttons, dials,etc. is referred to in other device class specifications and is used in many devices.
For example audio speakers provide endpoints to the digital to analogue converters and possibly an extra pipe for a microphone. They also provide a HID endpoint in a separate interface for the buttons and dials on the front of the device. The same is true for the monitor control class. It is straightforward to build support for these interfaces through the available kernel and userland libraries together with the HID class driver or the generic driver. Another device that serves as an example for interfaces within one configuration driven by different device drivers is a cheap keyboard with built-in legacy mouse port. To avoid having the cost of including the hardware for a USB hub in the device, manufacturers combined the mouse data received from the PS/2 port on the back of the keyboard and the key presses from the keyboard into two separate interfaces in the same configuration. The mouse and keyboard drivers each attach to the appropriate interface and allocate the pipes to the two independent endpoints.
Example: Firmware download Many devices that have been developed are based on a general purpose processor with an additional USB core added to it. Because the development of drivers and firmware for USB devices is still very new, many devices require the downloading of the firmware after they have been connected.
The procedure followed is straightforward. The device identifies itself through a vendor and product Id. The first driver probes and attaches to it and downloads the firmware into it. After that the device soft resets itself and the driver is detached. After a short pause the device announces its presence on the bus. The device will have changed its vendor/product/revision Id to reflect the fact that it has been supplied with firmware and as a consequence a second driver will probe it and attach to it.
An example of these types of devices is the ActiveWire I/O board, based on the EZ-USB chip. For this chip a generic firmware downloader is available. The firmware downloaded into the ActiveWire board changes the revision Id. It will then perform a soft reset of the USB part of the EZ-USB chip to disconnect from the USB bus and again reconnect.
Example: Mass Storage Devices Support for mass storage devices is mainly built around existing protocols. The Iomega USB Zipdrive is based on the SCSI version of their drive. The SCSI commands and status messages are wrapped in blocks and transferred over the bulk pipes to and from the device, emulating a SCSI controller over the USB wire. ATAPI and UFI commands are supported in a similar fashion.
The Mass Storage Specification supports 2 different types of wrapping of the command block.The initial attempt was based on sending the command and status through the default pipe and using bulk transfers for the data to be moved between the host and the device. Based on experience a second approach was designed that was based on wrapping the command and status blocks and sending them over the bulk out and in endpoint. The specification specifies exactly what has to happen when and what has to be done in case an error condition is encountered. The biggest challenge when writing drivers for these devices is to fit USB based protocol into the existing support for mass storage devices. CAM provides hooks to do this in a fairly straight forward way. ATAPI is less simple as historically the IDE interface has never had many different appearances.
The support for the USB floppy from Y-E Data is again less straightforward as a new command set has been designed.
Special thanks to Matthew N. Dodd, Warner Losh, Bill Paul, Doug Rabson, Mike Smith, Peter Wemm and Scott Long.
This chapter explains the Newbus device framework in detail.
A device driver is a software component which provides the interface between the kernel's generic view of a peripheral (e.g. disk, network adapter) and the actual implementation of the peripheral. The device driver interface (DDI) is the defined interface between the kernel and the device driver component.
There used to be days in UNIX, and thus FreeBSD, in which there were four types of devices defined:
block device drivers
character device drivers
network device drivers
pseudo-device drivers
Block devices performed in way that used fixed size blocks [of data]. This type of driver depended on the so called buffer cache, which had the purpose to cache accessed blocks of data in a dedicated part of the memory. Often this buffer cache was based on write-behind, which meant that when data was modified in memory it got synced to disk whenever the system did its periodical disk flushing, thus optimizing writes.
However, in the versions of FreeBSD 4.0 and onward the distinction between block and character devices became non-existent.
Newbus is the implementation of a new bus architecture based on abstraction layers which saw its introduction in FreeBSD 3.0 when the Alpha port was imported into the source tree. It was not until 4.0 before it became the default system to use for device drivers. Its goals are to provide a more object oriented means of interconnecting the various busses and devices which a host system provides to the Operating System.
Its main features include amongst others:
dynamic attaching
easy modularization of drivers
pseudo-busses
One of the most prominent changes is the migration from the flat and ad-hoc system to a device tree lay-out.
At the top level resides the “root” device which is the parent to hang all other devices on. For each architecture, there is typically a single child of “root” which has such things as host-to-PCI bridges, etc. attached to it. For x86, this “root” device is the “nexus” device and for Alpha, various different different models of Alpha have different top-level devices corresponding to the different hardware chipsets, including lca, apecs, cia and tsunami.
A device in the Newbus context represents a single hardware entity in the system. For instance each PCI device is represented by a Newbus device. Any device in the system can have children; a device which has children is often called a “bus”. Examples of common busses in the system are ISA and PCI which manage lists of devices attached to ISA and PCI busses respectively.
Often, a connection between different kinds of bus is represented by a “bridge” device which normally has one child for the attached bus. An example of this is a PCI-to-PCI bridge which is represented by a device pcibN on the parent PCI bus and has a child pciN for the attached bus. This layout simplifies the implementation of the PCI bus tree, allowing common code to be used for both top-level and bridged busses.
Each device in the Newbus architecture asks its parent to map its resources. The parent then asks its own parent until the nexus is reached. So, basically the nexus is the only part of the Newbus system which knows about all resources.
Tip: An ISA device might want to map its IO port at 0x230, so it asks its parent, in this case the ISA bus. The ISA bus hands it over to the PCI-to-ISA bridge which in its turn asks the PCI bus, which reaches the host-to-PCI bridge and finally the nexus. The beauty of this transition upwards is that there is room to translate the requests. For example, the 0x230 IO port request might become memory-mapped at 0xb0000230 on a MIPS box by the PCI bridge.
Resource allocation can be controlled at any place in the device tree. For instance on many Alpha platforms, ISA interrupts are managed separately from PCI interrupts and resource allocations for ISA interrupts are managed by the Alpha's ISA bus device. On IA-32, ISA and PCI interrupts are both managed by the top-level nexus device. For both ports, memory and port address space is managed by a single entity - nexus for IA-32 and the relevant chipset driver on Alpha (e.g. CIA or tsunami).
In order to normalize access to memory and port mapped resources, Newbus integrates the bus_space APIs from NetBSD. These provide a single API to replace inb/outb and direct memory reads/writes. The advantage of this is that a single driver can easily use either memory-mapped registers or port-mapped registers (some hardware supports both).
This support is integrated into the resource allocation mechanism. When a resource is
allocated, a driver can retrieve the associated bus_space_tag_t
and bus_space_handle_t
from the resource.
Newbus also allows for definitions of interface methods in files dedicated to this purpose. These are the .m files that are found under the src/sys hierarchy.
The core of the Newbus system is an extensible “object-based programming” model. Each device in the system has a table of methods which it supports. The system and other devices uses those methods to control the device and request services. The different methods supported by a device are defined by a number of “interfaces”. An “interface” is simply a group of related methods which can be implemented by a device.
In the Newbus system, the methods for a device are provided by the various device drivers in the system. When a device is attached to a driver during auto-configuration, it uses the method table declared by the driver. A device can later detach from its driver and re-attach to a new driver with a new method table. This allows dynamic replacement of drivers which can be useful for driver development.
The interfaces are described by an interface definition language similar to the language used to define vnode operations for file systems. The interface would be stored in a methods file (which would normally named foo_if.m).
Example 14-1. Newbus Methods
# Foo subsystem/driver (a comment...) INTERFACE foo METHOD int doit { device_t dev; }; # DEFAULT is the method that will be used, if a method was not # provided via: DEVMETHOD() METHOD void doit_to_child { device_t dev; driver_t child; } DEFAULT doit_generic_to_child;
When this interface is compiled, it generates a header file “foo_if.h” which contains function declarations:
int FOO_DOIT(device_t dev); int FOO_DOIT_TO_CHILD(device_t dev, device_t child);
A source file, “foo_if.c” is also created to accompany the automatically generated header file; it contains implementations of those functions which look up the location of the relevant functions in the object's method table and call that function.
The system defines two main interfaces. The first fundamental interface is called “device” and includes methods which are relevant to all devices. Methods in the “device” interface include “probe”, “attach” and “detach” to control detection of hardware and “shutdown”, “suspend” and “resume” for critical event notification.
The second, more complex interface is “bus”. This interface contains methods suitable for devices which have children, including methods to access bus specific per-device information [2], event notification (child_detached, driver_added) and resource management (alloc_resource, activate_resource, deactivate_resource, release_resource).
Many methods in the “bus” interface are performing services for some child of the bus device. These methods would normally use the first two arguments to specify the bus providing the service and the child device which is requesting the service. To simplify driver code, many of these methods have accessor functions which lookup the parent and call a method on the parent. For instance the method BUS_TEARDOWN_INTR(device_t dev, device_t child, ...) can be called using the function bus_teardown_intr(device_t child, ...).
Some bus types in the system define additional interfaces to provide access to bus-specific functionality. For instance, the PCI bus driver defines the “pci” interface which has two methods read_config and write_config for accessing the configuration registers of a PCI device.
As the Newbus API is huge, this section makes some effort at documenting it. More information to come in the next revision of this document.
src/sys/[arch]/[arch] - Kernel code for a specific machine architecture resides in this directory. For example, the i386 architecture, or the SPARC64 architecture.
src/sys/dev/[bus] - device support for a specific [bus] resides in this directory.
src/sys/dev/pci - PCI bus support code resides in this directory.
src/sys/[isa|pci] - PCI/ISA device drivers reside in this directory. The PCI/ISA bus support code used to exist in this directory in FreeBSD version 4.0.
devclass_t - This is a type definition of a pointer to a struct devclass.
device_method_t - This is same as kobj_method_t (see src/sys/kobj.h).
device_t - This is a type definition of a pointer to a struct device. device_t represents a device in the system. It is a kernel object. See src/sys/sys/bus_private.h for implementation details.
driver_t - This is a type definition which, references struct driver. The driver struct is a class of the device kernel object; it also holds data private to for the driver.
Figure 14-1. driver_t implementation
struct driver { KOBJ_CLASS_FIELDS; void *priv; /* driver private data */ };
A device_state_t type, which is an enumeration, device_state. It contains the possible states of a Newbus device before and after the autoconfiguration process.
The FreeBSD sound subsystem cleanly separates generic sound handling issues from device-specific ones. This makes it easier to add support for new hardware.
The pcm(4) framework is the central piece of the sound subsystem. It mainly implements the following elements:
A system call interface (read, write, ioctls) to digitized sound and mixer functions. The ioctl command set is compatible with the legacy OSS or Voxware interface, allowing common multimedia applications to be ported without modification.
Common code for processing sound data (format conversions, virtual channels).
A uniform software interface to hardware-specific audio interface modules.
Additional support for some common hardware interfaces (ac97), or shared hardware-specific code (ex: ISA DMA routines).
The support for specific sound cards is implemented by hardware-specific drivers, which provide channel and mixer interfaces to plug into the generic pcm code.
In this chapter, the term pcm will refer to the central, common part of the sound driver, as opposed to the hardware-specific modules.
The prospective driver writer will of course want to start from an existing module and use the code as the ultimate reference. But, while the sound code is nice and clean, it is also mostly devoid of comments. This document tries to give an overview of the framework interface and answer some questions that may arise while adapting the existing code.
As an alternative, or in addition to starting from a working example, you can find a commented driver template at http://people.FreeBSD.org/~cg/template.c
All the relevant code currently (FreeBSD 4.4) lives in /usr/src/sys/dev/sound/, except for the public ioctl interface definitions, found in /usr/src/sys/sys/soundcard.h
Under /usr/src/sys/dev/sound/, the pcm/ directory holds the central code, while the isa/ and pci/ directories have the drivers for ISA and PCI boards.
Sound drivers probe and attach in almost the same way as any hardware driver module. You might want to look at the ISA or PCI specific sections of the handbook for more information.
However, sound drivers differ in some ways:
They declare themselves as pcm class devices, with a struct snddev_info
device private structure:
static driver_t xxx_driver = { "pcm", xxx_methods, sizeof(struct snddev_info) }; DRIVER_MODULE(snd_xxxpci, pci, xxx_driver, pcm_devclass, 0, 0); MODULE_DEPEND(snd_xxxpci, snd_pcm, PCM_MINVER, PCM_PREFVER,PCM_MAXVER);
Most sound drivers need to store additional private information about their device. A
private data structure is usually allocated in the attach routine. Its address is passed
to pcm by the calls to pcm_register()
and mixer_init()
.
pcm later passes back this address as a parameter in calls to
the sound driver interfaces.
The sound driver attach routine should declare its MIXER or AC97 interface to pcm by calling mixer_init()
. For a
MIXER interface, this causes in turn a call to xxxmixer_init()
.
The sound driver attach routine declares its general CHANNEL configuration to pcm by calling pcm_register(dev, sc,
nplay, nrec)
, where sc
is the address for the device
data structure, used in further calls from pcm, and nplay
and nrec
are the number of play
and record channels.
The sound driver attach routine declares each of its channel objects by calls to pcm_addchan()
. This sets up the channel glue in pcm and causes in turn a call to xxxchannel_init()
.
The sound driver detach routine should call pcm_unregister()
before releasing its resources.
There are two possible methods to handle non-PnP devices:
Use a device_identify()
method (example: sound/isa/es1888.c). The device_identify()
method probes for the hardware at known
addresses and, if it finds a supported device, creates a new pcm device which is then
passed to probe/attach.
Use a custom kernel configuration with appropriate hints for pcm devices (example: sound/isa/mss.c).
pcm drivers should implement device_suspend
, device_resume
and
device_shutdown
routines, so that power management and
module unloading function correctly.
The interface between the pcm core and the sound drivers is defined in terms of kernel objects.
There are two main interfaces that a sound driver will usually provide: CHANNEL and either MIXER or AC97.
The AC97 interface is a very small hardware access (register read/write) interface, implemented by drivers for hardware with an AC97 codec. In this case, the actual MIXER interface is provided by the shared AC97 code in pcm.
Sound drivers usually have a private data structure to describe their device, and one structure for each play and record data channel that it supports.
For all CHANNEL interface functions, the first parameter is an opaque pointer.
The second parameter is a pointer to the private channel data structure, except for
channel_init()
which has a pointer to the private device
structure (and returns the channel pointer for further use by pcm).
For sound data transfers, the pcm core and the sound
drivers communicate through a shared memory area, described by a struct snd_dbuf
.
struct snd_dbuf
is private to pcm, and sound drivers obtain values of interest by calls to
accessor functions (sndbuf_getxxx()
).
The shared memory area has a size of sndbuf_getsize()
and is divided into fixed size blocks of sndbuf_getblksz()
bytes.
When playing, the general transfer mechanism is as follows (reverse the idea for recording):
pcm initially fills up the buffer, then calls the sound
driver's xxxchannel_trigger()
function with a parameter of
PCMTRIG_START.
The sound driver then arranges to repeatedly transfer the whole memory area (sndbuf_getbuf()
, sndbuf_getsize()
)
to the device, in blocks of sndbuf_getblksz()
bytes. It
calls back the chn_intr()
pcm
function for each transferred block (this will typically happen at interrupt time).
chn_intr()
arranges to copy new data to the area that
was transferred to the device (now free), and make appropriate updates to the snd_dbuf
structure.
xxxchannel_init()
is called to initialize each of the
play or record channels. The calls are initiated from the sound driver attach routine.
(See the probe and attach section).
static void * xxxchannel_init(kobj_t obj, void *data, struct snd_dbuf *b, struct pcm_channel *c, int dir) { struct xxx_info *sc = data; struct xxx_chinfo *ch; ... return ch; }
b
is the address for the channel struct snd_dbuf
. It should be initialized in the function by
calling sndbuf_alloc()
. The buffer size to use is normally
a small multiple of the 'typical' unit transfer size for your device.c
is the pcm channel control
structure pointer. This is an opaque object. The function should store it in the local
channel structure, to be used in later calls to pcm (ie:
chn_intr(c)
).
dir
indicates the channel direction (PCMDIR_PLAY or PCMDIR_REC).
xxxchannel_setformat()
should set up the hardware for
the specified channel for the specified sound format.
static int xxxchannel_setformat(kobj_t obj, void *data, u_int32_t format) { struct xxx_chinfo *ch = data; ... return 0; }
xxxchannel_setspeed()
sets up the channel hardware for
the specified sampling speed, and returns the possibly adjusted speed.
static int xxxchannel_setspeed(kobj_t obj, void *data, u_int32_t speed) { struct xxx_chinfo *ch = data; ... return speed; }
xxxchannel_setblocksize()
sets the block size, which is
the size of unit transactions between pcm and the sound
driver, and between the sound driver and the device. Typically, this would be the number
of bytes transferred before an interrupt occurs. During a transfer, the sound driver
should call pcm's chn_intr()
every time this size has been transferred.
Most sound drivers only take note of the block size here, to be used when an actual transfer will be started.
static int xxxchannel_setblocksize(kobj_t obj, void *data, u_int32_t blocksize) { struct xxx_chinfo *ch = data; ... return blocksize; }
xxxchannel_trigger()
is called by pcm to control data transfer operations in the driver.
static int xxxchannel_trigger(kobj_t obj, void *data, int go) { struct xxx_chinfo *ch = data; ... return 0; }
go
defines the action for the current call. The possible
values are:PCMTRIG_START: the driver should start a data transfer from
or to the channel buffer. If needed, the buffer base and size can be retrieved through
sndbuf_getbuf()
and sndbuf_getsize()
.
PCMTRIG_EMLDMAWR / PCMTRIG_EMLDMARD: this tells the driver that the input or output buffer may have been updated. Most drivers just ignore these calls.
PCMTRIG_STOP / PCMTRIG_ABORT: the driver should stop the current transfer.
Note: If the driver uses ISA DMA,
sndbuf_isadma()
should be called before performing actions on the device, and will take care of the DMA chip side of things.
xxxchannel_getptr()
returns the current offset in the
transfer buffer. This will typically be called by chn_intr()
, and this is how pcm knows
where it can transfer new data.
xxxchannel_free()
is called to free up channel
resources, for example when the driver is unloaded, and should be implemented if the
channel data structures are dynamically allocated or if sndbuf_alloc()
was not used for buffer allocation.
struct pcmchan_caps * xxxchannel_getcaps(kobj_t obj, void *data) { return &xxx_caps; }
channel_reset()
, channel_resetdone()
, and channel_notify()
are for special purposes and should not be
implemented in a driver without discussing it with the authorities (Cameron Grant <[email protected]>
).
channel_setdir()
is deprecated.
xxxmixer_init()
initializes the hardware and tells pcm what mixer devices are available for playing and
recording
static int xxxmixer_init(struct snd_mixer *m) { struct xxx_info *sc = mix_getdevinfo(m); u_int32_t v; [Initialize hardware] [Set appropriate bits in v for play mixers] mix_setdevs(m, v); [Set appropriate bits in v for record mixers] mix_setrecdevs(m, v) return 0; }
Mixer bits definitions can be found in soundcard.h (SOUND_MASK_XXX values and SOUND_MIXER_XXX bit shifts).
xxxmixer_set()
sets the volume level for one mixer
device.
static int xxxmixer_set(struct snd_mixer *m, unsigned dev, unsigned left, unsigned right) { struct sc_info *sc = mix_getdevinfo(m); [set volume level] return left | (right << 8); }
The volume values are specified in range [0-100]. A value of zero should mute the device.
xxxmixer_setrecsrc()
sets the recording source
device.
static int xxxmixer_setrecsrc(struct snd_mixer *m, u_int32_t src) { struct xxx_info *sc = mix_getdevinfo(m); [look for non zero bit(s) in src, set up hardware] [update src to reflect actual action] return src; }
xxxmixer_uninit()
should ensure that all sound is muted
and if possible mixer hardware should be powered down
xxxmixer_reinit()
should ensure that the mixer hardware
is powered up and any settings not controlled by mixer_set()
or mixer_setrecsrc()
are restored.
The AC97 interface is implemented by drivers with an AC97 codec. It only has three methods:
xxxac97_init()
returns the number of ac97 codecs
found.
ac97_read()
and ac97_write()
read or write a specified register.
The AC97 interface is used by the AC97 code in pcm to perform higher level operations. Look at sound/pci/maestro3.c or many others under sound/pci/ for an example.
This chapter will talk about the FreeBSD mechanisms for writing a device driver for a PC Card or CardBus device. However, at the present time, it just documents how to add a driver to an existing pccard driver.
The procedure for adding a new device to the list of supported pccard devices has changed from the system used through FreeBSD 4. In prior versions, editing a file in /etc to list the device was necessary. Starting in FreeBSD 5.0, devices drivers know what devices they support. There is now a table of supported devices in the kernel that drivers use to attach to a device.
PC Cards are identified in one of two ways, both based on information in the CIS of the card. The first method is to use numeric manufacturer and product numbers. The second method is to use the human readable strings that are also contained in the CIS. The PC Card bus uses a centralized database and some macros to facilitate a design pattern to help the driver writer match devices to his driver.
There is a widespread practice of one company developing a reference design for a PC Card product and then selling this design to other companies to market. Those companies refine the design, market the product to their target audience or geographic area and put their own name plate onto the card. However, the refinements to the physical card typically are very minor, if any changes are made at all. Often, however, to strengthen their branding of their version of the card, these vendors will place their company name in the human strings in the CIS space, but leave the manufacturer and product ids unchanged.
Because of the above practice, it is a smaller work load for FreeBSD to use the numeric IDs. It also introduces some minor complications into the process of adding IDs to the system. One must carefully check to see who really made the card, especially when it appears that the vendor who made the card from might already have a different manufacturer id listed in the central database. Linksys, D-Link and NetGear are a number of US Manufacturers of LAN hardware that often sell the same design. These same designs can be sold in Japan under names such as Buffalo and Corega. Yet often, these devices will all have the same manufacturer and product id.
The PC Card bus keeps its central database of card information, but not which driver is associated with them, in /sys/dev/pccard/pccarddevs. It also provides a set of macros that allow one to easily construct simple entries in the table the driver uses to claim devices.
Finally, some really low end devices do not contain manufacturer identification at all. These devices require that one matches them using the human readable CIS strings. While it would be nice if we did not need this method as a fallback, it is necessary for some very low end CD-ROM players that are quite popular. This method should generally be avoided, but a number of devices are listed in this section because they were added prior to the recognition of the OEM nature of the PC Card business. When adding new devices, prefer using the numeric method.
There are four sections of the pccarddevs files. The first section lists the manufacturer numbers for those vendors that use them. This section is sorted in numerical order. The next section has all of the products that are used by these vendors, along with their product ID numbers and a description string. The description string typically is not used (instead we set the device's description based on the human readable CIS, even if we match on the numeric version). These two sections are then repeated for those devices that use the string matching method. Finally, C-style comments are allowed anywhere in the file.
The first section of the file contains the vendor IDs. Please keep this list sorted in numeric order. Also, please coordinate changes to this file because we share it with NetBSD to help facilitate a common clearing house for this information. For example:
vendor FUJITSU 0x0004 Fujitsu Corporation vendor NETGEAR_2 0x000b Netgear vendor PANASONIC 0x0032 Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. vendor SANDISK 0x0045 Sandisk Corporation
shows the first few vendor ids. Chances are very good that the NETGEAR_2 entry is really an OEM that NETGEAR purchased cards from and the author of support for those cards was unaware at the time that Netgear was using someone else's id. These entries are fairly straightforward. There is the vendor keyword used to denote the kind of line that this is. There is the name of the vendor. This name will be repeated later in the pccarddevs file, as well as used in the driver's match tables, so keep it short and a valid C identifier. There is a numeric ID, in hex, for the manufacturer. Do not add IDs of the form 0xffffffff or 0xffff because these are reserved ids (the former is 'no id set' while the latter is sometimes seen in extremely poor quality cards to try to indicate 'none). Finally there is a string description of the company that makes the card. This string is not used in FreeBSD for anything but commentary purposes.
The second section of the file contains the products. As you can see in the following example:
/* Allied Telesis K.K. */ product ALLIEDTELESIS LA_PCM 0x0002 Allied Telesis LA-PCM /* Archos */ product ARCHOS ARC_ATAPI 0x0043 MiniCD
the format is similar to the vendor lines. There is the product keyword. Then there is the vendor name, repeated from above. This is followed by the product name, which is used by the driver and should be a valid C identifier, but may also start with a number. There is then the product id for this card, in hex. As with the vendors, there is the same convention for 0xffffffff and 0xffff. Finally, there is a string description of the device itself. This string typically is not used in FreeBSD, since FreeBSD's pccard bus driver will construct a string from the human readable CIS entries, but it can be used in the rare cases where this is somehow insufficient. The products are in alphabetical order by manufacturer, then numerical order by product id. They have a C comment before each manufacturer's entries and there is a blank line between entries.
The third section is like the previous vendor section, but with all of the manufacturer numeric ids as -1. -1 means “match anything you find” in the FreeBSD pccard bus code. Since these are C identifiers, their names must be unique. Otherwise the format is identical to the first section of the file.
The final section contains the entries for those cards that we must match with string entries. This sections' format is a little different than the generic section:
product ADDTRON AWP100 { "Addtron", "AWP-100&spWireless&spPCMCIA", "Version&sp01.02", NULL } product ALLIEDTELESIS WR211PCM { "Allied&spTelesis&spK.K.", "WR211PCM", NULL, NULL } Allied Telesis WR211PCM
We have the familiar product keyword, followed by the vendor name followed by the card name, just as in the second section of the file. However, then we deviate from that format. There is a {} grouping, followed by a number of strings. These strings correspond to the vendor, product and extra information that is defined in a CIS_INFO tuple. These strings are filtered by the program that generates pccarddevs.h to replace &sp with a real space. NULL entries mean that that part of the entry should be ignored. In the example I have picked, there is a bad entry. It should not contain the version number in it unless that is critical for the operation of the card. Sometimes vendors will have many different versions of the card in the field that all work, in which case that information only makes it harder for someone with a similar card to use it with FreeBSD. Sometimes it is necessary when a vendor wishes to sell many different parts under the same brand due to market considerations (availability, price, and so forth). Then it can be critical to disambiguating the card in those rare cases where the vendor kept the same manufacturer/product pair. Regular expression matching is not available at this time.
To understand how to add a device to the list of supported devices, one must understand the probe and/or match routines that many drivers have. It is complicated a little in FreeBSD 5.x because there is a compatibility layer for OLDCARD present as well. Since only the window-dressing is different, an idealized version will be presented here.
static const struct pccard_product wi_pccard_products[] = { PCMCIA_CARD(3COM, 3CRWE737A, 0), PCMCIA_CARD(BUFFALO, WLI_PCM_S11, 0), PCMCIA_CARD(BUFFALO, WLI_CF_S11G, 0), PCMCIA_CARD(TDK, LAK_CD011WL, 0), { NULL } }; static int wi_pccard_probe(dev) device_t dev; { const struct pccard_product *pp; if ((pp = pccard_product_lookup(dev, wi_pccard_products, sizeof(wi_pccard_products[0]), NULL)) != NULL) { if (pp->pp_name != NULL) device_set_desc(dev, pp->pp_name); return (0); } return (ENXIO); }
Here we have a simple pccard probe routine that matches a few devices. As stated
above, the name may vary (if it is not foo_pccard_probe()
it will be foo_pccard_match()
). The function pccard_product_lookup()
is a generalized function that walks the
table and returns a pointer to the first entry that it matches. Some drivers may use this
mechanism to convey additional information about some cards to the rest of the driver, so
there may be some variance in the table. The only requirement is that if you have a
different table, the first element of the structure you have a table of be a struct
pccard_product.
Looking at the table wi_pccard_products
, one notices
that all the entries are of the form PCMCIA_CARD(foo, bar, baz)
. The foo
part is the manufacturer id from pccarddevs. The bar part is the product. The baz is the expected function number that for this card.
Many pccards can have multiple functions, and some way to disambiguate function 1 from
function 0 is needed. You may see PCMCIA_CARD_D, which includes
the device description from the pccarddevs file. You may also
see PCMCIA_CARD2 and PCMCIA_CARD2_D
which are used when you need to match CIS both CIS strings and manufacturer numbers, in
the “use the default description” and “take the description from
pccarddevs” flavors.
So, to add a new device, one must do the following steps. First, one must obtain the identification information from the device. The easiest way to do this is to insert the device into a PC Card or CF slot and issue devinfo -v. You will likely see something like:
cbb1 pnpinfo vendor=0x104c device=0xac51 subvendor=0x1265 subdevice=0x0300 class=0x060700 at slot=10 function=1 cardbus1 pccard1 unknown pnpinfo manufacturer=0x026f product=0x030c cisvendor="BUFFALO" cisproduct="WLI2-CF-S11" function_type=6 at function=0
as part of the output. The manufacturer and product are the numeric IDs for this product. While the cisvendor and cisproduct are the strings that are present in the CIS that describe this product.
Since we first want to prefer the numeric option, first try to construct an entry based on that. The above card has been slightly fictionalized for the purpose of this example. The vendor is BUFFALO, which we see already has an entry:
vendor BUFFALO 0x026f BUFFALO (Melco Corporation)
so we are good there. Looking for an entry for this card, we do not find one. Instead we find:
/* BUFFALO */ product BUFFALO WLI_PCM_S11 0x0305 BUFFALO AirStation 11Mbps WLAN product BUFFALO LPC_CF_CLT 0x0307 BUFFALO LPC-CF-CLT product BUFFALO LPC3_CLT 0x030a BUFFALO LPC3-CLT Ethernet Adapter product BUFFALO WLI_CF_S11G 0x030b BUFFALO AirStation 11Mbps CF WLAN
we can just add
product BUFFALO WLI2_CF_S11G 0x030c BUFFALO AirStation ultra 802.11b CF
to pccarddevs. Presently, there is a manual step to regenerate the pccarddevs.h file used to convey these identifiers to the client driver. The following steps must be done before you can use them in the driver:
# cd src/sys/dev/pccard # make -f Makefile.pccarddevs
Once these steps are complete, you can add the card to the driver. That is a simple operation of adding one line:
static const struct pccard_product wi_pccard_products[] = { PCMCIA_CARD(3COM, 3CRWE737A, 0), PCMCIA_CARD(BUFFALO, WLI_PCM_S11, 0), PCMCIA_CARD(BUFFALO, WLI_CF_S11G, 0), + PCMCIA_CARD(BUFFALO, WLI_CF2_S11G, 0), PCMCIA_CARD(TDK, LAK_CD011WL, 0), { NULL } };
Note that I have included a '+' in the line before the line that I added, but that is simply to highlight the line. Do not add it to the actual driver. Once you have added the line, you can recompile your kernel or module and try to see if it recognizes the device. If it does and works, please submit a patch. If it does not work, please figure out what is needed to make it work and submit a patch. If it did not recognize it at all, you have done something wrong and should recheck each step.
If you are a FreeBSD src committer, and everything appears to be working, then you can commit the changes to the tree. However, there are some minor tricky things that you need to worry about. First, you must commit the pccarddevs file to the tree. After you have done that, you must regenerate pccarddevs.h and commit it as a second commit (this is to make sure that the right $FreeBSD$ tag is in the latter file). Finally, you need to commit the additions to the driver.
Many people send entries for new devices to the author directly. Please do not do this. Please submit them as a PR and send the author the PR number for his records. This makes sure that entries are not lost. When submitting a PR, it is unnecessary to include the pccardevs.h diffs in the patch, since those will be regenerated. It is necessary to include a description of the device, as well as the patches to the client driver. If you do not know the name, use OEM99 as the name, and the author will adjust OEM99 accordingly after investigation. Committers should not commit OEM99, but instead find the highest OEM entry and commit one more than that.
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Some utilities such as disklabel(8) may store the information in this area, mostly in the second sector. |
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