[RFC v2 0/3] ethdev: datapath-focused meter actions

[Alexander Kozyrev <akozyrev@nvidia.com>]

The introduction of asynchronous flow rules operations allowed users
to create/destroy flow rules as part of the datapath without blocking
on Flow API and slowing the packet processing down.

That applies to every possible action that has no preparation steps.
Unfortunately, one notable exception is the meter action.
There is a separate API to prepare a meter profile and a meter policy
before any meter object can be used as a flow rule action.

The application logic is the following:
1. rte_mtr_meter_profile_add() is called to create the meter profile
first to define how to classify incoming packets and to assign an
appropriate color to them.
2. rte_mtr_meter_policy_add() is invoked to define the fate of a packet,
based on its color (practically creating flow rules, matching colors).
3. rte_mtr_create() is then needed to search (with locks) for previously
created profile and policy in order to create the meter object.
4. rte_flow_create() is now finally can be used to specify the created
meter as an action.

This approach doesn't fit into the asynchronous rule creation model
and can be improved with the following proposal:
1. Creating a policy may be replaced with the creation of a group with
up to 3 different rules for every color using asynchronous Flow API.
That requires the introduction of a new pattern item - meter color.
Then creation a flow rule with the meter means a simple jump to a group:
rte_flow_async_create(group=1, pattern=color, actions=...);
rte_flow_async_create(group=0, pattern=5-tuple,
		      actions=meter,jump group 1);
This allows to classify packets and act upon their color classifications.
The Meter action assigns a color to a packet and an appropriate action
is selected based on the Meter color in group 1.

2. Preparing a meter object should be the part of flow rule creation
and use the same flow queue to benefit from asynchronous operations:
rte_flow_async_create(group=0, pattern=5-tuple,
		      actions=meter id 1 profile rfc2697, jump group 1);
Creation of the meter object takes time and flow creation must wait
until it is ready before inserting the rule. Using the same queue allows
ensuring that. There is no need to create a meter object outside of the
Flow API, but this approach won't affect the old Meter API in any way.

3. Another point of optimization is to prepare all the resources needed
in advance in rte_flow_configure(). All the policy rules can be created
during the initialization stage easily and put into several groups.
These groups can be used by many meter objects by simple jump action to
an appropriate group. Meter objects can be preallocated as well and
configured with required profile parameters later at the flow rule
creation stage. The number of pre-allocated profiles/policies is
specified in the Flow engine resources settings.

These optimizations alongside already existing pattern/actions templates
can improve the insertion rate significantly and allow meter usage as
part of the datapath. The introduction of the new API is intended to be
used with the asynchronous Flow API. Deprecation of the old Meter API
is not planned at this point.

Signed-off-by: Alexander Kozyrev <akozyrev@nvidia.com>

Alexander Kozyrev (3):
  ethdev: add meter color matching to Flow API
  ethdev: allow meter color modification
  ethdev: add extended meter action to Flow API

 lib/ethdev/rte_flow.h | 49 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 1 file changed, 49 insertions(+)

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2.18.2