[PATCH v2 0/5] net/mlx5: introduce Tx datapath tracing

[Thomas Monjalon]

20/06/2023 14:00, Raslan Darawsheh:
> Hi,
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Viacheslav Ovsiienko <viacheslavo at nvidia.com>
> > Sent: Tuesday, June 13, 2023 7:59 PM
> > To: dev at dpdk.org
> > Subject: [PATCH v2 0/5] net/mlx5: introduce Tx datapath tracing
> > 
> > The mlx5 provides the send scheduling on specific moment of time,
> > and for the related kind of applications it would be extremely useful
> > to have extra debug information - when and how packets were scheduled
> > and when the actual sending was completed by the NIC hardware (it helps
> > application to track the internal delay issues).
> > 
> > Because the DPDK tx datapath API does not suppose getting any feedback
> > from the driver and the feature looks like to be mlx5 specific, it seems
> > to be reasonable to engage exisiting DPDK datapath tracing capability.
> > 
> > The work cycle is supposed to be:
> >   - compile appplication with enabled tracing
> >   - run application with EAL parameters configuring the tracing in mlx5
> >     Tx datapath
> >   - store the dump file with gathered tracing information
> >   - run analyzing scrypt (in Python) to combine related events (packet
> >     firing and completion) and see the data in human-readable view
> > 
> > Below is the detailed instruction "how to" with mlx5 NIC to gather
> > all the debug data including the full timings information.
> > 
> > 
> > 1. Build DPDK application with enabled datapath tracing
> > 
> > The meson option should be specified:
> >    --enable_trace_fp=true
> > 
> > The c_args shoudl be specified:
> >    -DALLOW_EXPERIMENTAL_API
> > 
> > The DPDK configuration examples:
> > 
> >   meson configure --buildtype=debug -Denable_trace_fp=true
> >         -Dc_args='-DRTE_LIBRTE_MLX5_DEBUG -DRTE_ENABLE_ASSERT -
> > DALLOW_EXPERIMENTAL_API' build
> > 
> >   meson configure --buildtype=debug -Denable_trace_fp=true
> >         -Dc_args='-DRTE_ENABLE_ASSERT -DALLOW_EXPERIMENTAL_API' build
> > 
> >   meson configure --buildtype=release -Denable_trace_fp=true
> >         -Dc_args='-DRTE_ENABLE_ASSERT -DALLOW_EXPERIMENTAL_API' build
> > 
> >   meson configure --buildtype=release -Denable_trace_fp=true
> >         -Dc_args='-DALLOW_EXPERIMENTAL_API' build
> > 
> > 
> > 2. Configuring the NIC
> > 
> > If the sending completion timings are important the NIC should be configured
> > to provide realtime timestamps, the REAL_TIME_CLOCK_ENABLE NV settings
> > parameter
> > should be configured to TRUE, for example with command (and with following
> > FW/driver reset):
> > 
> >   sudo mlxconfig -d /dev/mst/mt4125_pciconf0 s
> > REAL_TIME_CLOCK_ENABLE=1
> > 
> > 
> > 3. Run DPDK application to gather the traces
> > 
> > EAL parameters controlling trace capability in runtime
> > 
> >   --trace=pmd.net.mlx5.tx - the regular expression enabling the tracepoints
> >                             with matching names at least "pmd.net.mlx5.tx"
> >                             must be enabled to gather all events needed
> >                             to analyze mlx5 Tx datapath and its timings.
> >                             By default all tracepoints are disabled.
> > 
> >   --trace-dir=/var/log - trace storing directory
> > 
> >   --trace-bufsz=<val>B|<val>K|<val>M - optional, trace data buffer size
> >                                        per thread. The default is 1MB.
> > 
> >   --trace-mode=overwrite|discard  - optional, selects trace data buffer mode.
> > 
> > 
> > 4. Installing or Building Babeltrace2 Package
> > 
> > The gathered trace data can be analyzed with a developed Python script.
> > To parse the trace, the data script uses the Babeltrace2 library.
> > The package should be either installed or built from source code as
> > shown below:
> > 
> >   git clone https://github.com/efficios/babeltrace.git
> >   cd babeltrace
> >   ./bootstrap
> >   ./configure -help
> >   ./configure --disable-api-doc --disable-man-pages
> >               --disable-python-bindings-doc --enbale-python-plugins
> >               --enable-python-binding
> > 
> > 5. Running the Analyzing Script
> > 
> > The analyzing script is located in the folder: ./drivers/net/mlx5/tools
> > It requires Python3.6, Babeltrace2 packages and it takes the only parameter
> > of trace data file. For example:
> > 
> >    ./mlx5_trace.py /var/log/rte-2023-01-23-AM-11-52-39
> > 
> > 
> > 6. Interpreting the Script Output Data
> > 
> > All the timings are given in nanoseconds.
> > The list of Tx (and coming Rx) bursts per port/queue is presented in the
> > output.
> > Each list element contains the list of built WQEs with specific opcodes, and
> > each WQE contains the list of the encompassed packets to send.

This information should be in the documentation.

I think we should request a review of the Python script from people familiar with tracing
and from people more familiar with Python scripting for user tools.