4 // Fraunhofer Institute for Open Communication Systems (FOKUS)
5 // Competence Center NETwork research (NET), St. Augustin, GERMANY
6 // Stefan Bund <g0dil@berlios.de>
8 // This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
9 // it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
10 // the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
11 // (at your option) any later version.
13 // This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
14 // but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
15 // MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
16 // GNU General Public License for more details.
18 // You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
19 // along with this program; if not, write to the
20 // Free Software Foundation, Inc.,
21 // 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.
23 /** \mainpage SENF: The Simple and Extensible Network Framework
25 The SENF Simple and Extensible Network Framework aims to be a complete set of libraries to
26 facilitate the development of network applications focusing on network protocols on the layers
27 below the application layer. However, the framework includes many general purpose utilities and
28 will be expedient to use well beyond its primary objective.
32 The main goals of this library are (in no particular order):
34 \li modular framework design
35 \li utilizing the power of modern C++
36 \li very low overhead for frequently called members
40 \section start Getting started
42 To get started using this library, begin by checking out the code from the <a
43 href="http://developer.berlios.de/svn/?group_id=7489">BerliOS SVN repository</a>. You may find
44 help on using the library at '\ref senf_usage'. If you are interested in SENF, feel free to subscribe
45 to the <a href="http://developer.berlios.de/mail/?group_id=7489">SENF mailing lists</a>. If you
46 want to contribute, read the docs and \e please adhere to the \ref senf_conventions.
48 \see \ref senf_usage\n
49 <a href="../../Examples/doc/html/index.html">Examples</a>
51 \section senfutil_overview Building Projects using SENF
53 When building projects using senf, SENFSCons has a very simple helper module \ref senfutil to
54 make the building of libraries utilizing senf simpler.
56 \see \ref senf_senfutil
59 /** \page senf_senfutil SENF SCons build utility (senfutil.py)
63 The \c senfutil utility for SCons helps setting up a project to compile against SENF:
65 \li \c senfutil adds all necessary libraries to link against
66 \li \c senfutil will set necessary compile options.
67 \li \c senfutil supports normal, debug and final project build options
68 \li \c senfutil allows specifying variables on the scons command line
69 \li \c senfutil supports more readable compile-time SENF loglevel configuration
71 Using the utility is quite simple
75 sys.path.extend(('senf/site_scons','/usr/lib/senf/site_scons'))
79 senfutil.SetupForSENF(env)
80 # senfutil.DefaultOptions(env)
82 # Set or change SCons environment variables with env.Append, env.Replace or env.SetDefault
84 CXXFLAGS = [ '-Wall', '-Woverloaded-virtual' ],
85 CXXFLAGS_final = [ '-O2' ],
86 CXXFLAGS_normal = [ '-O0', '-g' ],
87 CXXFLAGS_debug = [ '$CXXFLAGS_normal' ],
89 LINKFLAGS_normal = [ '-Wl,-S' ],
91 LOGLEVELS_debug = [ 'senf::log::Debug||VERBOSE' ],
95 env.Program( target='udpforward', source=glob.glob('*.cc') )
99 This example builds a simple binary from a number of source files (all '.cc' files). It links
100 against the SENF library and automatically sets all the correct compiler options using
101 <tt>senfutil.SetupForSENF( env )</tt>.
103 This script automatically uses a SENF installation either symlinked or imported into the current
104 project in directory 'senf' or, if this directory does not exist, a globally installed SENF.
106 \section senf_senfutil_options Build options
108 \c senfutil supports the <tt>debug=1</tt> or <tt>final=1</tt> build options. These parameters
109 select one of the build configurations 'debug', 'normal' or 'final'. The following variables are
110 supported each with separate values for all three configurations:
117 \c senfutil will detect the type of SENF library used (final or not) and set the correct compile
120 \section senf_senfutil_loglevels Specifying compile-time loglevels
122 To simplify specifying the compile-time loglevel configuration, the build variable \c LOGLEVELS
123 (and it's build configuration specific variants) may be set. This variable will be parsed and
124 converted into the correct \c SENF_LOG_CONF definition. The \c LOGLEVELS Syntax is
126 \par "" \e optional_stream \c | \e optional_area | \e level
128 where \e optional_stream and \e optional_area are optional fully scoped C++ names (e.g. \c
129 senf::log::Debug) and \e level is the loglevel. There must be \e no whitespace in a single
130 specification, multiple specifications are either specified using an array or separated with
133 \section senf_senfutil_default Default options
135 In the example above, all compile options are set manually. To specify the default customary
136 compile options for SENF programs, \c senfutil.DefaultOptions(env) is provided. This function is
140 senfutil.DefaultOptions(env) =>
142 CXXFLAGS = [ '-Wall', '-Woverloaded-virtual' ],
143 CXXFLAGS_final = [ '-O2' ],
144 CXXFLAGS_normal = [ '-O0', '-g' ],
145 CXXFLAGS_debug = [ '$CXXFLAGS_normal' ],
147 LINKFLAGS_normal = [ '-Wl,-S' ],
151 Thus above example can be simplified to
154 sys.path.extend(('senf/site_scons','/usr/lib/senf/site_scons'))
155 import glob, senfutil
158 senfutil.SetupForSENF(env)
159 senfutil.DefaultOptions(env)
161 env.Append( LOGLEVELS_debug = [ 'senf::log::Debug||VERBOSE' ] )
164 env.Program( target = 'udpforward', source = glob.glob('*.cc') )
168 \section senf_senfutil_arguments 'scons' Command line arguments
170 \c senfutil automatically parses SCons command line arguments into the SCons build
171 environment. This allows specifying any parameter on the command line:
173 $ scons CXX=myg++ CXXFLAGS+=-mtune=geode
175 You may either set variables unconditionally using '=' or append values to the end of a list
179 /** \page senf_usage Using the SENF framework
181 The SENF Framework is a collection of loosely coupled modules. The libraries are heavily object
182 oriented and template based. For compatibility reasons, the libraries are therefore built
183 together with every project making use of the framework.
185 When starting a new project based on the SENF framework, it is advisable, to make use of the
186 SENFSCons build environment and use SVN to manage the code repository. This is the
187 configuration, described in this documentation.
189 \see \ref senf_build \n
191 \ref senf_components \n
194 \section senf_preliminaries Preliminaries
196 Before starting the development, make sure to fulfill the following requirements:
198 \li GNU g++, version at least 3.4
199 \li The Boost libraries (http://www.boost.org)
200 \li The SCons build tool (http://www.scons.org)
202 If you want to build the documentation, you additionally need
204 \li Doxygen (http://www.doxygen.org)
205 \li The \c dia diagram editor (http://www.gnome.org/projects/dia/)
206 \li HTML \c tidy (http://tidy.sourceforge.net/)
207 \li The \c xsltproc XSLT processor (http://xmlsoft.org/XSLT/xsltproc2.html)
208 \li The \c graphviz library (http://www.graphviz.org)
211 The library is only tested with gcc-3.4 and 4.0 on Linux. On other POSIX platforms with a BSD
212 Socket API, the library should be usable, possibly with some tweaking (except for the Scheduler,
213 which relies on \c epoll)
215 \section senf_compiler_options Compiler and Linker Options
217 If SENF is compiled in debug mode (SENF_DEBUG is defined), exception messages will automatically
218 include a stack backtrace. For this to work, you need to add the -rdynamic option to all link
219 commands. This feature depends on gcc and the GNU-libc.
221 It is <B>very important</B> that both the SENF library and the application using it are compiled
222 \e both either with or without this compiler switch (-DSENF_DEBUG). Otherwise, the compiler will
223 emit error messages which might be hard to debug.
226 /** \page senf_build Building the SENF framework
228 This procedure will test building the complete framework including the unit tests and the
229 Sniffer test application. This build is \e not needed to use the framework since every project
230 will include the full SENF source code itself (via Subversion).
232 After you have successfully built the library tests, you can continue to setup your own project
235 \see \ref senf_setup \n
236 \ref senf_components \n
239 \section senf_checkout Getting the code
241 To access the code, check out the code from the BerliOS repository. Change to your development
242 directory and use the following subversion command
245 $ svn checkout http://svn.berlios.de/svnroot/repos/senf/trunk senf
248 This will create a new directory \c senf within the current directory. For further documentation
249 on the use of Subversion, see the \c svn man-page or the subversion homepage at
250 http://subversion.tigris.org. A very good introduction and reference to subversion is available
251 at http://svnbook.red-bean.com.
253 \section senf_compile Building
255 To build the library, execute all unit tests and build the Sniffer test application, use
262 in the \c senf directory. This assumes, that you want to build the library with your default gcc
263 and requires the boost libraries to be available in the system include paths. If this is not the
264 case, you can take a look at <tt>SConfig.template</tt> file. Copy this file to <tt>SConfig</tt>
265 and comment out all the variables you don't want to change (The \e values in the template file
266 are just arbitrary examples).
269 /** \page senf_setup Setting up a new project using SENF
271 The most simple way to use SENF for now is to checkout the svn repository and build SENF
272 yourselves. After you have built SENF, reference your SENF build directory from your build
273 environment. The most flexible way to do this, is to use a symbolic link to your SENF build.
275 Here an example \c SConstruct file for a project using SENF. This script expects SENF to be
276 found in the <tt>%senf</tt> sub-directory of the directory, where the \c SConstruct file is
277 found. This may either be a SENF checkout (if managing your project via subversion, you can use
278 <tt>svn:externals</tt> for this) or a symbolic link to your SENF checkout.
285 LIBS = [ 'senf', 'boost_regex', 'boost_iostreams' ],
286 CXXFLAGS = [ '-Wall', '-Woverloaded-virtual', '-Wno-long-long' ],
292 source = glob.glob('*.cc'),
296 When building against a self-built SENF which will probably be in debug mode, the '-DSENF_DEBUG'
297 option must be added to the compile command.
299 The most simple way to build using SENF is to use a very simple SCons helper which automatically
300 supports debug and final builds, uses SENF either centrally installed or locally built and has
301 some other nice features. See <a
302 href="../../senfscons/doc/html/index.html#senfutil_overview">Building Projects using SENF</a>
303 for more info and an example for this utility.
305 \see \ref senf_components \n
309 /** \page senf_components The SENF modules
311 The framework is made up of several modular components. When using the library, it is possible
312 to selectively choose to use only a subset of the implemented modules.
314 \see \ref senf_overview
316 \section libPPI libPPI: Packet Processing Infrastructure
318 The Packet Processing Infrastructure implements a modular framework for implementing packet
319 oriented network applications. The library provides a large set of pre-defined modules as well
320 as the necessary helpers to implement application specific processing modules.
322 \see <a href="../../PPI/doc/html/index.html">libPPI API reference</a>
324 \section libSocket libSocket: C++ abstraction of the BSD socket API
326 This library provides a high performance and object oriented abstraction of the standard socket
327 API. It utilizes a flexible and extensible policy based design. The library provides predefined
328 types for the important socket types (UDP and TCP sockets etc) including raw and packet sockets.
330 \see <a href="../../Socket/doc/html/index.html">libSocket API reference</a>
332 \section libPackets libPackets: Network packet manipulation
334 This library provides a very flexible infrastructure to parse, create and otherwise manipulate
335 packetized network data. Included is a library of several protocol parsers covering the basic
336 IPv4 and IPv6 network protocols down to the Ethernet layer.
338 \see <a href="../../Packets/doc/html/index.html">libPackets API reference</a>
340 \section libScheduler libScheduler: Asynchronous event handling
342 The scheduler library provides an object oriented interface to the standard UNIX \c select type
343 event dispatcher. It is based on the high performance \c epoll system call. It provides support
344 for read/write events as well as simple timer based events.
346 \see <a href="../../Scheduler/doc/html/index.html">libScheduler API reference</a>
348 \section libUtils libUtils: Collection of arbitrary utilities
350 This library is used be most all of the other modules for miscellaneous tools and utilities. We
353 \li Simple functions to manage daemon processes
354 \li Standard exception classes
355 \li senf::intrusive_refcount to simplify the implementation of classes usable with
357 \li boost::bind extensions
358 \li An interface to the \c g++ de-mangler integrated with type_info
359 \li Typedefs and rudimentary methods to simplify handling high-resolution time values
361 \see <a href="../../Utils/doc/html/index.html">libUtils API reference</a>
363 \section senfscons SENFSCons, the SENF build environment
365 SENF relies on SCons (http://www.scons.org) to build. To further simplify the common tasks, SENF
366 includes a library of custom routines and builders comprising a very concise build
367 environment. Included are a number of templates to help bootstrapping a new project or
370 \see <a href="../../senfscons/doc/html/index.html">SENFSCons reference</a>
373 /** \page senf_overview Introduction to the framework
375 The SENF framework is relatively complex and makes use of advanced features of the C++
376 language. To make the most efficient use of the framework, you should have at least a basic
377 understanding of C++ templates and the standard library concepts.
379 The library implementation at places makes heavy use of advanced template techniques and relies
380 on some very advanced template libraries from Boost. The aim was however for the \e external
381 interface of the library to be as simple as possible without sacrificing important functionality
382 or adversely impacting the runtime performance.
384 As already mentioned several times, the library relies on Boost (http://www.boost.org) as a
385 generic library of high quality reusable C++ components. It also makes frequent use of the
386 standard library. It is designed, to integrate well into both libraries and to use the same
389 \section senf_startup Getting starting developing with SENF
391 To introduce the framework and it's general structure, a simple example application is provided
392 in the SENF repository in the \c Sniffer module. Peruse this example to get a first look at how
395 When building a network Application with SENF, you will use several modules:
397 \li Use the <a href="../../Socket/doc/html/index.html">Socket library</a> for network
398 communication needs. This library includes support for raw and packet sockets to allow low
399 level network access.
400 \li Use the <a href="../../Scheduler/doc/html/index.html">Scheduler library</a> to coordinate
401 the asynchronous event processing. This drastically reduces the number of threads needed in
402 your application and will greatly enhance the overall responsiveness.
403 \li To interpret low level network packets, use the <a
404 href="../../Packets/doc/html/index.html">Packets library</a>. This library will provide
405 efficient and convenient access to all protocol fields. It supports parsing as well as
406 modifying and creating packets. It has default support for the most important Internet
407 protocols and is highly extensible with new protocols.
408 \li Go over the <a href="../../Utils/doc/html/index.html">Utils library</a>. It contains small
409 helpers to simplify tasks like daemonization, exception handling, debugging and so on.
411 The simplest way to get started is: copy the Sniffer application and start to modify it.
413 \see <a href="../../Examples/doc/html/index.html">Examples</a> \n
414 \ref senf_components \n
417 \section senf_conventions Coding Conventions
419 Here we have laid down the coding conventions used throughout the SENF framework. Please ad here
420 to these conventions when changing or adding code. If you use emacs, you can use the C++ IDE for
421 emacs from http://g0dil.de which greatly simplifies following these conventions.
423 \subsection senf_conventions_file_naming File Naming
425 Files should be named according to the main class they define. A single header file should
426 define only one main class. Exceptions to this rule are OK.
429 This simplifies finding the implementation/header for a given class and also reduces the
430 size of each single file.
432 The implementation is divided into a number of different files:
434 <table class="glossary"> <tr><td>\c .h</td><td>C public header</td></tr>
436 <tr><td>\c .hh</td><td>C++ public header</td></tr>
438 <tr><td>\c .ih</td><td>C++ internal header used only by the implementation. This header will
439 probably be included indirectly by the public header but is not meant to be perused by the
440 library user</td></tr>
442 <tr><td>\c .c</td><td>C implementation</td></tr>
444 <tr><td>\c .cc</td><td>C++ implementation of non-inline non-template functions and
447 <tr><td>\c .ct</td><td>C++ implementation of non-inline template functions and members</td></tr>
449 <tr><td>\c .cci</td><td>C++ implementation of inline non-template functions and
452 <tr><td>\c .cti</td><td>C++ implementation of inline template functions and members</td></tr>
454 <tr><td>\c .mpp</td><td>Special include file used for external iteration by the
455 Boost.Preprocessor library</td></tr> </table>
458 There are two part's to this: First, separating the implementation of inlines and templates
459 out of the header file makes the header file much easier to read. This is important, since
460 the header file will be used as a reference by the developers.
462 Separating inline from non-inline members is used together with the \c prefix_ convention
463 below to ensure the correct placement of inline vs non-inline members in the source
464 code. The C++ language requires, that inline members must be included into \e every
465 compilation unit, non-inline members however must be included \e only in one compilation
466 unit. Placing the inline members into a separate file allows to automate this: Simply moving
467 an implementation from one of the inline files into one of the non-inline files will change
468 the type of implementation accordingly.
470 \subsection senf_conventions_type_naming Type Naming
472 SENF prefers the use of the CapitalziedLettersToSeparateWords convention for class names. In
473 this case, class names must start with a capital letter. There are some exceptions to this rule:
474 Types which define new basic data types to be used like other built-in types may be named using
475 lowercase letters plus underscores. Also, if a type or class is directly related to some other
476 library (STL or Boost) which uses the underscore convention, it might be more sensible to follow
477 this convention. This is open to debate.
480 Naming types with capital letters nicely gives a visual clue, that a symbol is a type
481 name. This can also be used by the editor to highlight type names correctly. Additionally,
482 this convention is compact and does not add additional or repeated overhead.
484 \subsection senf_conventions_impl Implementation
486 Only in very few places, SENF allows the use of inline implementations (not to be confused with
487 inline functions). An \e implementation is inline, if it is written directly into the class
488 definition in the header file. Again there are exceptions to this rule but they are very few:
489 \li When defining simple exception classes, the 'what()' member may be defined inline if it
490 returns a string constant.
491 \li It may be OK to use inline implementations for one-line implementations in internal
493 \li The Packet library allows inline implementations for the definition of parsers since doing
494 so outside the declaration just gets to verbose and parsers definitions are quite length but
495 very simple and straight forward.
498 Implementing members inline inside the class declaration makes the declaration much harder
499 to read. Since the declaration in the header file will be used as a reference by the
500 developer, the header files should be as readable as possible.
502 Every function or method implementation in one of the implementation files must \e always be
503 prefixed with \c prefix_. This symbol is defined at the beginning of the file and undefined at
504 the end. The symbol must be defined to be \c inline in the \c .cti and \c .cci files and must be
505 defined empty in the \c .cc and \c .ct files.
508 Together with splitting inlines and non-inlines into separate files, this allows to
509 automatically include the inline definitions at the right places. See above.
511 Private data members are named with a trailing underscore character.
514 This helps distinguishing local variables from parameter names. The trailing underscore
515 does not interfere with other naming conventions and is allowed by the standard (underscore
516 at the beginning of the name are problematic since some classes of names beginning with an
517 underscore are reserved for the standard library implementation)
521 // :vim:textwidth=100
525 // c-file-style: "senf"
526 // indent-tabs-mode: nil
527 // ispell-local-dictionary: "american"
528 // compile-command: "scons doc"