SVR5

spm(1Mcert)

spm -- STREAMS performance analyzer for MDI

Synopsis

spm [options] -r | -s -a address -n device start
spm [-v] -n /dev/whatever status
spm -n /dev/whatever abort

Description

The STREAMS Performance Analyzer for MDI (spm) accurately measures performance of a network driver. It sends frames directly to the MDI driver, bypassing the dlpi module, and can measure both send and receive speeds.

Options

-c count: Number of frames at each size. Default is 40000.
-x: OR in ROUTE_INDICATOR; used only with FDDI and token ring.
-d level: Set debug to decimal level
-s: This is the sender process.
-r: This is the receiver process.
-n /dev/whatever: dev/netX device to use
-v: Show verbose status; used only with status command.
-a 01:02:03:04:05:06: MAC address of remote machine.
-q sap: sap in frames(default=0x911)
-o: blast number of frames indicated by the -c option and quit. This is used only with the -s option (sender process) and is not valid for ISDN devices.
-l: Build long chained msgb(D4str) structures to verify that the driver uses the msgpullup(D3str) function correctly. This is valid only with the -o option.

Running spm

Use the netcfg(1M) utility to install all network adapter drivers. It is possible to run spm without this step, but you will have to manually edit the /etc/ap/spam.ap file later if you do not use netcfg to configure the drivers.
Install the ndtest package. This creates the ndcert user, installs the spam driver into the system, and edits the /etc/conf/pack.d/spam/space.c file to allow the ndcert user to use spm.
NOTE: If you have added or removed any network drivers since installing the ndtests package, you must edit the /etc/ap/spam.ap file so that it matches the contents of the /dev/mdi directory.
Shut down and reboot the machine to single user mode (initstate=s). Edit the /stand/boot or inittab(4) file if you will be doing this often.
Use the psradm(1M) command to bring all additional processors online.
Type:
```
   nd start
```
You'll see messages like the following in the kernel putbuf array or on the system console:
```
   %spam  -   -  -  -  CPU family=%d drv_usecwait says XX Mhz CPU
```
Messages like the following will be displayed on the console when dlpid opens the device:
```
   NOTICE: spamopen: queue for <driver_name> is 0x%x
```
Type ndstat on both machines to see the MAC address to use.
Initialize spm first on the sending machine and then on the receiving machine. If you start the receiver first, it will time out waiting for the sender to go online. spm will still work, but you will have to wait up to 10 seconds longer to get valid information.
For example, if the MAC address of the receiving machine is 01:02:03:04:05:06, the spm process on the sender machine might be started with the following command:
```
   spm -c 30000 -s -n /dev/net0 -a 01:02:03:04:05:06 start
```
If the MAC address of the sending machine is 06:05:04:03:02:01, the spm process on the receiver machine might be started with the following command:
```
   spm -c 30000 -r -n /dev/net0 -a 06:05:04:03:02:01 start
```
To blast full-sized frames repeatedly, issue the following command:
```
   spm -c 1000000 -s -n /dev/net0 -a 01:02:03:04:05:06 -o start
```
To see if your driver can handle weird msgb(D4str) structures, use a command such as the following:
```
   spm -c 1000000 -s -n /dev/net0 -a 01:02:03:04:05:06 -o -l start
```
To abort a test in progress, use the command:
```
   spm -n /dev/net0 abort
```
When the test is done, issue the following command on both the sender and the receiver machines to see the results of the test and save them to a file:
```
   spm -n /dev/net0 status  > filename
```
This can be very useful to show performance in your driver as development progresses.
This can also be done while the test is running, but will slow things down a bit and skew the results for some number of frames, since they are being measured by the RDTSC instruction.

What spm does

spm is written as a STREAMS module. It is autopushed by the kernel when dlpid opens the /dev/mdi device, silently passing all frames between the MDI driver and the dlpi module. When the spam module receives a "start" ioctl from the spm utility, it prevents frames from dlpi from going to the MDI driver and begins sending frames on the wire according to the configuration information. During the testing period, any frames received on the wire that are not to the testing SAP (set with the -q option, default=0x911), are discarded. However, you should run spm on a isolated network for best results, since extraneous traffic can skew the performance results. spm sends frames with a small frame size up to full-sized frames, allowing both the sender and the receiving machines to exercise the driver's capabilities.

On the receiving side, spm sends a configuration frame to the sender. This frame effectively says, "please send me x frames of size y". The receiving side then waits for the first frame to arrive. If, after 10 seconds, the first frame has not arrived, it then sends another configuration frame to the sender. Upon receiving the first frame, spm starts the clock running. spm stops the clock when either all frames have been received or 5 seconds elapse without receiving a frame. The receiving side ignores any frames of the wrong size.

On the sending side, spm waits to receive a configuration frame from the receiver. Upon receiving one, spm starts the clock, blasts the number of desired frames to the receiver, and stops the clock when either the last frame has been freed or a new configuration frame from the receiver is received by the sender.

Error handling

If spm encounters an error while testing, it times out and tries the next large frame size. The receive counters are zeroed when this happens, but spm will continue to execute until it is aborted with an explicit command.

Files

~ndcert/nd-spam/bin/spm: Binary for spm user program.
/etc/ap/spam.ap: Autopush configuration file

Hardware requirements

Pentium or later

References

autopush(1M), ndtests(1Mcert)

``Testing and debugging MDI drivers'' in Developing MDI network adapter drivers