xref: /netbsd-src/share/man/man4/netintro.4 (revision aad9773e38ed2370a628a6416e098f9008fc10a7)
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32.Dd July 13, 2014
33.Dt NETINTRO 4
34.Os
35.Sh NAME
36.Nm netintro
37.Nd introduction to networking facilities
38.Sh SYNOPSIS
39.In sys/types.h
40.In sys/socket.h
41.In net/route.h
42.In net/if.h
43.Sh DESCRIPTION
44This section is a general introduction to the networking facilities
45available in the system.
46Documentation in this part of section
474 is broken up into three areas:
48.Em protocol families
49(domains),
50.Em protocols ,
51and
52.Em network interfaces .
53.Pp
54All network protocols are associated with a specific
55.Em protocol family .
56A protocol family provides basic services to the protocol implementation
57to allow it to function within a specific network environment.
58These services may include packet fragmentation and reassembly,
59routing, addressing, and basic transport.
60A protocol family may support multiple methods of addressing, though
61the current protocol implementations do not.
62A protocol family normally comprises a number of protocols, one per
63.Xr socket 2
64type.
65It is not required that a protocol family support all socket types.
66A protocol family may contain multiple protocols supporting the
67same socket abstraction.
68.Pp
69A protocol supports one of the socket abstractions detailed in
70.Xr socket 2 .
71A specific protocol may be accessed either by creating a
72socket of the appropriate type and protocol family, or
73by requesting the protocol explicitly when creating a socket.
74Protocols normally accept only one type of address format,
75usually determined by the addressing structure inherent in
76the design of the protocol family/network architecture.
77Certain semantics of the basic socket abstractions are
78protocol specific.
79All protocols are expected to support the basic model for their
80particular socket type, but may, in addition, provide non-standard
81facilities or extensions to a mechanism.
82For example, a protocol supporting the
83.Dv SOCK_STREAM
84abstraction may allow more than one byte of out-of-band
85data to be transmitted per out-of-band message.
86.Pp
87A network interface is similar to a device interface.
88Network interfaces comprise the lowest layer of the networking
89subsystem, interacting with the actual transport hardware.
90An interface may support one or more protocol families and/or address formats.
91The
92.Em SYNOPSIS
93section of each network interface entry gives a sample specification
94of the related drivers for use in providing a system description to the
95.Xr config 1
96program.
97.Pp
98The
99.Em DIAGNOSTICS
100section lists messages which may appear on the console
101and/or in the system error log,
102.Pa /var/log/messages
103(see
104.Xr syslogd 8 ) ,
105due to errors in device operation.
106.Sh PROTOCOLS
107The system currently supports the Internet protocols and some of the
108.Tn ISO OSI
109protocols.
110Raw socket interfaces are provided to the
111.Tn IP
112protocol layer of the Internet, and to the
113.Tn IDP
114protocol of Xerox
115.Tn NS .
116Consult the appropriate manual pages in this section for more
117information regarding the support for each protocol family.
118.Sh ADDRESSING
119Associated with each protocol family is an address format.
120All network address adhere to a general structure, called a sockaddr,
121described below.
122However, each protocol imposes finer and more specific structure,
123generally renaming the variant, which is discussed in the protocol
124family manual page alluded to above.
125.Bd -literal -offset indent
126struct sockaddr {
127	u_char	sa_len;
128    	u_char	sa_family;
129    	char	sa_data[14];
130};
131.Ed
132.Pp
133The field
134.Ar sa_len
135contains the total length of the of the structure, which may exceed 16 bytes.
136The following address values for
137.Ar sa_family
138are known to the system
139(and additional formats are defined for possible future implementation):
140.Bd -literal
141#define    AF_LOCAL     1    /* local to host */
142#define    AF_INET      2    /* internetwork: UDP, TCP, etc. */
143#define    AF_NS        6    /* Xerox NS protocols */
144#define    AF_CCITT     10   /* CCITT protocols, X.25 etc */
145#define    AF_HYLINK    15   /* NSC Hyperchannel */
146#define    AF_INET6     24   /* internetwork, v6: UDP, TCP, etc. */
147.Ed
148.Sh ROUTING
149.Ux
150provides some packet routing facilities.
151The kernel maintains a routing information database, which
152is used in selecting the appropriate network interface when
153transmitting packets.
154.Pp
155A user process (or possibly multiple co-operating processes)
156maintains this database by sending messages over a special kind
157of socket.
158This supplants fixed size
159.Xr ioctl 2
160used in earlier releases.
161.Pp
162This facility is described in
163.Xr route 4 .
164.Sh INTERFACES
165Each network interface in a system corresponds to a
166path through which messages may be sent and received.
167A network interface usually has a hardware device associated with it,
168though certain interfaces such as the loopback interface,
169.Xr lo 4 ,
170do not.
171.Pp
172The following
173.Xr ioctl 2
174calls may be used to manipulate network interfaces.
175The
176.Xr ioctl 2
177is made on a socket (typically of type
178.Dv SOCK_DGRAM )
179in the desired domain.
180Most of the requests supported in earlier releases
181take an
182.Ar ifreq
183structure as its parameter.
184This structure has the form
185.Bd -literal
186struct	ifreq {
187#define    IFNAMSIZ    16
188    char    ifr_name[IFNAMSIZ];         /* if name, e.g. "en0" */
189    union {
190        struct    sockaddr ifru_addr;
191        struct    sockaddr ifru_dstaddr;
192        struct    sockaddr ifru_broadaddr;
193        short     ifru_flags;
194        int       ifru_metric;
195        void   *ifru_data;
196    } ifr_ifru;
197#define ifr_addr      ifr_ifru.ifru_addr    /* address */
198#define ifr_dstaddr   ifr_ifru.ifru_dstaddr /* other end of p-to-p link */
199#define ifr_broadaddr ifr_ifru.ifru_broadaddr /* broadcast address */
200#define ifr_space     ifr_ifru.ifru_space     /* sockaddr_storage */
201#define ifr_flags     ifr_ifru.ifru_flags   /* flags */
202#define ifr_metric    ifr_ifru.ifru_metric  /* metric */
203#define ifr_mtu       ifr_ifru.ifru_mtu       /* mtu */
204#define ifr_dlt       ifr_ifru.ifru_dlt       /* data link type (DLT_*) */
205#define ifr_value     ifr_ifru.ifru_value     /* generic value */
206#define ifr_media     ifr_ifru.ifru_metric    /* media options (overload) */
207#define ifr_data      ifr_ifru.ifru_data    /* for use by interface */
208#define ifr_buf       ifr_ifru.ifru_b.b_buf   /* new interface ioctls */
209#define ifr_buflen    ifr_ifru.ifru_b.b_buflen
210#define ifr_index     ifr_ifru.ifru_value     /* interface index */
211};
212.Ed
213.Pp
214Calls which are now deprecated are:
215.Bl -tag -width SIOCGIFBRDADDR
216.It Dv SIOCSIFADDR
217Set interface address for protocol family.
218Following the address assignment, the ``initialization'' routine for
219the interface is called.
220.It Dv SIOCSIFDSTADDR
221Set point to point address for protocol family and interface.
222.It Dv SIOCSIFBRDADDR
223Set broadcast address for protocol family and interface.
224.El
225.Pp
226.Xr ioctl 2
227requests to obtain addresses and requests both to set and
228retrieve other data are still fully supported
229and use the
230.Ar ifreq
231structure:
232.Bl -tag -width SIOCGIFBRDADDR
233.It Dv SIOCGIFADDR
234Get interface address for protocol family.
235.It Dv SIOCGIFDSTADDR
236Get point to point address for protocol family and interface.
237.It Dv SIOCGIFBRDADDR
238Get broadcast address for protocol family and interface.
239.It Dv SIOCSIFFLAGS
240Set interface flags field.
241If the interface is marked down, any processes currently routing
242packets through the interface are notified; some interfaces may be
243reset so that incoming packets are no longer received.
244When marked up again, the interface is reinitialized.
245.It Dv SIOCGIFFLAGS
246Get interface flags.
247.It Dv SIOCSIFMETRIC
248Set interface routing metric.
249The metric is used only by user-level routers.
250.It Dv SIOCGIFMETRIC
251Get interface metric.
252.It Dv SIOCGIFINDEX
253Get the interface index and populate ifr_index.
254.El
255.Pp
256There are two requests that make use of a new structure:
257.Bl -tag -width SIOCGIFBRDADDR
258.It Dv SIOCAIFADDR
259An interface may have more than one address associated with it
260in some protocols.
261This request provides a means to add additional addresses (or modify
262characteristics of the primary address if the default address for
263the address family is specified).
264Rather than making separate calls to set destination or broadcast
265addresses, or network masks (now an integral feature of multiple
266protocols) a separate structure,
267.Ar ifaliasreq ,
268is used to specify all three facets
269simultaneously (see below).
270One would use a slightly tailored version of this struct specific
271to each family (replacing each sockaddr by one
272of the family-specific type).
273Where the sockaddr itself is larger than the
274default size, one needs to modify the
275.Xr ioctl 2
276identifier itself to include the total size, as described in
277.Xr ioctl 2 .
278.It Dv SIOCDIFADDR
279This requests deletes the specified address from the list
280associated with an interface.
281It also uses the
282.Ar ifaliasreq
283structure to allow for the possibility of protocols allowing
284multiple masks or destination addresses, and also adopts the
285convention that specification of the default address means
286to delete the first address for the interface belonging to
287the address family in which the original socket was opened.
288.It Dv SIOCGIFALIAS
289This request provides means to get additional addresses together
290with netmask and broadcast/destination from an interface.
291It also uses the
292.Ar ifaliasreq
293structure.
294.El
295.Pp
296Request making use of the
297.Ar ifconf
298structure:
299.Bl -tag -width SIOCGIFBRDADDR
300.It Dv SIOCGIFCONF
301Get interface configuration list.
302This request takes an
303.Ar ifconf
304structure (see below) as a value-result parameter.
305The
306.Ar ifc_len
307field should be initially set to the size of the buffer
308pointed to by
309.Ar ifc_buf .
310On return it will contain the length, in bytes, of the
311configuration list.
312.El
313.Bd -literal
314/*
315* Structure used in SIOC[AD]IFADDR request.
316*/
317struct ifaliasreq {
318        char    ifra_name[IFNAMSIZ];   /* if name, e.g. "en0" */
319        struct  sockaddr        ifra_addr;
320        struct  sockaddr        ifra_dstaddr;
321#define	ifra_broadaddr  ifra_dstaddr
322        struct  sockaddr        ifra_mask;
323};
324.Ed
325.Pp
326.Bd -literal
327/*
328* Structure used in SIOCGIFCONF request.
329* Used to retrieve interface configuration
330* for machine (useful for programs which
331* must know all networks accessible).
332*/
333struct ifconf {
334    int   ifc_len;		/* size of associated buffer */
335    union {
336        void    *ifcu_buf;
337        struct     ifreq *ifcu_req;
338    } ifc_ifcu;
339#define ifc_buf ifc_ifcu.ifcu_buf /* buffer address */
340#define ifc_req ifc_ifcu.ifcu_req /* array of structures returned */
341};
342.Ed
343.Sh SEE ALSO
344.Xr config 1 ,
345.Xr ioctl 2 ,
346.Xr socket 2 ,
347.Xr intro 4 ,
348.Xr routed 8
349.Sh HISTORY
350The
351.Nm netintro
352manual appeared in
353.Bx 4.3 Tahoe .
354