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<chapter id="ipc">
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  <title>IPC</title>

  <para>Due to the high intertask communication traffic, IPC becomes critical
  subsystem for microkernels, putting high demands on the speed, latency and
  reliability of IPC model and implementation. Although theoretically the use
  of asynchronous messaging system looks promising, it is not often
  implemented because of a problematic implementation of end user
  applications. HelenOS implements fully asynchronous messaging system with a
  special layer providing a user application developer a reasonably
  synchronous multithreaded environment sufficient to develop complex
  protocols.</para>

  <section>
    <title>Kernel Services</title>

    <para>Every message consists of four numeric arguments (32-bit and 64-bit
    on the corresponding platforms), from which the first one is considered a
    method number on message receipt and a return value on answer receipt. The
    received message contains identification of the incoming connection, so
    that the receiving application can distinguish the messages between
    different senders. Internally the message contains pointer to the
    originating task and to the source of the communication channel. If the
    message is forwarded, the originating task identifies the recipient of the
    answer, the source channel identifies the connection in case of a hangup
    response.</para>

    <para>Every message must be eventually answered. The system keeps track of
    all messages, so that it can answer them with appropriate error code
    should one of the connection parties fail unexpectedly. To limit buffering
    of the messages in the kernel, every task has a limit on the amount of
    asynchronous messages it can send simultaneously. If the limit is reached,
    the kernel refuses to send any other message until some active message is
    answered.</para>

    <para>To facilitate kernel-to-user communication, the IPC subsystem
    provides notification messages. The applications can subscribe to a
    notification channel and receive messages directed to this channel. Such
    messages can be freely sent even from interrupt context as they are
    primarily destined to deliver IRQ events to userspace device drivers.
    These messages need not be answered, there is no party that could receive
    such response.</para>

    <section>
      <title>Low Level IPC</title>

      <para>The whole IPC subsystem consists of one-way communication
      channels. Each task has one associated message queue (answerbox). The
      task can call other tasks and connect its phones to their answerboxes,
      send and forward messages through these connections and answer received
      messages. Every sent message is identified by a unique number, so that
      the response can be later matched against it. The message is sent over
      the phone to the target answerbox. The server application periodically
      checks the answerbox and pulls messages from several queues associated
      with it. After completing the requested action, the server sends a reply
      back to the answerbox of the originating task. If a need arises, it is
      possible to <emphasis>forward</emphasis> a received message through any
      of the open phones to another task. This mechanism is used e.g. for
      opening new connections to services via the naming service.</para>

      <para>The answerbox contains four different message queues:</para>

      <itemizedlist>
        <listitem>
          <para>Incoming call queue</para>
        </listitem>

        <listitem>
          <para>Dispatched call queue</para>
        </listitem>

        <listitem>
          <para>Answer queue</para>
        </listitem>

        <listitem>
          <para>Notification queue</para>
        </listitem>
      </itemizedlist>

      <figure float="1">
        <title>Low level IPC</title>

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      <para>The communication between task A, that is connected to task B
      looks as follows: task A sends a message over its phone to the target
      asnwerbox. The message is saved in task B's incoming call queue. When
      task B fetches the message for processing, it is automatically moved
      into the dispatched call queue. After the server decides to answer the
      message, it is removed from dispatched queue and the result is moved
      into the answer queue of task A.</para>

      <para>The arguments contained in the message are completely arbitrary
      and decided by the user. The low level part of kernel IPC fills in
      appropriate error codes if there is an error during communication. It is
      assured that the applications are correctly notified about communication
      state. If a program closes the outgoing connection, the target answerbox
      receives a hangup message. The connection identification is not reused
      until the hangup message is acknowledged and all other pending messages
      are answered.</para>

      <para>Closing an incoming connection is done by responding to any
      incoming message with an EHANGUP error code. The connection is then
      immediately closed. The client connection identification (phone id) is
      not reused, until the client closes its own side of the connection
      ("hangs his phone up").</para>

      <para>When a task dies (whether voluntarily or by being killed), cleanup
      process is started.</para>

      <orderedlist>
        <listitem>
          <para>hangs up all outgoing connections and sends hangup messages to
          all target answerboxes,</para>
        </listitem>

        <listitem>
          <para>disconnects all incoming connections,</para>
        </listitem>

        <listitem>
          <para>disconnects from all notification channels,</para>
        </listitem>

        <listitem>
          <para>answers all unanswered messages from answerbox queues with
          appropriate error code and</para>
        </listitem>

        <listitem>
          <para>waits until all outgoing messages are answered and all
          remaining answerbox queues are empty.</para>
        </listitem>
      </orderedlist>
    </section>

    <section>
      <title>System Call IPC Layer</title>

      <para>On top of this simple protocol the kernel provides special
      services closely related to the inter-process communication. A range of
      method numbers is allocated and protocol is defined for these functions.
      These messages are interpreted by the kernel layer and appropriate
      actions are taken depending on the parameters of the message and the
      answer.</para>

      <para>The kernel provides the following services:</para>

      <itemizedlist>
        <listitem>
          <para>creating new outgoing connection,</para>
        </listitem>

        <listitem>
          <para>creating a callback connection,</para>
        </listitem>

        <listitem>
          <para>sending an address space area and</para>
        </listitem>

        <listitem>
          <para>asking for an address space area.</para>
        </listitem>
      </itemizedlist>

      <para>On startup, every task is automatically connected to a
      <emphasis>naming service task</emphasis>, which provides a switchboard
      functionality. In order to open a new outgoing connection, the client
      sends a <constant>CONNECT_ME_TO</constant> message using any of his
      phones. If the recepient of this message answers with an accepting
      answer, a new connection is created. In itself, this mechanism would
      allow only duplicating existing connection. However, if the message is
      forwarded, the new connection is made to the final recipient.</para>

      <para>In order for a task to be able to forward a message, it must have
      a phone connected to the destination task. The destination task
      establishes such connection by sending the
      <constant>CONNECT_TO_ME</constant> message to the forwarding task. A
      callback connection is opened afterwards. Every service that wants to
      receive connections has to ask the naming service to create the callback
      connection via this mechanism.</para>

      <para>Tasks can share their address space areas using IPC messages. The
      two message types - <constant>AS_AREA_SEND</constant> and
      <constant>AS_AREA_RECV</constant> are used for sending and receiving an
      address space area respectively. The shared area can be accessed as soon
      as the message is acknowledged.</para>
    </section>
  </section>

  <section>
    <title>Userspace View</title>

    <para>The conventional design of the asynchronous API seems to produce
    applications with one event loop and several big switch statements.
    However, by intensive utilization of userspace fibrils, it was possible to
    create an environment that is not necessarily restricted to this type of
    event-driven programming and allows for more fluent expression of
    application programs.</para>

    <section>
      <title>Single Point of Entry</title>

      <para>Each task is associated with only one answerbox. If a
      multithreaded application needs to communicate, it must be not only able
      to send a message, but it should be able to retrieve the answer as well.
      If several fibrils pull messages from task answerbox, it is a matter of
      coincidence, which fibril receives which message. If a particular fibril
      needs to wait for a message answer, an idle <emphasis>manager</emphasis>
      fibril is found or a new one is created and control is transfered to
      this manager fibril. The manager fibrils pop messages from the answerbox
      and put them into appropriate queues of running fibrils. If a fibril
      waiting for a message is not running, the control is transferred to
      it.</para>

      <figure float="1">
        <title>Single point of entry</title>

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      <para>Very similar situation arises when a task decides to send a lot of
      messages and reaches the kernel limit of asynchronous messages. In such
      situation, two remedies are available - the userspace library can either
      cache the message locally and resend the message when some answers
      arrive, or it can block the fibril and let it go on only after the
      message is finally sent to the kernel layer. With one exception, HelenOS
      uses the second approach - when the kernel responds that the maximum
      limit of asynchronous messages was reached, the control is transferred
      to a manager fibril. The manager fibril then handles incoming replies
      and, when space is available, sends the message to the kernel and
      resumes the application fibril execution.</para>

      <para>If a kernel notification is received, the servicing procedure is
      run in the context of the manager fibril. Although it wouldn't be
      impossible to allow recursive calling, it could potentially lead to an
      explosion of manager fibrils. Thus, the kernel notification procedures
      are not allowed to wait for a message result, they can only answer
      messages and send new ones without waiting for their results. If the
      kernel limit for outgoing messages is reached, the data is automatically
      cached within the application. This behaviour is enforced automatically
      and the decision making is hidden from the developer.</para>

      <figure float="1">
        <title>Single point of entry solution</title>

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    </section>

    <section>
      <title>Ordering Problem</title>

      <para>Unfortunately, the real world is is never so simple. E.g. if a
      server handles incoming requests and as a part of its response sends
      asynchronous messages, it can be easily preempted and another thread may
      start intervening. This can happen even if the application utilizes only
      one userspace thread. Classical synchronization using semaphores is not
      possible as locking on them would block the thread completely so that
      the answer couldn't be ever processed. The IPC framework allows a
      developer to specify, that part of the code should not be preempted by
      any other fibril (except notification handlers) while still being able
      to queue messages belonging to other fibrils and regain control when the
      answer arrives.</para>

      <para>This mechanism works transparently in multithreaded environment,
      where additional locking mechanism (futexes) should be used. The IPC
      framework ensures that there will always be enough free userspace
      threads to handle incoming answers and allow the application to run more
      fibrils inside the userspace threads without the danger of locking all
      userspace threads in futexes.</para>
    </section>

    <section>
      <title>The Interface</title>

      <para>The interface was developed to be as simple to use as possible.
      Typical applications simply send messages and occasionally wait for an
      answer and check results. If the number of sent messages is higher than
      the kernel limit, the flow of application is stopped until some answers
      arrive. On the other hand, server applications are expected to work in a
      multithreaded environment.</para>

      <para>The server interface requires the developer to specify a
      <function>connection_fibril</function> function. When new connection is
      detected, a new fibril is automatically created and control is
      transferred to this function. The code then decides whether to accept
      the connection and creates a normal event loop. The userspace IPC
      library ensures correct switching between several threads within the
      kernel environment.</para>
    </section>
  </section>
</chapter>