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<PART id="net-common-tcpip">
<TITLE>TCP/IP Stack Support for eCos</TITLE>
<PARTINTRO>
<PARA>
The Common Networking for <productname>eCos</productname> package
provides support for a complete TCP/IP networking stack.
The design allows for the actual stack to be modular and at the
current time two different implementations, one based on OpenBSD
from 2000 and a new version based on FreeBSD, are available.
The particulars of each stack implementation are presented in
separate sections following this top-level discussion.
</PARA>
</PARTINTRO>
<CHAPTER id="net-common-ethernet-driver-design">
<TITLE>Ethernet Driver Design</TITLE>
<PARA>Currently, the networking stack only supports ethernet based
networking. </PARA>
<PARA>The network drivers use a two-layer design.  One layer is
hardware independent and contains all the stack specific code. 
The other layer is platform dependent and communicates with the
hardware independent layer via a very simple API.  In this way,
hardware device drivers can actually be used with other stacks,
if the same API can be provided by that stack.  We designed the
drivers this way to encourage the development of other stacks in
eCos while allowing re-use of the actual hardware specific code. </PARA>
<PARA>More comprehensive documentation of the ethernet device driver and
the associated API can be found in the generic ethernet device driver
documentation
<xref linkend="io-eth-drv-generic">
The driver and API is the same as the minimal debug stack used by
the RedBoot application. See the RedBoot documentation
<xref linkend="redboot">
for further
information.</PARA>
</CHAPTER>
<CHAPTER id="net-common-sample-code">
<TITLE>Sample Code</TITLE>
<PARA>Many examples using the networking support are provided. 
These are arranged as eCos test programs, primarily for use in verifying
the package, but they can also serve as useful frameworks for program
design.  We have taken a
<acronym>KISS</acronym>
approach to building programs which
use the network.  A single include file
&lt;<FILENAME>network.h</FILENAME>&gt; is
all that is required to access the stack.  A complete, annotated
test program can be found at
<FILENAME>net/common/<REPLACEABLE>VERSION</REPLACEABLE>/tests/ftp_test.c</FILENAME>,
with its associated files.     </PARA>
</CHAPTER>
<CHAPTER id="net-common-configuring-ip-addresses">
<TITLE>Configuring IP Addresses</TITLE>
<PARA>Each interface (&ldquo;eth0&rdquo; and &ldquo;eth1&rdquo;)
has independent configuration of its setup.  Each can be set up
manually (in which case you must write code to do this), or by using
<acronym>BOOTP/DHCP</acronym>,
or explicitly, with configured values. If additional
interfaces are added, these must be configured manually.</PARA>
<PARA>The configurable values are: </PARA>
<itemizedlist>
<LISTITEM><PARA>IP address</para></listitem>
<LISTITEM><PARA>netmask</para></listitem>
<LISTITEM><PARA>broadcast address</para></listitem>
<LISTITEM><PARA>gateway/router</para></listitem>
<LISTITEM><PARA>server address.</para></listitem>
</itemizedlist>
<PARA>Server address is the DHCP server if applicable, but in addition,
many test cases use it as &ldquo;the machine to talk to&rdquo; in
whatever manner the test exercises the protocol stack.</PARA>
<PARA>The initialization is invoked by calling the C routine   
<PROGRAMLISTING>
void <function>init_all_network_interfaces</function>(void);
</PROGRAMLISTING>
</PARA>
<PARA>
Additionally, if the system is configured to support IPv6 then each
interface may have an address assigned which is a composite of a 64 bit
prefix and the 32 bit IPv4 address for that interface.
The prefix is controlled by the CDL setting 
CYGHWR_NET_DRIVER_ETH0_IPV6_PREFIX for &ldquo;eth0&rdquo;, etc.
This is a CDL booldata type, allowing this address to be suppressed if
not desired.
</PARA>
<PARA>
Refer to the test cases,
<FILENAME>&hellip;/packages/net/common/<REPLACEABLE>VERSION</REPLACEABLE>/tests/ftp_test.c</FILENAME>
for example usage, and the source files in
<FILENAME>&hellip;/packages/net/common/<REPLACEABLE>VERSION</REPLACEABLE>/src/bootp_support.c</FILENAME>
and
<FILENAME>network_support.c</FILENAME>
to see what that call does.</PARA>
<PARA>This assumes that the MAC address (also known as 
<acronym>ESA</acronym> or Ethernet Station Address)
is already defined in the
serial EEPROM or however the particular target implements this;
support for setting the MAC address is hardware dependent.</PARA>
<PARA>DHCP support is active by default, and there are configuration
options to control it.  Firstly, in the top level of the
&ldquo;Networking&rdquo; configuration
tree, &ldquo;Use full DHCP instead of BOOTP&rdquo; enables
DHCP, and it contains an option to have the system provide a thread
to renew DHCP leases and manage lease expiry. Secondly, the individual
interfaces &ldquo;eth0&rdquo; and &ldquo;eth1&rdquo; each
have new options within the &ldquo;Use BOOTP/DHCP to
initialize &lsquo;<EMPHASIS>ethX</EMPHASIS>&rsquo;&rdquo; to
select whether to use DHCP rather than BOOTP.</PARA>
<para>
Note that you are completely at liberty to ignore this startup code and its
configuration in building your application.
<function>init_all_network_interfaces()</function>
is provided for three main purposes:
<itemizedlist>
<LISTITEM><PARA>For use by Red Hat's own test programs.</para></listitem>
<LISTITEM><PARA>As an easy &ldquo;get you going&rdquo; utility for
newcomers to <productname>eCos</productname>.</para></listitem>
<LISTITEM><PARA>As readable example code from which further development
might start.</para></listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</para><para>
If your application has different requirements for bringing up 
available network interfaces, setting up routes, determining IP addresses
and the like from the defaults that the example code provides, you can
write your own initialization code to use whatever sequence of
<function>ioctl()</function> function
calls carries out the desired setup.  Analogously, in larger systems,
a sequence of &ldquo;ifconfig&rdquo invocations is used; these mostly
map to <function>ioctl()</function> calls to manipulate the state of
the interface in question.
</para>
</CHAPTER>
<CHAPTER id="net-common-tests-and-demonstrations">
<TITLE>Tests and Demonstrations</TITLE>
<SECT1 id="net-common-loopback-tests">
<TITLE><!-- <xref> -->Loopback tests</TITLE>
<PARA>By default, only tests which can execute on any target
          will be built. These therefore do not actually use external
          network interfaces (though they may configure and initialize
          them) but are limited to testing via the loopback
          interface.</PARA>
<PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>ping_lo_test</EMPHASIS> - ping test of the loopback address 
<EMPHASIS>tcp_lo_select</EMPHASIS> - simple test of select with TCP via loopback 
<EMPHASIS>tcp_lo_test</EMPHASIS> - trivial TCP test via loopback 
<EMPHASIS>udp_lo_test</EMPHASIS> - trivial UDP test via loopback 
<EMPHASIS>multi_lo_select</EMPHASIS> - test of multiple select() calls simultaneously</PROGRAMLISTING>
</SECT1>
<SECT1 id="net-common-building-the-network-tests">
<TITLE>Building the Network Tests</TITLE>
<PARA>To build further network tests, ensure that the configuration
option CYGPKG_NET_BUILD_TESTS is set in your build
and then make the tests in the usual way.  Alternatively
(with that option set) use
<PROGRAMLISTING>make -C net/common/<REPLACEABLE>VERSION</REPLACEABLE>/ tests </PROGRAMLISTING>
after building the eCos library, if you wish to build
<emphasis>only</emphasis>
the network tests.</PARA>
<PARA>This should give test executables in
<FILENAME>install/tests/net/common/<REPLACEABLE>VERSION</REPLACEABLE>/tests</FILENAME>
including
the following:</PARA>
<PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>socket_test</EMPHASIS> - trivial test of socket creation API 
<EMPHASIS>mbuf_test</EMPHASIS> - trivial test of mbuf allocation API 
<EMPHASIS>ftp_test</EMPHASIS> - simple FTP test, connects to &ldquo;server&rdquo; 
<EMPHASIS>ping_test</EMPHASIS> - pings &ldquo;server&rdquo; and non-existent host to test timeout 
<EMPHASIS>dhcp_test</EMPHASIS> - ping test, but also relinquishes and
            reacquires DHCP leases periodically 
<EMPHASIS>flood</EMPHASIS> - a flood ping test; use with care 
<EMPHASIS>tcp_echo</EMPHASIS> - data forwarding program for performance test
<EMPHASIS>nc_test_master </EMPHASIS>- network characterization master
<EMPHASIS>nc_test_slave </EMPHASIS>- network characterization slave
<EMPHASIS>server_test</EMPHASIS> - a very simple server example
<EMPHASIS>tftp_client_test</EMPHASIS> - performs a tftp get and put from/to &ldquo;server&rdquo; 
<EMPHASIS>tftp_server_test</EMPHASIS> - runs a tftp server for a short while 
<EMPHASIS>set_mac_address </EMPHASIS>- set MAC address(es) of interfaces in NVRAM
<EMPHASIS>bridge</EMPHASIS> - contributed network bridge code
<EMPHASIS>nc6_test_master </EMPHASIS>- IPv4/IPv6 network characterization master
<EMPHASIS>nc6_test_slave </EMPHASIS>- IPv4/IPv6 network characterization slave
<EMPHASIS>ga_server_test</EMPHASIS> - a very simple IPv4/IPv6 server example
</PROGRAMLISTING>
</SECT1>
<SECT1 id="net-common-standalone-tests">
<TITLE>Standalone Tests</TITLE>
<PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>socket_test</EMPHASIS> - trivial test of socket creation API 
<EMPHASIS>mbuf_test</EMPHASIS> - trivial test of mbuf allocation API</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>These two do not communicate over the net; they just perform
simple API tests then exit.</PARA>
<PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>ftp_test</EMPHASIS>      - simple FTP test, connects to &ldquo;server&rdquo;</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>This test initializes the interface(s) then connects to the
FTP server on the &ldquo;server&rdquo; machine for for each
active interface in turn, confirms that the connection was successful,
disconnects and exits.  This tests interworking with the server.</PARA>
<PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>ping_test</EMPHASIS>      - pings &ldquo;server&rdquo; and non-existent host to test timeout</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>This test initializes the interface(s) then pings the server
machine in the standard way, then pings address &ldquo;32 up&rdquo; from
the server in the expectation that there is no machine there.  This
confirms that the successful ping is not a false positive, and tests
the receive timeout.  If there is such a machine, of course the
2nd set of pings succeeds, confirming that we can talk to a machine
not previously mentioned by configuration or by bootp. It then does
the same thing on the other interface, eth1.</PARA>
<PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>dhcp_test</EMPHASIS>    - ping test, but also manipulates DHCP leases</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>This test is very similar to the ping test, but in addition,
provided the network package is not configured to do this automatically,
it manually relinquishes and reclaims DHCP leases for all available
interfaces. This tests the external API to DHCP. See section below
describing this.</PARA>
<PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>flood</EMPHASIS>        - a flood ping test; use with care</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>This test performs pings on all interfaces as quickly as possible,
and only prints status information periodically. Flood pinging is
bad for network performance; so do not use this test on general
purpose networks unless protected by a switch.</PARA>
</SECT1>
<SECT1 id="net-common-performance-test">
<TITLE>Performance Test</TITLE>
<PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>tcp_echo</EMPHASIS>      - data forwarding program for performance test</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA><command>tcp_echo</command> is one
part of the standard performance test we use.  The other parts are
host programs <LITERAL>tcp_source</LITERAL> and <LITERAL>tcp_sink</LITERAL>.
 To make these (under LINUX) cd to the tests source directory in
the eCos repository and type &ldquo;<LITERAL>make -f make.linux</LITERAL>&rdquo; -
this should build <LITERAL>tcp_source</LITERAL> and <LITERAL>tcp_sink</LITERAL>.</PARA>
<PARA>The LINUX program &ldquo;<LITERAL>tcp_source</LITERAL>&rdquo; sends
data to the target.  On the target, &ldquo;<LITERAL>tcp_echo</LITERAL>&rdquo; sends
it onwards to &ldquo;<LITERAL>tcp_sink</LITERAL>&rdquo; running
on LINUX.  So the target must receive and send on all the data that <LITERAL>tcp_source</LITERAL> sends
it; the time taken for this is measured and the data rate is calculated.</PARA>
<PARA>To invoke the test, first start <LITERAL>tcp_echo</LITERAL> on
the target board and wait for it to become quiescent - it will report
work to calibrate a CPU load which can be used to simulate real
operating conditions for the stack.</PARA>
<PARA>Then on your LINUX machine, in one terminal window, invoke <LITERAL>tcp_sink</LITERAL> giving
it the IP address (or hostname) of one interface of the target board.
 For example &ldquo;<LITERAL>tcp_sink 10.130.39.66</LITERAL>&rdquo;.
 <LITERAL>tcp_echo</LITERAL> on the target
will print something like &ldquo;<LITERAL>SINK connection
from 10.130.39.13:1143</LITERAL>&rdquo; when <LITERAL>tcp_sink</LITERAL> is
correctly invoked.</PARA>
<PARA>Next, in another LINUX terminal window, invoke <LITERAL>tcp_source</LITERAL>,
giving it the IP address (or hostname) of an interface of the target
board, and optionally a background load to apply to the target while
the test runs.  For example, &ldquo;<LITERAL>tcp_source
194.130.39.66</LITERAL>&rdquo; to run the test with no
additional target CPU load, or &ldquo;<LITERAL>tcp_source
194.130.39.66 85</LITERAL>&rdquo; to load it up to 85% used.
 The target load must be a multiple of 5.  <LITERAL>tcp_echo</LITERAL> on
the target will print something like &ldquo;<LITERAL>SOURCE
connection from 194.130.39.13:1144</LITERAL>&rdquo; when
tcp_source is correctly invoked.</PARA>
<PARA>You can connect tcp_sink to one target interface
and tcp_source to another, or both to the same interface.
 Similarly, you can run <LITERAL>tcp_sink</LITERAL> and <LITERAL>tcp_source</LITERAL> on
the same LINUX machine or different ones.  TCP/IP and ARP
look after them finding one another, as intended.</PARA>
<PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>nc_test_master</EMPHASIS> - network characterization master
<EMPHASIS>nc_test_slave</EMPHASIS> - network characterization slave</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>These tests talk to each other to measure network performance.
They can each run on either a test target or a LINUX host computer
given some customization to your local environment. As provided, <literal>nc_test_slave</literal> must
run on the test target, and <literal>nc_test_master</literal> must
be run on a LINUX host, and be given the test target's
IP address or hostname.</PARA>
<PARA>The tests print network performance for various packet sizes
over UDP and TCP, versus various additional CPU loads on the target.</PARA>
<PARA>
The programs <PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>nc6_test_slave</EMPHASIS>
<EMPHASIS>nc6_test_master</EMPHASIS></PROGRAMLISTING>
are additional forms which support both IPv4 and IPv6 addressing.
</PARA>
</SECT1>
<SECT1 id="net-common-interactive-tests">
<TITLE>Interactive Tests</TITLE>
<PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>server_test</EMPHASIS> - a very simple server example</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>This test simply awaits a connection on port 7734 and after
accepting a connection, gets a packet (with a timeout of a few seconds)
and prints it. </PARA>
<PARA>The connection is then closed. We then loop to await the next
connection, and so on. To use it, telnet to the target on port 7734
then type something (quickly!)</PARA>
<screen>% telnet 172.16.19.171 7734 
Hello target board</screen>
<PARA>and the test program will print something like:</PARA>
<screen>connection from 172.16.19.13:3369 
buf = "Hello target board"</screen>

<PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>ga_server_test</EMPHASIS> - another very simple server example</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>This is a variation on the <EMPHASIS>ga_server_test</EMPHASIS> test
with the difference being that it uses the <FUNCTION>getaddrinfo</FUNCTION>
function to set up its addresses.  On a system with IPv6 enabled, it will
listen on port 7734 for a TCP connection via either IPv4 or IPv6.
</PARA>

<PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>tftp_client_test</EMPHASIS> - performs a tftp get and put from/to &ldquo;server&rdquo;</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>This is only partially interactive.  You need to set things
up on the &ldquo;server&rdquo; in order for this to work,
and you will need to look at the server afterwards to confirm that all
was well.</PARA>
<PARA>For each interface in turn, this test attempts to read by
tftp from the server, a file called
<filename>tftp_get</filename>
and
prints the status and contents it read (if any).  It then writes
the same data to a file called
<filename>tftp_put</filename>
on
the same server.</PARA>
<PARA>In order for this to succeed, both files must already exist.
 The TFTP protocol does not require that a WRQ request _create_ a
file, just that it can write it.  The TFTP server on Linux certainly
will only allow writes to an existing file, given the appropriate
permission.  Thus, you need to have these files in place, with proper permission,
before running the test.</PARA>
<PARA>The conventional place for the tftp server to operate in LINUX
is /tftpboot/; you will likely need root privileges
to create files there. The data contents of
<filename>tftp_get</filename>
can
be anything you like, but anything very large will waste lots of
time printing it on the test&rsquo;s stdout, and anything above
32kB will cause a buffer overflow and unpredictable failure.</PARA>
<PARA>Creating an empty tftp_put file (eg. by copying /dev/null
to it) is neatest.  So before the test you should have something
like:</PARA>
<PROGRAMLISTING>-rw-rw-rw- 1 root        1076 May  1 11:39 tftp_get
-rw-rw-rw- 1 root        0 May  1 15:52 tftp_put </PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>note that both files have public permissions wide open.  After
running the test,
<filename>tftp_put</filename>
should
be a copy of
<filename>tftp_get</filename>.</PARA>
<PROGRAMLISTING>-rw-rw-rw-  1 root       1076 May  1 11:39 tftp_get
-rw-rw-rw-  1 root       1076 May  1 15:52 tftp_put

</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>tftp_server_test</EMPHASIS> - runs a tftp server for a short while</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>This test is truly interactive, in that you can use a standard
tftp application to get and put files from the server, during the
5 minutes that it runs.  The dummy filesystem which underlies the
server initially contains one file, called &ldquo;uu&rdquo; which contains
part of a familiar text and some padding.  It also accommodates
creation of 3 further files of up to 1Mb in size and names of up
to 256 bytes.  Exceeding these limits will cause a buffer overflow
and unpredictable failure.</PARA>
<PARA>The dummy filesystem is an implementation of the generic API
which allows a true filesystem to be attached to the tftp server
in the network stack.</PARA>
<PARA>We have been testing the tftp server by running the test on
the target board, then using two different host computers connecting
to the different target interfaces, putting a file from each, getting
the &ldquo;uu&rdquo; file, and getting the file from the other computer.
 This verifies that data is preserved during the transfer as well
as interworking with standard tftp applications.</PARA>
</SECT1>
<SECT1 id="net-common-maintenance-tools">
<TITLE>Maintenance Tools </TITLE>
<PROGRAMLISTING><EMPHASIS>set_mac_address</EMPHASIS> - set MAC address(es) of interfaces in NVRAM</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>This program makes an example <function>ioctl()</function> call
<acronym>SIOCSIFHWADDR</acronym> 
&ldquo;Socket IO Set InterFace HardWare ADDRess&rdquo;
to set the MAC address on targets
where this is supported and enabled in the configuration. You must
edit the source to choose a MAC address and further edit it to allow
this very dangerous operation. Not all ethernet drivers support
this operation, because most ethernet hardware does not support
it &mdash; or it comes pre-set from the factory.
<emphasis>Do not use this program.</emphasis></PARA>
</SECT1>
</CHAPTER>
<CHAPTER id="net-common-support">
<title>Support Features</title>
<SECT1 id="net-common-tftp">
<TITLE>TFTP</TITLE>
<PARA>The TFTP client and server are described in
<filename>tftp_support.h</filename>;
the client API is simple and can be easily understood by reading
<filename>tftp_client_test.c</filename>.</PARA>
<PARA>The server is more complex.  It requires a filesystem implementation
to be supplied by the user, and attached to the tftp server by means
of a vector of function pointers:</PARA>
<PROGRAMLISTING>struct tftpd_fileops {
             int (&ast;open)(const char &ast;, int);
             int (&ast;close)(int);
             int (&ast;write)(int, const void &ast;, int);
             int (&ast;read)(int, void &ast;, int);
};</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>These functions have the obvious semantics.  The structure
describing the filesystem is an argument to the <function>tftpd_start(int,
struct tftpd_fileops &ast;);</function> call.
 The first argument is the port to use for the server.</PARA>
<PARA>As discussed in the description of the tftp_server_test
above, an example filesystem is provided in
<filename>net/common/<REPLACEABLE>VERSION</REPLACEABLE>/src/tftp_dummy_file.c</filename>
for
use by the tftp server test.  The dummy filesystem is not a supported
part of the network stack, it exists purely for demonstration purposes.</PARA>
</SECT1>
<SECT1 id="net-common-dhcp">
<TITLE>DHCP</TITLE>
<PARA>This API publishes a routine to maintain DHCP state, and a
semaphore that is signalled when a lease requires attention: this
is your clue to call the aforementioned routine.</PARA>
<PARA>The intent with this API is that a simple DHCP client thread,
which maintains the state of the interfaces, can go as follows:
(after <function>init_all_network_interfaces()</function> is
called from elsewhere)</PARA>
<PROGRAMLISTING>while ( 1 ) {
        while ( 1 ) {
            cyg_semaphore_wait( &amp;dhcp_needs_attention );
            if ( ! dhcp_bind() ) // a lease expired
                break; // If we need to re-bind
        }
        dhcp_halt(); // tear everything down
        init_all_network_interfaces(); // re-initialize
}</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>and if the application does not want to suffer the overhead
of a separate thread and its stack for this, this functionality
can be placed in the app&rsquo;s server loop in an obvious fashion.
 That is the goal of breaking out these internal elements.  For example,
some server might be arranged to poll DHCP from time to time like
this:</PARA>
<PROGRAMLISTING>while ( 1 ) {
    init_all_network_interfaces();
    open-my-listen-sockets();
    while ( 1 ) {
       serve-one-request();
       // sleeps if no connections, but not forever; 
       // so this loop is polled a few times a minute...
       if ( cyg_semaphore_trywait( &amp;dhcp_needs_attention )) {
             if ( ! dhcp_bind() ) {
                 close-my-listen-sockets();
                 dhcp_halt();
                 break;
             }
       }
    }
}</PROGRAMLISTING>
<PARA>If the configuration option CYGOPT_NET_DHCP_DHCP_THREAD
is defined, then eCos provides a thread as described initially.
Independent of this option, initialization of the interfaces still
occurs in <function>init_all_network_interfaces()</function> and
your startup code can call that.  It will start the DHCP management
thread if configured.  If a lease fails to be renewed, the management
thread will shut down all interfaces and attempt to initialize all
the interfaces again from scratch.  This may cause chaos in the
app, which is why managing the DHCP state in an application aware
thread is actually better, just far less convenient for testing.</PARA>
</SECT1>
</CHAPTER>
    &net-common-tcpip-manpages-sgml;
</PART>