Re: [dpdk-dev] [RFC PATCH 0/5] graph: introduce graph subsystem

[Jerin Jacob <jerinjacobk@gmail.com>]

On Mon, Feb 17, 2020 at 2:08 PM Thomas Monjalon <thomas@monjalon.net> wrote:
>
> Hi Jerin,

Hi Thomas,

Thanks for starting this discussion now. It is an interesting
discussion.  Some thoughts below.
We can decide based on community consensus and follow a single rule
across the components.

>
> 17/02/2020 08:19, Jerin Jacob:
> > I got initial comments from Ray and Stephen on this RFC[1]. Thanks for
> > the comments.
> >
> > Is anyone else planning to have an architecture level or API usage
> > level review or any review of other top-level aspects?
>
> If we add rte_graph to DPDK, we will have 2 similar libraries.
>
> I already proposed several times to move rte_pipeline in a separate
> repository for two reasons:
>         1/ it is acting at a higher API layer level

We need to define what is the higher layer API. Is it processing beyond L2?

In the context of Graph library, it is a framework, not using any of
the substem API
other than EAL and it is under lib/librte_graph.
Nodes library using graph and other subsystem components such as ethdev and
it is under lib/lib_node/


Another interesting question would what would be an issue in DPDK supporting
beyond L2. Or higher level protocols?


>         2/ there can be different solutions in this layer

Is there any issue with that?
There is overlap with the distributor library and eventdev as well.
ethdev and SW traffic manager libraries as well. That list goes on.

>
> I think 1/ was commonly agreed in the community.
> Now we see one more proof of the reason 2/.
>
> I believe it is time to move rte_pipeline (Packet Framework)
> in a separate repository, and welcome rte_graph as well in another
> separate repository.

What would be gain out of this?

My concerns are:
# Like packet-gen, The new code will be filled with unnecessary DPDK
version checks
and unnecessary compatibility issues.
# Anything is not in main dpdk repo, it is a second class citizen.
# Customer has the pain to use two repos and two releases. Internally,
it can be two different
repo but release needs to go through one repo.

If we are focusing ONLY on the driver API then how can DPDK grow
further? If linux kernel
would be thought only have just the kernel and networking/storage as
different repo it would
not have grown up?

What is the real concern? Maintenance?

> I think the original DPDK repository should focus on low-level features
> which offer hardware offloads and optimizations.

The nodes can be vendor-specific to optimize the specific use cases.
As I mentioned in the cover letter,

"
2) Based on our experience, NPU HW accelerates are so different than one vendor
to another vendor. Going forward, We believe, API abstraction may not be enough
abstract the difference in HW. The Vendor-specific nodes can abstract the HW
differences and reuse generic the nodes as needed.
This would help both the silicon vendors and DPDK end users.
"

Thoughts from other folks?


> Consuming the low-level API in different abstractions,
> and building applications, should be done on top of dpdk.git.
>
>