Diff: features/FEATURE_LWIP/lwip-interface/lwip/doc/rawapi.txt

Revision:

0:f269e3021894

--- /dev/null	Thu Jan 01 00:00:00 1970 +0000
+++ b/features/FEATURE_LWIP/lwip-interface/lwip/doc/rawapi.txt	Sun Oct 23 15:10:02 2016 +0000
@@ -0,0 +1,506 @@
+Raw TCP/IP interface for lwIP
+
+Authors: Adam Dunkels, Leon Woestenberg, Christiaan Simons
+
+lwIP provides three Application Program's Interfaces (APIs) for programs
+to use for communication with the TCP/IP code:
+* low-level "core" / "callback" or "raw" API.
+* higher-level "sequential" API.
+* BSD-style socket API.
+
+The raw API (sometimes called native API) is an event-driven API designed
+to be used without an operating system that implements zero-copy send and
+receive. This API is also used by the core stack for interaction between
+the various protocols. It is the only API available when running lwIP
+without an operating system.
+
+The sequential API provides a way for ordinary, sequential, programs
+to use the lwIP stack. It is quite similar to the BSD socket API. The
+model of execution is based on the blocking open-read-write-close
+paradigm. Since the TCP/IP stack is event based by nature, the TCP/IP
+code and the application program must reside in different execution
+contexts (threads).
+
+The socket API is a compatibility API for existing applications,
+currently it is built on top of the sequential API. It is meant to
+provide all functions needed to run socket API applications running
+on other platforms (e.g. unix / windows etc.). However, due to limitations
+in the specification of this API, there might be incompatibilities
+that require small modifications of existing programs.
+
+** Multithreading
+
+lwIP started targeting single-threaded environments. When adding multi-
+threading support, instead of making the core thread-safe, another
+approach was chosen: there is one main thread running the lwIP core
+(also known as the "tcpip_thread"). When running in a multithreaded
+environment, raw API functions MUST only be called from the core thread
+since raw API functions are not protected from concurrent access (aside
+from pbuf- and memory management functions). Application threads using
+the sequential- or socket API communicate with this main thread through
+message passing.
+
+      As such, the list of functions that may be called from
+      other threads or an ISR is very limited! Only functions
+      from these API header files are thread-safe:
+      - api.h
+      - netbuf.h
+      - netdb.h
+      - netifapi.h
+      - pppapi.h
+      - sockets.h
+      - sys.h
+
+      Additionaly, memory (de-)allocation functions may be
+      called from multiple threads (not ISR!) with NO_SYS=0
+      since they are protected by SYS_LIGHTWEIGHT_PROT and/or
+      semaphores.
+
+      Netconn or Socket API functions are thread safe against the
+      core thread but they are not reentrant at the control block
+      granularity level. That is, a UDP or TCP control block must
+      not be shared among multiple threads without proper locking.
+
+      If SYS_LIGHTWEIGHT_PROT is set to 1 and
+      LWIP_ALLOW_MEM_FREE_FROM_OTHER_CONTEXT is set to 1,
+      pbuf_free() may also be called from another thread or
+      an ISR (since only then, mem_free - for PBUF_RAM - may
+      be called from an ISR: otherwise, the HEAP is only
+      protected by semaphores).
+
+
+** The remainder of this document discusses the "raw" API. **
+
+The raw TCP/IP interface allows the application program to integrate
+better with the TCP/IP code. Program execution is event based by
+having callback functions being called from within the TCP/IP
+code. The TCP/IP code and the application program both run in the same
+thread. The sequential API has a much higher overhead and is not very
+well suited for small systems since it forces a multithreaded paradigm
+on the application.
+
+The raw TCP/IP interface is not only faster in terms of code execution
+time but is also less memory intensive. The drawback is that program
+development is somewhat harder and application programs written for
+the raw TCP/IP interface are more difficult to understand. Still, this
+is the preferred way of writing applications that should be small in
+code size and memory usage.
+
+All APIs can be used simultaneously by different application
+programs. In fact, the sequential API is implemented as an application
+program using the raw TCP/IP interface.
+
+Do not confuse the lwIP raw API with raw Ethernet or IP sockets.
+The former is a way of interfacing the lwIP network stack (including
+TCP and UDP), the later refers to processing raw Ethernet or IP data
+instead of TCP connections or UDP packets.
+
+Raw API applications may never block since all packet processing
+(input and output) as well as timer processing (TCP mainly) is done
+in a single execution context.
+
+--- Callbacks
+
+Program execution is driven by callbacks functions, which are then
+invoked by the lwIP core when activity related to that application
+occurs. A particular application may register to be notified via a
+callback function for events such as incoming data available, outgoing
+data sent, error notifications, poll timer expiration, connection
+closed, etc. An application can provide a callback function to perform
+processing for any or all of these events. Each callback is an ordinary
+C function that is called from within the TCP/IP code. Every callback
+function is passed the current TCP or UDP connection state as an
+argument. Also, in order to be able to keep program specific state,
+the callback functions are called with a program specified argument
+that is independent of the TCP/IP state.
+
+The function for setting the application connection state is:
+
+- void tcp_arg(struct tcp_pcb *pcb, void *arg)
+
+  Specifies the program specific state that should be passed to all
+  other callback functions. The "pcb" argument is the current TCP
+  connection control block, and the "arg" argument is the argument
+  that will be passed to the callbacks.
+
+  
+--- TCP connection setup
+
+The functions used for setting up connections is similar to that of
+the sequential API and of the BSD socket API. A new TCP connection
+identifier (i.e., a protocol control block - PCB) is created with the
+tcp_new() function. This PCB can then be either set to listen for new
+incoming connections or be explicitly connected to another host.
+
+- struct tcp_pcb *tcp_new(void)
+
+  Creates a new connection identifier (PCB). If memory is not
+  available for creating the new pcb, NULL is returned.
+
+- err_t tcp_bind(struct tcp_pcb *pcb, ip_addr_t *ipaddr,
+                 u16_t port)
+
+  Binds the pcb to a local IP address and port number. The IP address
+  can be specified as IP_ADDR_ANY in order to bind the connection to
+  all local IP addresses.
+
+  If another connection is bound to the same port, the function will
+  return ERR_USE, otherwise ERR_OK is returned.
+
+- struct tcp_pcb *tcp_listen(struct tcp_pcb *pcb)
+
+  Commands a pcb to start listening for incoming connections. When an
+  incoming connection is accepted, the function specified with the
+  tcp_accept() function will be called. The pcb will have to be bound
+  to a local port with the tcp_bind() function.
+
+  The tcp_listen() function returns a new connection identifier, and
+  the one passed as an argument to the function will be
+  deallocated. The reason for this behavior is that less memory is
+  needed for a connection that is listening, so tcp_listen() will
+  reclaim the memory needed for the original connection and allocate a
+  new smaller memory block for the listening connection.
+
+  tcp_listen() may return NULL if no memory was available for the
+  listening connection. If so, the memory associated with the pcb
+  passed as an argument to tcp_listen() will not be deallocated.
+
+- struct tcp_pcb *tcp_listen_with_backlog(struct tcp_pcb *pcb, u8_t backlog)
+
+  Same as tcp_listen, but limits the number of outstanding connections
+  in the listen queue to the value specified by the backlog argument.
+  To use it, your need to set TCP_LISTEN_BACKLOG=1 in your lwipopts.h.
+
+- void tcp_accepted(struct tcp_pcb *pcb)
+
+  Inform lwIP that an incoming connection has been accepted. This would
+  usually be called from the accept callback. This allows lwIP to perform
+  housekeeping tasks, such as allowing further incoming connections to be
+  queued in the listen backlog.
+  ATTENTION: the PCB passed in must be the listening pcb, not the pcb passed
+  into the accept callback!
+
+- void tcp_accept(struct tcp_pcb *pcb,
+                  err_t (* accept)(void *arg, struct tcp_pcb *newpcb,
+                                   err_t err))
+
+  Specified the callback function that should be called when a new
+  connection arrives on a listening connection.
+
+- err_t tcp_connect(struct tcp_pcb *pcb, ip_addr_t *ipaddr,
+                    u16_t port, err_t (* connected)(void *arg,
+                                                    struct tcp_pcb *tpcb,
+                                                    err_t err));
+
+  Sets up the pcb to connect to the remote host and sends the
+  initial SYN segment which opens the connection. 
+
+  The tcp_connect() function returns immediately; it does not wait for
+  the connection to be properly setup. Instead, it will call the
+  function specified as the fourth argument (the "connected" argument)
+  when the connection is established. If the connection could not be
+  properly established, either because the other host refused the
+  connection or because the other host didn't answer, the "err"
+  callback function of this pcb (registered with tcp_err, see below)
+  will be called.
+
+  The tcp_connect() function can return ERR_MEM if no memory is
+  available for enqueueing the SYN segment. If the SYN indeed was
+  enqueued successfully, the tcp_connect() function returns ERR_OK.
+
+
+--- Sending TCP data
+
+TCP data is sent by enqueueing the data with a call to
+tcp_write(). When the data is successfully transmitted to the remote
+host, the application will be notified with a call to a specified
+callback function.
+
+- err_t tcp_write(struct tcp_pcb *pcb, const void *dataptr, u16_t len,
+                  u8_t apiflags)
+
+  Enqueues the data pointed to by the argument dataptr. The length of
+  the data is passed as the len parameter. The apiflags can be one or more of:
+  - TCP_WRITE_FLAG_COPY: indicates whether the new memory should be allocated
+    for the data to be copied into. If this flag is not given, no new memory
+    should be allocated and the data should only be referenced by pointer. This
+    also means that the memory behind dataptr must not change until the data is
+    ACKed by the remote host
+  - TCP_WRITE_FLAG_MORE: indicates that more data follows. If this is omitted,
+    the PSH flag is set in the last segment created by this call to tcp_write.
+    If this flag is given, the PSH flag is not set.
+
+  The tcp_write() function will fail and return ERR_MEM if the length
+  of the data exceeds the current send buffer size or if the length of
+  the queue of outgoing segment is larger than the upper limit defined
+  in lwipopts.h. The number of bytes available in the output queue can
+  be retrieved with the tcp_sndbuf() function.
+
+  The proper way to use this function is to call the function with at
+  most tcp_sndbuf() bytes of data. If the function returns ERR_MEM,
+  the application should wait until some of the currently enqueued
+  data has been successfully received by the other host and try again.
+
+- void tcp_sent(struct tcp_pcb *pcb,
+                err_t (* sent)(void *arg, struct tcp_pcb *tpcb,
+                u16_t len))
+
+  Specifies the callback function that should be called when data has
+  successfully been received (i.e., acknowledged) by the remote
+  host. The len argument passed to the callback function gives the
+  amount bytes that was acknowledged by the last acknowledgment.
+
+  
+--- Receiving TCP data
+
+TCP data reception is callback based - an application specified
+callback function is called when new data arrives. When the
+application has taken the data, it has to call the tcp_recved()
+function to indicate that TCP can advertise increase the receive
+window.
+
+- void tcp_recv(struct tcp_pcb *pcb,
+                err_t (* recv)(void *arg, struct tcp_pcb *tpcb,
+                               struct pbuf *p, err_t err))
+
+  Sets the callback function that will be called when new data
+  arrives. The callback function will be passed a NULL pbuf to
+  indicate that the remote host has closed the connection. If
+  there are no errors and the callback function is to return
+  ERR_OK, then it must free the pbuf. Otherwise, it must not
+  free the pbuf so that lwIP core code can store it.
+
+- void tcp_recved(struct tcp_pcb *pcb, u16_t len)
+
+  Must be called when the application has received the data. The len
+  argument indicates the length of the received data.
+
+
+--- Application polling
+
+When a connection is idle (i.e., no data is either transmitted or
+received), lwIP will repeatedly poll the application by calling a
+specified callback function. This can be used either as a watchdog
+timer for killing connections that have stayed idle for too long, or
+as a method of waiting for memory to become available. For instance,
+if a call to tcp_write() has failed because memory wasn't available,
+the application may use the polling functionality to call tcp_write()
+again when the connection has been idle for a while.
+
+- void tcp_poll(struct tcp_pcb *pcb, 
+                err_t (* poll)(void *arg, struct tcp_pcb *tpcb),
+                u8_t interval)
+
+  Specifies the polling interval and the callback function that should
+  be called to poll the application. The interval is specified in
+  number of TCP coarse grained timer shots, which typically occurs
+  twice a second. An interval of 10 means that the application would
+  be polled every 5 seconds.
+
+
+--- Closing and aborting connections
+
+- err_t tcp_close(struct tcp_pcb *pcb)
+
+  Closes the connection. The function may return ERR_MEM if no memory
+  was available for closing the connection. If so, the application
+  should wait and try again either by using the acknowledgment
+  callback or the polling functionality. If the close succeeds, the
+  function returns ERR_OK.
+
+  The pcb is deallocated by the TCP code after a call to tcp_close(). 
+
+- void tcp_abort(struct tcp_pcb *pcb)
+
+  Aborts the connection by sending a RST (reset) segment to the remote
+  host. The pcb is deallocated. This function never fails.
+
+  ATTENTION: When calling this from one of the TCP callbacks, make
+  sure you always return ERR_ABRT (and never return ERR_ABRT otherwise
+  or you will risk accessing deallocated memory or memory leaks!
+
+
+If a connection is aborted because of an error, the application is
+alerted of this event by the err callback. Errors that might abort a
+connection are when there is a shortage of memory. The callback
+function to be called is set using the tcp_err() function.
+
+- void tcp_err(struct tcp_pcb *pcb, void (* err)(void *arg,
+       err_t err))
+
+  The error callback function does not get the pcb passed to it as a
+  parameter since the pcb may already have been deallocated.
+
+
+--- UDP interface
+
+The UDP interface is similar to that of TCP, but due to the lower
+level of complexity of UDP, the interface is significantly simpler.
+
+- struct udp_pcb *udp_new(void)
+
+  Creates a new UDP pcb which can be used for UDP communication. The
+  pcb is not active until it has either been bound to a local address
+  or connected to a remote address.
+
+- void udp_remove(struct udp_pcb *pcb)
+
+  Removes and deallocates the pcb.  
+  
+- err_t udp_bind(struct udp_pcb *pcb, ip_addr_t *ipaddr,
+                 u16_t port)
+
+  Binds the pcb to a local address. The IP-address argument "ipaddr"
+  can be IP_ADDR_ANY to indicate that it should listen to any local IP
+  address. The function currently always return ERR_OK.
+
+- err_t udp_connect(struct udp_pcb *pcb, ip_addr_t *ipaddr,
+                    u16_t port)
+
+  Sets the remote end of the pcb. This function does not generate any
+  network traffic, but only set the remote address of the pcb.
+
+- err_t udp_disconnect(struct udp_pcb *pcb)
+
+  Remove the remote end of the pcb. This function does not generate
+  any network traffic, but only removes the remote address of the pcb.
+
+- err_t udp_send(struct udp_pcb *pcb, struct pbuf *p)
+
+  Sends the pbuf p. The pbuf is not deallocated.
+
+- void udp_recv(struct udp_pcb *pcb,
+                void (* recv)(void *arg, struct udp_pcb *upcb,
+                                         struct pbuf *p,
+                                         ip_addr_t *addr,
+                                         u16_t port),
+                              void *recv_arg)
+
+  Specifies a callback function that should be called when a UDP
+  datagram is received.
+  
+
+--- System initalization
+
+A truly complete and generic sequence for initializing the lwIP stack
+cannot be given because it depends on additional initializations for
+your runtime environment (e.g. timers).
+
+We can give you some idea on how to proceed when using the raw API.
+We assume a configuration using a single Ethernet netif and the
+UDP and TCP transport layers, IPv4 and the DHCP client.
+
+Call these functions in the order of appearance:
+
+- lwip_init()
+
+  Initialize the lwIP stack and all of its subsystems.
+
+- netif_add(struct netif *netif, const ip4_addr_t *ipaddr,
+            const ip4_addr_t *netmask, const ip4_addr_t *gw,
+            void *state, netif_init_fn init, netif_input_fn input)
+
+  Adds your network interface to the netif_list. Allocate a struct
+  netif and pass a pointer to this structure as the first argument.
+  Give pointers to cleared ip_addr structures when using DHCP,
+  or fill them with sane numbers otherwise. The state pointer may be NULL.
+
+  The init function pointer must point to a initialization function for
+  your Ethernet netif interface. The following code illustrates its use.
+  
+  err_t netif_if_init(struct netif *netif)
+  {
+    u8_t i;
+    
+    for (i = 0; i < ETHARP_HWADDR_LEN; i++) {
+      netif->hwaddr[i] = some_eth_addr[i];
+    }
+    init_my_eth_device();
+    return ERR_OK;
+  }
+  
+  For Ethernet drivers, the input function pointer must point to the lwIP
+  function ethernet_input() declared in "netif/etharp.h". Other drivers
+  must use ip_input() declared in "lwip/ip.h".
+  
+- netif_set_default(struct netif *netif)
+
+  Registers the default network interface.
+
+- netif_set_link_up(struct netif *netif)
+
+  This is the hardware link state; e.g. whether cable is plugged for wired
+  Ethernet interface. This function must be called even if you don't know
+  the current state. Having link up and link down events is optional but
+  DHCP and IPv6 discover benefit well from those events.
+
+- netif_set_up(struct netif *netif)
+
+  This is the administrative (= software) state of the netif, when the
+  netif is fully configured this function must be called.
+
+- dhcp_start(struct netif *netif)
+
+  Creates a new DHCP client for this interface on the first call.
+  
+  You can peek in the netif->dhcp struct for the actual DHCP status.
+
+- sys_check_timeouts()
+
+  When the system is running, you have to periodically call
+  sys_check_timeouts() which will handle all timers for all protocols in
+  the stack; add this to your main loop or equivalent.
+
+
+--- Optimalization hints
+
+The first thing you want to optimize is the lwip_standard_checksum()
+routine from src/core/inet.c. You can override this standard
+function with the #define LWIP_CHKSUM <your_checksum_routine>.
+
+There are C examples given in inet.c or you might want to
+craft an assembly function for this. RFC1071 is a good
+introduction to this subject.
+
+Other significant improvements can be made by supplying
+assembly or inline replacements for htons() and htonl()
+if you're using a little-endian architecture.
+#define LWIP_PLATFORM_BYTESWAP 1
+#define LWIP_PLATFORM_HTONS(x) <your_htons>
+#define LWIP_PLATFORM_HTONL(x) <your_htonl>
+
+Check your network interface driver if it reads at
+a higher speed than the maximum wire-speed. If the
+hardware isn't serviced frequently and fast enough
+buffer overflows are likely to occur.
+
+E.g. when using the cs8900 driver, call cs8900if_service(ethif)
+as frequently as possible. When using an RTOS let the cs8900 interrupt
+wake a high priority task that services your driver using a binary
+semaphore or event flag. Some drivers might allow additional tuning
+to match your application and network.
+
+For a production release it is recommended to set LWIP_STATS to 0.
+Note that speed performance isn't influenced much by simply setting
+high values to the memory options.
+
+For more optimization hints take a look at the lwIP wiki.
+
+--- Zero-copy MACs
+
+To achieve zero-copy on transmit, the data passed to the raw API must
+remain unchanged until sent. Because the send- (or write-)functions return
+when the packets have been enqueued for sending, data must be kept stable
+after that, too.
+
+This implies that PBUF_RAM/PBUF_POOL pbufs passed to raw-API send functions
+must *not* be reused by the application unless their ref-count is 1.
+
+For no-copy pbufs (PBUF_ROM/PBUF_REF), data must be kept unchanged, too,
+but the stack/driver will/must copy PBUF_REF'ed data when enqueueing, while
+PBUF_ROM-pbufs are just enqueued (as ROM-data is expected to never change).
+
+Also, data passed to tcp_write without the copy-flag must not be changed!
+
+Therefore, be careful which type of PBUF you use and if you copy TCP data
+or not!