xref: /freebsd/share/man/man9/taskqueue.9 (revision 263d6a7ece4f357d01b3152c39e5d36043f877bb)
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31.Dd Apr 30, 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.Fn TASK_INIT "struct task *task" "int priority" "task_fn_t *func" "void *context"
71.Fn TASKQUEUE_DECLARE "name"
72.Fn TASKQUEUE_DEFINE "name" "taskqueue_enqueue_fn enqueue" "void *context" "init"
73.Fn TASKQUEUE_DEFINE_THREAD "name"
74.Sh DESCRIPTION
75These functions provide a simple interface for asynchronous execution
76of code.
77.Pp
78The function
79.Fn taskqueue_create
80is used to create new queues.
81The arguments to
82.Fn taskqueue_create
83include a name that should be unique,
84a set of
85.Xr malloc 9
86flags that specify whether the call to
87.Fn malloc
88is allowed to sleep,
89a function that is called from
90.Fn taskqueue_enqueue
91when a task is added to the queue,
92and a pointer to the memory location where the identity of the
93thread that services the queue is recorded.
94.\" XXX	The rest of the sentence gets lots in relation to the first part.
95The function called from
96.Fn taskqueue_enqueue
97must arrange for the queue to be processed
98(for instance by scheduling a software interrupt or waking a kernel
99thread).
100The memory location where the thread identity is recorded is used
101to signal the service thread(s) to terminate--when this value is set to
102zero and the thread is signaled it will terminate.
103.Pp
104The function
105.Fn taskqueue_free
106should be used to remove the queue from the global list of queues
107and free the memory used by the queue.
108Any tasks that are on the queue will be executed at this time after
109which the thread servicing the queue will be signaled that it should exit.
110.Pp
111The system maintains a list of all queues which can be searched using
112.Fn taskqueue_find .
113The first queue whose name matches is returned, otherwise
114.Dv NULL .
115.Pp
116To add a task to the list of tasks queued on a taskqueue, call
117.Fn taskqueue_enqueue
118with pointers to the queue and task.
119If the task's
120.Va ta_pending
121field is non-zero,
122then it is simply incremented to reflect the number of times the task
123was enqueued.
124Otherwise,
125the task is added to the list before the first task which has a lower
126.Va ta_priority
127value or at the end of the list if no tasks have a lower priority.
128Enqueueing a task does not perform any memory allocation which makes
129it suitable for calling from an interrupt handler.
130This function will return
131.Er EPIPE
132if the queue is being freed.
133.Pp
134The function
135.Fn taskqueue_enqueue_fast
136should be used in place of
137.Fn taskqueue_enqueue
138when the enqueuing must happen from a fast interrupt handler.
139This method uses spin locks to avoid the possibility of sleeping in the fast
140interrupt context.
141.Pp
142To execute all the tasks on a queue,
143call
144.Fn taskqueue_run
145or
146.Fn taskqueue_run_fast
147depending on the flavour of the queue.
148When a task is executed,
149first it is removed from the queue,
150the value of
151.Va ta_pending
152is recorded and then the field is zeroed.
153The function
154.Va ta_func
155from the task structure is called with the value of the field
156.Va ta_context
157as its first argument
158and the value of
159.Va ta_pending
160as its second argument.
161.Pp
162A convenience macro,
163.Fn TASK_INIT "task" "priority" "func" "context"
164is provided to initialise a
165.Va task
166structure.
167The values of
168.Va priority ,
169.Va func ,
170and
171.Va context
172are simply copied into the task structure fields and the
173.Va ta_pending
174field is cleared.
175.Pp
176Three macros
177.Fn TASKQUEUE_DECLARE "name" ,
178.Fn TASKQUEUE_DEFINE "name" "enqueue" "context" "init" ,
179and
180.Fn TASKQUEUE_DEFINE_THREAD "name"
181are used to declare a reference to a global queue, to define the
182implementation of the queue, and declare a queue that uses its own thread.
183The
184.Fn TASKQUEUE_DEFINE
185macro arranges to call
186.Fn taskqueue_create
187with the values of its
188.Va name ,
189.Va enqueue
190and
191.Va context
192arguments during system initialisation.
193After calling
194.Fn taskqueue_create ,
195the
196.Va init
197argument to the macro is executed as a C statement,
198allowing any further initialisation to be performed
199(such as registering an interrupt handler etc.)
200.Pp
201The
202.Fn TASKQUEUE_DEFINE_THREAD
203macro defines a new taskqueue with its own kernel thread to serve tasks.
204The variable
205.Vt struct proc *taskqueue_name_proc
206is defined which contains the kernel thread serving the tasks.
207The variable
208.Vt struct taskqueue *taskqueue_name
209is used to enqueue tasks onto the queue.
210.Ss Predefined Task Queues
211The system provides four global taskqueues,
212.Va taskqueue_fast ,
213.Va taskqueue_swi ,
214.Va taskqueue_swi_giant ,
215and
216.Va taskqueue_thread .
217The
218.Va taskqueue_fast
219queue is for swi handlers dispatched from fast interrupt handlers,
220where sleep mutexes cannot be used.
221The swi taskqueues are run via a software interrupt mechanism.
222The
223.Va taskqueue_swi
224queue runs without the protection of the
225.Va Giant
226kernel lock, and the
227.Va taskqueue_swi_giant
228queue runs with the protection of the
229.Va Giant
230kernel lock.
231The thread taskqueue
232.Va taskqueue_thread
233runs in a kernel thread context, and tasks run from this thread do
234not run under the
235.Va Giant
236kernel lock.
237If the caller wants to run under
238.Va Giant ,
239he should explicitly acquire and release
240.Va Giant
241in his taskqueue handler routine.
242.Pp
243To use these queues,
244call
245.Fn taskqueue_enqueue
246with the value of the global taskqueue variable for the queue you wish to
247use
248.Va ( taskqueue_swi ,
249.Va taskqueue_swi_giant ,
250or
251.Va taskqueue_thread ) .
252Use
253.Fn taskqueue_enqueue_fast
254for the global taskqueue variable
255.Va taskqueue_fast .
256.Pp
257The software interrupt queues can be used,
258for instance, for implementing interrupt handlers which must perform a
259significant amount of processing in the handler.
260The hardware interrupt handler would perform minimal processing of the
261interrupt and then enqueue a task to finish the work.
262This reduces to a minimum
263the amount of time spent with interrupts disabled.
264.Pp
265The thread queue can be used, for instance, by interrupt level routines
266that need to call kernel functions that do things that can only be done
267from a thread context.
268(e.g., call malloc with the M_WAITOK flag.)
269.Pp
270Note that tasks queued on shared taskqueues such as
271.Va taskqueue_swi
272may be delayed an indeterminate amount of time before execution.
273If queueing delays cannot be tolerated then a private taskqueue should
274be created with a dedicated processing thread.
275.Sh SEE ALSO
276.Xr ithread 9 ,
277.Xr kthread 9 ,
278.Xr swi 9
279.Sh HISTORY
280This interface first appeared in
281.Fx 5.0 .
282There is a similar facility called tqueue in the Linux kernel.
283.Sh AUTHORS
284This man page was written by
285.An Doug Rabson .
286.Sh BUGS
287There is no
288.Fn taskqueue_create_fast .
289