This is an extended version of the Click Modular Router featuring an improved Netmap support and a new DPDK support. It is the result of our ANCS paper available at http://hdl.handle.net/2268/181954 You'll find more details on http://fastclick.run.montefiore.ulg.ac.be
Partial DPDK support is now reverted into vanilla Click (without support for batching, auto-thread assignment, thread vector, ...).
Be sure to install Netmap on your system then configure with : ./configure --with-netmap --enable-netmap-pool --enable-multithread --disable-linuxmodule --enable-intel-cpu --enable-user-multithread --verbose --enable-select=poll CFLAGS="-O3" CXXFLAGS="-std=gnu++11 -O3" --disable-dynamic-linking --enable-poll --enable-bound-port-transfer --enable-local --enable-zerocopy --enable-batch to get the better performances.
An example configuration is : FromNetmapDevice(netmap:eth0) -> CheckIPHeader() -> ToNetmapDevice(netmap:eth1)
To run click, do : sudo bin/click -j 4 -a /path/to/config/file.click Where 4 is the number of threads to use. The FromNetmapDevice will share the assigned cores themselves, do not pin the thread.
We noted that Netmap performs better without MQ, or at least with a minimal amount of queues : ethtool -L eth% combined 1 will set the number of Netmap queues to 1. No need to pin the IRQ of the queues as our FastClick implementation will take care of it. Just kill irqbalance.
Also, be sure to read the sections of our paper about full push to make the faster configuration.
The --enable-netmap-pool option allows to use Netmap buffers instead of Click malloc'ed buffers. This enhance performance as there is only one kind of buffer floating into Click. However with this option you need to place at least one From/ToNetmapDevice in your configuration and allocate enough Netmap buffers using NetmapInfo.
Setup your DPDK 1.6 to 2.2 environment, then configure with : ./configure --enable-multithread --disable-linuxmodule --enable-intel-cpu --enable-user-multithread --verbose CFLAGS="-g -O3" CXXFLAGS="-g -std=gnu++11 -O3" --disable-dynamic-linking --enable-poll --enable-bound-port-transfer --enable-dpdk --enable-batch --with-netmap=no --enable-zerocopy --enable-dpdk-pool --disable-dpdk-packet to get the better performances.
An example configuration is : FromDpdkDevice(0) -> CheckIPHeader() -> ToDpdkDevice(1)
To run click with DPDK, you can add the usual EAL parameters : sudo bin/click -c 0xf -n 4 -- /path/to/config/file.click where 4 is the number of memory channel and 0xf the core mask.
DPDK only supports full push mode.
As for Netmap --enable-dpdk-pool option allows to use only DPDK buffers instead of Click malloc'ed buffers. The --enable-dpdk-packet option allows to use DPDK packet handling mechanism instead of of Click's Packet object. All Packet function will be changed by wrappers around DPDK's rte_pktmbuf functions. However this feature while reducing memory footprint do not enhance the performances as Packets objects are recyced in LIFO and stays in cache while every new access to metadata inside the rte_mbuf produce a cache miss.
Use the github issue tracker or contact tom.barbette at ulg.ac.be if you encounter any problem.
Please do not ask FastClick-related problems on the vanilla Click mailing list.
The original Click readme is available in the README.original file.