| Message ID | 20230513202037.158777-1-ivan.orlov0322@gmail.com |
|---|---|
| State | New |
| Headers | show |
| Series | [1/3] docs: admin-guide: add valsa driver documentation | expand |
On Sat, 13 May 2023 22:20:35 +0200, Ivan Orlov wrote: > > Add documentation for the new Virtual ALSA driver. It covers all possible > usage cases: errors and delay injections, random and pattern-based data > generation, playback and ioctl redefinition functionalities testing. > > We have a lot of different virtual media drivers, which can be used for > testing of the userspace applications and media subsystem middle layer. > However, all of them are aimed at testing the video functionality and > simulating the video devices. For audio devices we have only snd-dummy > module, which is good in simulating the correct behavior of an ALSA device. > I decided to write a tool, which would help to test the userspace ALSA > programs (and the PCM middle layer as well) under unusual circumstances > to figure out how they would behave. So I came up with this Virtual ALSA > Driver. > > This new Virtual ALSA Driver has several features which can be useful > during the userspace ALSA applications testing/fuzzing, or testing/fuzzing > of the PCM middle layer. Not all of them can be implemented using the > existing virtual drivers (like dummy or loopback). Here is what can this > driver do: > > - Simulate both capture and playback processes > - Check the playback stream for containing the looped pattern > - Generate random or pattern-based capture data > - Inject delays into the playback and capturing processes > - Inject errors during the PCM callbacks > > Also, this driver can check the playback stream for containing the > predefined pattern, which is used in the corresponding selftest to check > the PCM middle layer data transferring functionality. Additionally, this > driver redefines the default RESET ioctl, and the selftest covers this PCM > API functionality as well. > > Signed-off-by: Ivan Orlov <ivan.orlov0322@gmail.com> > --- > Documentation/admin-guide/index.rst | 1 + > Documentation/admin-guide/valsa.rst | 114 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ We have already subdirectories for the sound stuff (Documentation/sound/*), and this should go to there, I suppose (unless there is somewhere dedicated for each selftest scenario). thanks, Takashi
On 5/14/23 13:21, Takashi Iwai wrote: > We have already subdirectories for the sound stuff > (Documentation/sound/*), and this should go to there, I suppose > (unless there is somewhere dedicated for each selftest scenario). Alright, I'll move the documentation to the sound subfolder. Thank you! Kind regards, Ivan Orlov.
On 5/15/23 05:28, Mark Brown wrote: > On Sun, May 14, 2023 at 12:20:37AM +0400, Ivan Orlov wrote: > >> +uid=$(id -u) >> +if [ $uid -ne 0 ]; then >> + echo "$0: Must be run as root" >> + exit 1 >> +fi > > It is not an error to run the selftest as a non-root user, the test > should be skipped. Alright, thanks! >> +modprobe snd-valsa > > We don't check if the module was already loaded. > >> +if [ ! -e /sys/kernel/debug/valsa/pc_test ]; then >> + mount -t debugfs none /sys/kernel/debug >> + >> + if [ ! -e /sys/kernel/debug/valsa/pc_test ]; then >> + echo "$0: Error mounting debugfs" >> + exit 4 >> + fi >> +fi > > This will unconditionally attempt to mount debugfs in a standard > location and won't clean up after itself, if the system didn't have > debugfs mounted for some reason then this will leave it sitting there. Yes, I agree... I'll remove this in the future versions, I think the approach with skipping in case of missing debugfs would be better. By the way, I used the 'fpa' test as an example, and it looks like it should be fixed as well... > Would it not be better to have a C program that actually calls the ioctl > rather than a custom debugfs thing that may or may not be wired up to do > the same thing as an ioctl would? It seems like other than whatever > this ioctl test actually does this is all just a simplified version of > the existing pcm-test. Well, the idea was to test the playback buffer consistency - the driver has the functionality of testing the playback buffer for containing the looped pattern (and if the buffer doesn't contain the looped pattern the test fails). So, firstly we get the capture buffer with this pattern (via arecord), and then send it to the driver for the test (via aplay). The pcm-test (as I understand) performs only time checks, not the checks of the data played/captured, and I think it is pointless to test the time again. But I agree, that C test implementation would be better - using this approach I can perform additional buffer checks and cover more functionality of the driver. Thank you very much for the review! Kind regards, Ivan Orlov.
diff --git a/Documentation/admin-guide/index.rst b/Documentation/admin-guide/index.rst index 43ea35613dfc..328cc59275a1 100644 --- a/Documentation/admin-guide/index.rst +++ b/Documentation/admin-guide/index.rst @@ -131,6 +131,7 @@ configure specific aspects of kernel behavior to your liking. thunderbolt ufs unicode + valsa vga-softcursor video-output xfs diff --git a/Documentation/admin-guide/valsa.rst b/Documentation/admin-guide/valsa.rst new file mode 100644 index 000000000000..64ffc130fb4c --- /dev/null +++ b/Documentation/admin-guide/valsa.rst @@ -0,0 +1,114 @@ +.. SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0 + +The Virtual ALSA Driver +======================= + +The Virtual ALSA Driver emulates a generic ALSA device, and can be used for +testing/fuzzing of the userspace ALSA applications, as well as for testing/fuzzing of +the ALSA middle layer. Additionally, it can be used for simulating hard to reproduce +problems with PCM devices. + +What can this driver do? +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + +At this moment the driver can do the following things: + * Simulate both capture and playback processes + * Generate random or pattern-based capturing data + * Inject delays into the playback and capturing processes + * Inject errors during the PCM callbacks + +Also, this driver can check the playback stream for containing the +predefined pattern, which is used in the corresponding selftest (alsa/valsa-test.sh) +to check the PCM middle layer data transferring functionality. Additionally, this +driver redefines the default RESET ioctl, and the selftest covers this PCM +API functionality as well. + +Configuration +------------- + +The driver has several parameters besides the common ALSA module parameters: + + * fill_mode (bool) - Buffer fill mode (see below) + * inject_delay (int) + * inject_hwpars_err (bool) + * inject_prepare_err (bool) + * inject_trigger_err (bool) + + +Capture Data Generation +----------------------- + +The driver has two modes of data generation: the first (0 in the fill_mode parameter) +means random data generation, the second (1 in the fill_mode) - pattern-based +data generation. Let's look at the second mode. + +First of all, you may want to specify the pattern for data generation. You can do it +by writing the pattern to the debugfs file (/sys/kernel/debug/valsa/fill_pattern). +Like that: + +.. code-block:: bash + + echo -n mycoolpattern > /sys/kernel/debug/valsa/fill_pattern + +After this, every capture action performed on the 'valsa' device will return +'mycoolpatternmycoolpatternmycoolpatternmy...' in the capturing buffer. + +The pattern itself can be up to 4096 bytes long. + +Delay injection +--------------- + +The driver has 'inject_delay' parameter, which has very self-descriptive name and +can be used for time delay/speedup simulations. The parameter has integer type, and +it means the delay added between module's internal timer ticks. + +If the 'inject_delay' value is positive, the buffer will be filled slower, if it is +negative - faster. You can try it yourself by starting a recording in any +audiorecording application (like Audacity) and selecting the 'valsa' device as a +source. + +This parameter can be also used for generating a huge amount of sound data in a very +short period of time (with the negative 'inject_delay' value). + +Errors injection +---------------- + +This module can be used for injecting errors into the PCM communication process. This +action can help you to figure out how the userspace ALSA program behaves under unusual +circumstances. + +For example, you can make all 'hw_params' PCM callback calls return EBUSY error by +writing '1' to the 'inject_hwpars_err' module parameter: + +.. code-block:: bash + + echo 1 > /sys/module/snd_valsa/parameters/inject_hwpars_err + +Errors can be injected into the following PCM callbacks: + + * hw_params (EBUSY) + * prepare (EINVAL) + * trigger (EINVAL) + + +Playback test +------------- + +This driver can be also used for the playback functionality testing - every time you +write the playback data to the 'valsa' PCM device and close it, the driver checks the +buffer for containing the looped pattern (which is specified in the fill_pattern +debugfs file). If the playback buffer content represents the looped pattern, 'pc_test' +debugfs entry is set into '1'. Otherwise, the driver sets it to '0'. + +ioctl redefinition test +----------------------- + +The driver redefines the 'reset' ioctl, which is default for all PCM devices. To test +this functionality, we can trigger the reset ioctl and check the 'ioctl_test' debugfs +entry: + +.. code-block:: bash + + cat /sys/kernel/debug/valsa/ioctl_test + +If the ioctl is triggered successfully, this file will contain '1', and '0' otherwise.
Add documentation for the new Virtual ALSA driver. It covers all possible usage cases: errors and delay injections, random and pattern-based data generation, playback and ioctl redefinition functionalities testing. We have a lot of different virtual media drivers, which can be used for testing of the userspace applications and media subsystem middle layer. However, all of them are aimed at testing the video functionality and simulating the video devices. For audio devices we have only snd-dummy module, which is good in simulating the correct behavior of an ALSA device. I decided to write a tool, which would help to test the userspace ALSA programs (and the PCM middle layer as well) under unusual circumstances to figure out how they would behave. So I came up with this Virtual ALSA Driver. This new Virtual ALSA Driver has several features which can be useful during the userspace ALSA applications testing/fuzzing, or testing/fuzzing of the PCM middle layer. Not all of them can be implemented using the existing virtual drivers (like dummy or loopback). Here is what can this driver do: - Simulate both capture and playback processes - Check the playback stream for containing the looped pattern - Generate random or pattern-based capture data - Inject delays into the playback and capturing processes - Inject errors during the PCM callbacks Also, this driver can check the playback stream for containing the predefined pattern, which is used in the corresponding selftest to check the PCM middle layer data transferring functionality. Additionally, this driver redefines the default RESET ioctl, and the selftest covers this PCM API functionality as well. Signed-off-by: Ivan Orlov <ivan.orlov0322@gmail.com> --- Documentation/admin-guide/index.rst | 1 + Documentation/admin-guide/valsa.rst | 114 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 2 files changed, 115 insertions(+) create mode 100644 Documentation/admin-guide/valsa.rst