.. SPDX-License-Identifier: BSD-3-Clause Copyright(c) 2017 Intel Corporation. DPDK pdump Library and pdump Tool ================================= This document describes how the Data Plane Development Kit (DPDK) Packet Capture Framework is used for capturing packets on DPDK ports. It is intended for users of DPDK who want to know more about the Packet Capture feature and for those who want to monitor traffic on DPDK-controlled devices. The DPDK packet capture framework was introduced in DPDK v16.07. The DPDK packet capture framework consists of the DPDK pdump library and DPDK pdump tool. Introduction ------------ The :ref:`librte_pdump ` library provides the APIs required to allow users to initialize the packet capture framework and to enable or disable packet capture. The library works on a multi process communication model and its usage is recommended for debugging purposes. The :ref:`dpdk-pdump ` tool is developed based on the ``librte_pdump`` library. It runs as a DPDK secondary process and is capable of enabling or disabling packet capture on DPDK ports. The ``dpdk-pdump`` tool provides command-line options with which users can request enabling or disabling of the packet capture on DPDK ports. The application which initializes the packet capture framework will be a primary process and the application that enables or disables the packet capture will be a secondary process. The primary process sends the Rx and Tx packets from the DPDK ports to the secondary process. In DPDK the ``testpmd`` application can be used to initialize the packet capture framework and acts as a server, and the ``dpdk-pdump`` tool acts as a client. To view Rx or Tx packets of ``testpmd``, the application should be launched first, and then the ``dpdk-pdump`` tool. Packets from ``testpmd`` will be sent to the tool, which then sends them on to the Pcap PMD device and that device writes them to the Pcap file or to an external interface depending on the command-line option used. Some things to note: * The ``dpdk-pdump`` tool can only be used in conjunction with a primary application which has the packet capture framework initialized already. In dpdk, only ``testpmd`` is modified to initialize packet capture framework, other applications remain untouched. So, if the ``dpdk-pdump`` tool has to be used with any application other than the testpmd, the user needs to explicitly modify that application to call the packet capture framework initialization code. Refer to the ``app/test-pmd/testpmd.c`` code and look for ``pdump`` keyword to see how this is done. * The ``dpdk-pdump`` tool depends on the libpcap based PMD. Test Environment ---------------- The overview of using the Packet Capture Framework and the ``dpdk-pdump`` tool for packet capturing on the DPDK port in :numref:`figure_packet_capture_framework`. .. _figure_packet_capture_framework: .. figure:: img/packet_capture_framework.* Packet capturing on a DPDK port using the dpdk-pdump tool. Running the Application ----------------------- The following steps demonstrate how to run the ``dpdk-pdump`` tool to capture Rx side packets on dpdk_port0 in :numref:`figure_packet_capture_framework` and inspect them using ``tcpdump``. #. Launch testpmd as the primary application:: sudo /app/dpdk-testpmd -c 0xf0 -n 4 -- -i --port-topology=chained #. Launch the pdump tool as follows:: sudo /app/dpdk-pdump -- \ --pdump 'port=0,queue=*,rx-dev=/tmp/capture.pcap' #. Send traffic to dpdk_port0 from traffic generator. Inspect packets captured in the file capture.pcap using a tool that can interpret Pcap files, for example tcpdump:: $tcpdump -nr /tmp/capture.pcap reading from file /tmp/capture.pcap, link-type EN10MB (Ethernet) 11:11:36.891404 IP 4.4.4.4.whois++ > 3.3.3.3.whois++: UDP, length 18 11:11:36.891442 IP 4.4.4.4.whois++ > 3.3.3.3.whois++: UDP, length 18 11:11:36.891445 IP 4.4.4.4.whois++ > 3.3.3.3.whois++: UDP, length 18