Hi Thomas, testpmd has a 12,000 line parser just for taking in strings and
converting it to flow rules. This is obviously useful for testing flows,
but it also is an interface for any type of flow imaginable since this is
where they're tested.

Now imagine you're developing an application that allows the user to
specify custom flows in a config. Your only option is to make your own flow
string input (json, etc) and convert that to to the flow spec. This is
reinventing almost all of what testpmd already does, and it's extremely
error-prone. I think it would be very useful to have this as an API call
rather than a user constructing each flow by hand so that all these other
applications can benefit and not be worries about bugs during conversions.



On Thu, Apr 27, 2023, 01:37 Thomas Monjalon <thomas@monjalon.net> wrote:

> 26/04/2023 07:47, David Marchand:
> > On Wed, Apr 26, 2023 at 6:47 AM Cliff Burdick <shaklee3@gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > >
> > > Does anyone know if a generic parser for flow strings exists anywhere?
> The one inside of testpmd is ideal, but unfortunately it's self-contained
> and not distributed as part of a normal DPDK install. This seems like
> something that is likely reinvented over and over and it would be useful if
> there was a single API to take in strings and generate flows.
> >
> > I heard this same question in the past, but I don't remember the answer.
> > Copying Thomas and Ori who might know.
>
> I'm not sure how the testpmd code could help another application.
> And in general, if your application has a CLI,
> you need to integrate the flow commands in a broader context.
>
>
>