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6f8e021c3c
Switch most of BPF helper definitions from returning int to long. These
definitions are coming from comments in BPF UAPI header and are used to
generate bpf_helper_defs.h (under libbpf) to be later included and used from
BPF programs.
In actual in-kernel implementation, all the helpers are defined as returning
u64, but due to some historical reasons, most of them are actually defined as
returning int in UAPI (usually, to return 0 on success, and negative value on
error).
This actually causes Clang to quite often generate sub-optimal code, because
compiler believes that return value is 32-bit, and in a lot of cases has to be
up-converted (usually with a pair of 32-bit bit shifts) to 64-bit values,
before they can be used further in BPF code.
Besides just "polluting" the code, these 32-bit shifts quite often cause
problems for cases in which return value matters. This is especially the case
for the family of bpf_probe_read_str() functions. There are few other similar
helpers (e.g., bpf_read_branch_records()), in which return value is used by
BPF program logic to record variable-length data and process it. For such
cases, BPF program logic carefully manages offsets within some array or map to
read variable-length data. For such uses, it's crucial for BPF verifier to
track possible range of register values to prove that all the accesses happen
within given memory bounds. Those extraneous zero-extending bit shifts,
inserted by Clang (and quite often interleaved with other code, which makes
the issues even more challenging and sometimes requires employing extra
per-variable compiler barriers), throws off verifier logic and makes it mark
registers as having unknown variable offset. We'll study this pattern a bit
later below.
Another common pattern is to check return of BPF helper for non-zero state to
detect error conditions and attempt alternative actions in such case. Even in
this simple and straightforward case, this 32-bit vs BPF's native 64-bit mode
quite often leads to sub-optimal and unnecessary extra code. We'll look at
this pattern as well.
Clang's BPF target supports two modes of code generation: ALU32, in which it
is capable of using lower 32-bit parts of registers, and no-ALU32, in which
only full 64-bit registers are being used. ALU32 mode somewhat mitigates the
above described problems, but not in all cases.
This patch switches all the cases in which BPF helpers return 0 or negative
error from returning int to returning long. It is shown below that such change
in definition leads to equivalent or better code. No-ALU32 mode benefits more,
but ALU32 mode doesn't degrade or still gets improved code generation.
Another class of cases switched from int to long are bpf_probe_read_str()-like
helpers, which encode successful case as non-negative values, while still
returning negative value for errors.
In all of such cases, correctness is preserved due to two's complement
encoding of negative values and the fact that all helpers return values with
32-bit absolute value. Two's complement ensures that for negative values
higher 32 bits are all ones and when truncated, leave valid negative 32-bit
value with the same value. Non-negative values have upper 32 bits set to zero
and similarly preserve value when high 32 bits are truncated. This means that
just casting to int/u32 is correct and efficient (and in ALU32 mode doesn't
require any extra shifts).
To minimize the chances of regressions, two code patterns were investigated,
as mentioned above. For both patterns, BPF assembly was analyzed in
ALU32/NO-ALU32 compiler modes, both with current 32-bit int return type and
new 64-bit long return type.
Case 1. Variable-length data reading and concatenation. This is quite
ubiquitous pattern in tracing/monitoring applications, reading data like
process's environment variables, file path, etc. In such case, many pieces of
string-like variable-length data are read into a single big buffer, and at the
end of the process, only a part of array containing actual data is sent to
user-space for further processing. This case is tested in test_varlen.c
selftest (in the next patch). Code flow is roughly as follows:
void *payload = &sample->payload;
u64 len;
len = bpf_probe_read_kernel_str(payload, MAX_SZ1, &source_data1);
if (len <= MAX_SZ1) {
payload += len;
sample->len1 = len;
}
len = bpf_probe_read_kernel_str(payload, MAX_SZ2, &source_data2);
if (len <= MAX_SZ2) {
payload += len;
sample->len2 = len;
}
/* and so on */
sample->total_len = payload - &sample->payload;
/* send over, e.g., perf buffer */
There could be two variations with slightly different code generated: when len
is 64-bit integer and when it is 32-bit integer. Both variations were analysed.
BPF assembly instructions between two successive invocations of
bpf_probe_read_kernel_str() were used to check code regressions. Results are
below, followed by short analysis. Left side is using helpers with int return
type, the right one is after the switch to long.
ALU32 + INT ALU32 + LONG
=========== ============
64-BIT (13 insns): 64-BIT (10 insns):
------------------------------------ ------------------------------------
17: call 115 17: call 115
18: if w0 > 256 goto +9 <LBB0_4> 18: if r0 > 256 goto +6 <LBB0_4>
19: w1 = w0 19: r1 = 0 ll
20: r1 <<= 32 21: *(u64 *)(r1 + 0) = r0
21: r1 s>>= 32 22: r6 = 0 ll
22: r2 = 0 ll 24: r6 += r0
24: *(u64 *)(r2 + 0) = r1 00000000000000c8 <LBB0_4>:
25: r6 = 0 ll 25: r1 = r6
27: r6 += r1 26: w2 = 256
00000000000000e0 <LBB0_4>: 27: r3 = 0 ll
28: r1 = r6 29: call 115
29: w2 = 256
30: r3 = 0 ll
32: call 115
32-BIT (11 insns): 32-BIT (12 insns):
------------------------------------ ------------------------------------
17: call 115 17: call 115
18: if w0 > 256 goto +7 <LBB1_4> 18: if w0 > 256 goto +8 <LBB1_4>
19: r1 = 0 ll 19: r1 = 0 ll
21: *(u32 *)(r1 + 0) = r0 21: *(u32 *)(r1 + 0) = r0
22: w1 = w0 22: r0 <<= 32
23: r6 = 0 ll 23: r0 >>= 32
25: r6 += r1 24: r6 = 0 ll
00000000000000d0 <LBB1_4>: 26: r6 += r0
26: r1 = r6 00000000000000d8 <LBB1_4>:
27: w2 = 256 27: r1 = r6
28: r3 = 0 ll 28: w2 = 256
30: call 115 29: r3 = 0 ll
31: call 115
In ALU32 mode, the variant using 64-bit length variable clearly wins and
avoids unnecessary zero-extension bit shifts. In practice, this is even more
important and good, because BPF code won't need to do extra checks to "prove"
that payload/len are within good bounds.
32-bit len is one instruction longer. Clang decided to do 64-to-32 casting
with two bit shifts, instead of equivalent `w1 = w0` assignment. The former
uses extra register. The latter might potentially lose some range information,
but not for 32-bit value. So in this case, verifier infers that r0 is [0, 256]
after check at 18:, and shifting 32 bits left/right keeps that range intact.
We should probably look into Clang's logic and see why it chooses bitshifts
over sub-register assignments for this.
NO-ALU32 + INT NO-ALU32 + LONG
============== ===============
64-BIT (14 insns): 64-BIT (10 insns):
------------------------------------ ------------------------------------
17: call 115 17: call 115
18: r0 <<= 32 18: if r0 > 256 goto +6 <LBB0_4>
19: r1 = r0 19: r1 = 0 ll
20: r1 >>= 32 21: *(u64 *)(r1 + 0) = r0
21: if r1 > 256 goto +7 <LBB0_4> 22: r6 = 0 ll
22: r0 s>>= 32 24: r6 += r0
23: r1 = 0 ll 00000000000000c8 <LBB0_4>:
25: *(u64 *)(r1 + 0) = r0 25: r1 = r6
26: r6 = 0 ll 26: r2 = 256
28: r6 += r0 27: r3 = 0 ll
00000000000000e8 <LBB0_4>: 29: call 115
29: r1 = r6
30: r2 = 256
31: r3 = 0 ll
33: call 115
32-BIT (13 insns): 32-BIT (13 insns):
------------------------------------ ------------------------------------
17: call 115 17: call 115
18: r1 = r0 18: r1 = r0
19: r1 <<= 32 19: r1 <<= 32
20: r1 >>= 32 20: r1 >>= 32
21: if r1 > 256 goto +6 <LBB1_4> 21: if r1 > 256 goto +6 <LBB1_4>
22: r2 = 0 ll 22: r2 = 0 ll
24: *(u32 *)(r2 + 0) = r0 24: *(u32 *)(r2 + 0) = r0
25: r6 = 0 ll 25: r6 = 0 ll
27: r6 += r1 27: r6 += r1
00000000000000e0 <LBB1_4>: 00000000000000e0 <LBB1_4>:
28: r1 = r6 28: r1 = r6
29: r2 = 256 29: r2 = 256
30: r3 = 0 ll 30: r3 = 0 ll
32: call 115 32: call 115
In NO-ALU32 mode, for the case of 64-bit len variable, Clang generates much
superior code, as expected, eliminating unnecessary bit shifts. For 32-bit
len, code is identical.
So overall, only ALU-32 32-bit len case is more-or-less equivalent and the
difference stems from internal Clang decision, rather than compiler lacking
enough information about types.
Case 2. Let's look at the simpler case of checking return result of BPF helper
for errors. The code is very simple:
long bla;
if (bpf_probe_read_kenerl(&bla, sizeof(bla), 0))
return 1;
else
return 0;
ALU32 + CHECK (9 insns) ALU32 + CHECK (9 insns)
==================================== ====================================
0: r1 = r10 0: r1 = r10
1: r1 += -8 1: r1 += -8
2: w2 = 8 2: w2 = 8
3: r3 = 0 3: r3 = 0
4: call 113 4: call 113
5: w1 = w0 5: r1 = r0
6: w0 = 1 6: w0 = 1
7: if w1 != 0 goto +1 <LBB2_2> 7: if r1 != 0 goto +1 <LBB2_2>
8: w0 = 0 8: w0 = 0
0000000000000048 <LBB2_2>: 0000000000000048 <LBB2_2>:
9: exit 9: exit
Almost identical code, the only difference is the use of full register
assignment (r1 = r0) vs half-registers (w1 = w0) in instruction #5. On 32-bit
architectures, new BPF assembly might be slightly less optimal, in theory. But
one can argue that's not a big issue, given that use of full registers is
still prevalent (e.g., for parameter passing).
NO-ALU32 + CHECK (11 insns) NO-ALU32 + CHECK (9 insns)
==================================== ====================================
0: r1 = r10 0: r1 = r10
1: r1 += -8 1: r1 += -8
2: r2 = 8 2: r2 = 8
3: r3 = 0 3: r3 = 0
4: call 113 4: call 113
5: r1 = r0 5: r1 = r0
6: r1 <<= 32 6: r0 = 1
7: r1 >>= 32 7: if r1 != 0 goto +1 <LBB2_2>
8: r0 = 1 8: r0 = 0
9: if r1 != 0 goto +1 <LBB2_2> 0000000000000048 <LBB2_2>:
10: r0 = 0 9: exit
0000000000000058 <LBB2_2>:
11: exit
NO-ALU32 is a clear improvement, getting rid of unnecessary zero-extension bit
shifts.
Signed-off-by: Andrii Nakryiko <andriin@fb.com>
Signed-off-by: Daniel Borkmann <daniel@iogearbox.net>
Link: https://lore.kernel.org/bpf/20200623032224.4020118-1-andriin@fb.com
This is a mirror of bpf-next Linux source
tree's
tools/lib/bpf directory plus its supporting header files.
All the gory details of syncing can be found in scripts/sync-kernel.sh
script.
Some header files in this repo (include/linux/*.h) are reduced versions of
their counterpart files at
bpf-next's
tools/include/linux/*.h to make compilation successful.
BPF questions
All general BPF questions, including kernel functionality, libbpf APIs and their application, should be sent to bpf@vger.kernel.org mailing list. You can subscribe to it here and search its archive here. Please search the archive before asking new questions. It very well might be that this was already addressed or answered before.
bpf@vger.kernel.org is monitored by many more people and they will happily try to help you with whatever issue you have. This repository's PRs and issues should be opened only for dealing with issues pertaining to specific way this libbpf mirror repo is set up and organized.
Build
libelf is an internal dependency of libbpf and thus it is required to link
against and must be installed on the system for applications to work.
pkg-config is used by default to find libelf, and the program called can be
overridden with PKG_CONFIG.
If using pkg-config at build time is not desired, it can be disabled by
setting NO_PKG_CONFIG=1 when calling make.
To build both static libbpf.a and shared libbpf.so:
$ cd src
$ make
To build only static libbpf.a library in directory build/ and install them together with libbpf headers in a staging directory root/:
$ cd src
$ mkdir build root
$ BUILD_STATIC_ONLY=y OBJDIR=build DESTDIR=root make install
To build both static libbpf.a and shared libbpf.so against a custom libelf dependency installed in /build/root/ and install them together with libbpf headers in a build directory /build/root/:
$ cd src
$ PKG_CONFIG_PATH=/build/root/lib64/pkgconfig DESTDIR=/build/root make install
Distributions
Distributions packaging libbpf from this mirror:
Benefits of packaging from the mirror over packaging from kernel sources:
- Consistent versioning across distributions.
- No ties to any specific kernel, transparent handling of older kernels. Libbpf is designed to be kernel-agnostic and work across multitude of kernel versions. It has built-in mechanisms to gracefully handle older kernels, that are missing some of the features, by working around or gracefully degrading functionality. Thus libbpf is not tied to a specific kernel version and can/should be packaged and versioned independently.
- Continuous integration testing via TravisCI.
- Static code analysis via LGTM and Coverity.
Package dependencies of libbpf, package names may vary across distros:
- zlib
- libelf
BPF CO-RE (Compile Once – Run Everywhere)
Libbpf supports building BPF CO-RE-enabled applications, which, in contrast to BCC, do not require Clang/LLVM runtime being deployed to target servers and doesn't rely on kernel-devel headers being available.
It does rely on kernel to be built with BTF type information, though. Some major Linux distributions come with kernel BTF already built in:
- Fedora 31+
- RHEL 8.2+
- OpenSUSE Tumbleweed (in the next release, as of 2020-06-04)
- Arch Linux (from kernel 5.7.1.arch1-1)
If your kernel doesn't come with BTF built-in, you'll need to build custom kernel. You'll need:
pahole1.16+ tool (part ofdwarvespackage), which performs DWARF to BTF conversion;- kernel built with
CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO_BTF=yoption; - you can check if your kernel has BTF built-in by looking for
/sys/kernel/btf/vmlinuxfile:
$ ls -la /sys/kernel/btf/vmlinux
-r--r--r--. 1 root root 3541561 Jun 2 18:16 /sys/kernel/btf/vmlinux
To develop and build BPF programs, you'll need Clang/LLVM 10+. The following distributions have Clang/LLVM 10+ packaged by default:
- Fedora 32+
- Ubuntu 20.04+
- Arch Linux
Otherwise, please make sure to update it on your system.
The following resources are useful to understand what BPF CO-RE is and how to use it:
- BPF Portability and CO-RE
- HOWTO: BCC to libbpf conversion
- libbpf-tools in BCC repo contain lots of real-world tools converted from BCC to BPF CO-RE. Consider converting some more to both contribute to the BPF community and gain some more experience with it.
License
This work is dual-licensed under BSD 2-clause license and GNU LGPL v2.1 license. You can choose between one of them if you use this work.
SPDX-License-Identifier: BSD-2-Clause OR LGPL-2.1