xref: /freebsd/share/man/man9/taskqueue.9 (revision 1669d8afc64812c8d2d1d147ae1fd42ff441e1b1)
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31.Dd May 19, 2005
32.Dt TASKQUEUE 9
33.Os
34.Sh NAME
35.Nm taskqueue
36.Nd asynchronous task execution
37.Sh SYNOPSIS
38.In sys/param.h
39.In sys/kernel.h
40.In sys/malloc.h
41.In sys/queue.h
42.In sys/taskqueue.h
43.Bd -literal
44typedef void (*task_fn_t)(void *context, int pending);
45
46typedef void (*taskqueue_enqueue_fn)(void *context);
47
48struct task {
49	STAILQ_ENTRY(task)	ta_link;	/* link for queue */
50	u_short			ta_pending;	/* count times queued */
51	u_short			ta_priority;	/* priority of task in queue */
52	task_fn_t		ta_func;	/* task handler */
53	void			*ta_context;	/* argument for handler */
54};
55.Ed
56.Ft struct taskqueue *
57.Fn taskqueue_create "const char *name" "int mflags" "taskqueue_enqueue_fn enqueue" "void *context" "struct proc **"
58.Ft void
59.Fn taskqueue_free "struct taskqueue *queue"
60.Ft struct taskqueue *
61.Fn taskqueue_find "const char *name"
62.Ft int
63.Fn taskqueue_enqueue "struct taskqueue *queue" "struct task *task"
64.Ft int
65.Fn taskqueue_enqueue_fast "struct taskqueue *queue" "struct task *task"
66.Ft void
67.Fn taskqueue_run "struct taskqueue *queue"
68.Ft void
69.Fn taskqueue_run_fast "struct taskqueue *queue"
70.Ft void
71.Fn taskqueue_drain "struct taskqueue *queue" "struct task *task"
72.Fn TASK_INIT "struct task *task" "int priority" "task_fn_t *func" "void *context"
73.Fn TASKQUEUE_DECLARE "name"
74.Fn TASKQUEUE_DEFINE "name" "taskqueue_enqueue_fn enqueue" "void *context" "init"
75.Fn TASKQUEUE_DEFINE_THREAD "name"
76.Sh DESCRIPTION
77These functions provide a simple interface for asynchronous execution
78of code.
79.Pp
80The function
81.Fn taskqueue_create
82is used to create new queues.
83The arguments to
84.Fn taskqueue_create
85include a name that should be unique,
86a set of
87.Xr malloc 9
88flags that specify whether the call to
89.Fn malloc
90is allowed to sleep,
91a function that is called from
92.Fn taskqueue_enqueue
93when a task is added to the queue,
94and a pointer to the memory location where the identity of the
95thread that services the queue is recorded.
96.\" XXX	The rest of the sentence gets lots in relation to the first part.
97The function called from
98.Fn taskqueue_enqueue
99must arrange for the queue to be processed
100(for instance by scheduling a software interrupt or waking a kernel
101thread).
102The memory location where the thread identity is recorded is used
103to signal the service thread(s) to terminate--when this value is set to
104zero and the thread is signaled it will terminate.
105.Pp
106The function
107.Fn taskqueue_free
108should be used to remove the queue from the global list of queues
109and free the memory used by the queue.
110Any tasks that are on the queue will be executed at this time after
111which the thread servicing the queue will be signaled that it should exit.
112.Pp
113The system maintains a list of all queues which can be searched using
114.Fn taskqueue_find .
115The first queue whose name matches is returned, otherwise
116.Dv NULL .
117.Pp
118To add a task to the list of tasks queued on a taskqueue, call
119.Fn taskqueue_enqueue
120with pointers to the queue and task.
121If the task's
122.Va ta_pending
123field is non-zero,
124then it is simply incremented to reflect the number of times the task
125was enqueued.
126Otherwise,
127the task is added to the list before the first task which has a lower
128.Va ta_priority
129value or at the end of the list if no tasks have a lower priority.
130Enqueueing a task does not perform any memory allocation which makes
131it suitable for calling from an interrupt handler.
132This function will return
133.Er EPIPE
134if the queue is being freed.
135.Pp
136The function
137.Fn taskqueue_enqueue_fast
138should be used in place of
139.Fn taskqueue_enqueue
140when the enqueuing must happen from a fast interrupt handler.
141This method uses spin locks to avoid the possibility of sleeping in the fast
142interrupt context.
143.Pp
144To execute all the tasks on a queue,
145call
146.Fn taskqueue_run
147or
148.Fn taskqueue_run_fast
149depending on the flavour of the queue.
150When a task is executed,
151first it is removed from the queue,
152the value of
153.Va ta_pending
154is recorded and then the field is zeroed.
155The function
156.Va ta_func
157from the task structure is called with the value of the field
158.Va ta_context
159as its first argument
160and the value of
161.Va ta_pending
162as its second argument.
163After the function
164.Va ta_func
165returns,
166.Xr wakeup 9
167is called on the task pointer passed to
168.Fn taskqueue_enqueue .
169.Pp
170The
171.Fn taskqueue_drain
172function is used to wait for the task to finish.
173There is no guarantee that the task will not be
174enqueued after call to
175.Fn taskqueue_drain .
176.Pp
177A convenience macro,
178.Fn TASK_INIT "task" "priority" "func" "context"
179is provided to initialise a
180.Va task
181structure.
182The values of
183.Va priority ,
184.Va func ,
185and
186.Va context
187are simply copied into the task structure fields and the
188.Va ta_pending
189field is cleared.
190.Pp
191Three macros
192.Fn TASKQUEUE_DECLARE "name" ,
193.Fn TASKQUEUE_DEFINE "name" "enqueue" "context" "init" ,
194and
195.Fn TASKQUEUE_DEFINE_THREAD "name"
196are used to declare a reference to a global queue, to define the
197implementation of the queue, and declare a queue that uses its own thread.
198The
199.Fn TASKQUEUE_DEFINE
200macro arranges to call
201.Fn taskqueue_create
202with the values of its
203.Va name ,
204.Va enqueue
205and
206.Va context
207arguments during system initialisation.
208After calling
209.Fn taskqueue_create ,
210the
211.Va init
212argument to the macro is executed as a C statement,
213allowing any further initialisation to be performed
214(such as registering an interrupt handler etc.)
215.Pp
216The
217.Fn TASKQUEUE_DEFINE_THREAD
218macro defines a new taskqueue with its own kernel thread to serve tasks.
219The variable
220.Vt struct proc *taskqueue_name_proc
221is defined which contains the kernel thread serving the tasks.
222The variable
223.Vt struct taskqueue *taskqueue_name
224is used to enqueue tasks onto the queue.
225.Ss Predefined Task Queues
226The system provides four global taskqueues,
227.Va taskqueue_fast ,
228.Va taskqueue_swi ,
229.Va taskqueue_swi_giant ,
230and
231.Va taskqueue_thread .
232The
233.Va taskqueue_fast
234queue is for swi handlers dispatched from fast interrupt handlers,
235where sleep mutexes cannot be used.
236The swi taskqueues are run via a software interrupt mechanism.
237The
238.Va taskqueue_swi
239queue runs without the protection of the
240.Va Giant
241kernel lock, and the
242.Va taskqueue_swi_giant
243queue runs with the protection of the
244.Va Giant
245kernel lock.
246The thread taskqueue
247.Va taskqueue_thread
248runs in a kernel thread context, and tasks run from this thread do
249not run under the
250.Va Giant
251kernel lock.
252If the caller wants to run under
253.Va Giant ,
254he should explicitly acquire and release
255.Va Giant
256in his taskqueue handler routine.
257.Pp
258To use these queues,
259call
260.Fn taskqueue_enqueue
261with the value of the global taskqueue variable for the queue you wish to
262use
263.Va ( taskqueue_swi ,
264.Va taskqueue_swi_giant ,
265or
266.Va taskqueue_thread ) .
267Use
268.Fn taskqueue_enqueue_fast
269for the global taskqueue variable
270.Va taskqueue_fast .
271.Pp
272The software interrupt queues can be used,
273for instance, for implementing interrupt handlers which must perform a
274significant amount of processing in the handler.
275The hardware interrupt handler would perform minimal processing of the
276interrupt and then enqueue a task to finish the work.
277This reduces to a minimum
278the amount of time spent with interrupts disabled.
279.Pp
280The thread queue can be used, for instance, by interrupt level routines
281that need to call kernel functions that do things that can only be done
282from a thread context.
283(e.g., call malloc with the M_WAITOK flag.)
284.Pp
285Note that tasks queued on shared taskqueues such as
286.Va taskqueue_swi
287may be delayed an indeterminate amount of time before execution.
288If queueing delays cannot be tolerated then a private taskqueue should
289be created with a dedicated processing thread.
290.Sh SEE ALSO
291.Xr ithread 9 ,
292.Xr kthread 9 ,
293.Xr swi 9
294.Sh HISTORY
295This interface first appeared in
296.Fx 5.0 .
297There is a similar facility called tqueue in the Linux kernel.
298.Sh AUTHORS
299This manual page was written by
300.An Doug Rabson .
301.Sh BUGS
302There is no
303.Fn taskqueue_create_fast .
304