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+===============
+XDP RX Metadata
+===============
+
+This document describes how an eXpress Data Path (XDP) program can access
+hardware metadata related to a packet using a set of helper functions,
+and how it can pass that metadata on to other consumers.
+
+General Design
+==============
+
+XDP has access to a set of kfuncs to manipulate the metadata in an XDP frame.
+Every device driver that wishes to expose additional packet metadata can
+implement these kfuncs. The set of kfuncs is declared in ``include/net/xdp.h``
+via ``XDP_METADATA_KFUNC_xxx``.
+
+Currently, the following kfuncs are supported. In the future, as more
+metadata is supported, this set will grow:
+
+.. kernel-doc:: net/core/xdp.c
+   :identifiers: bpf_xdp_metadata_rx_timestamp bpf_xdp_metadata_rx_hash
+
+An XDP program can use these kfuncs to read the metadata into stack
+variables for its own consumption. Or, to pass the metadata on to other
+consumers, an XDP program can store it into the metadata area carried
+ahead of the packet. Not all packets will necessary have the requested
+metadata available in which case the driver returns ``-ENODATA``.
+
+Not all kfuncs have to be implemented by the device driver; when not
+implemented, the default ones that return ``-EOPNOTSUPP`` will be used
+to indicate the device driver have not implemented this kfunc.
+
+
+Within an XDP frame, the metadata layout (accessed via ``xdp_buff``) is
+as follows::
+
+  +----------+-----------------+------+
+  | headroom | custom metadata | data |
+  +----------+-----------------+------+
+             ^                 ^
+             |                 |
+   xdp_buff->data_meta   xdp_buff->data
+
+An XDP program can store individual metadata items into this ``data_meta``
+area in whichever format it chooses. Later consumers of the metadata
+will have to agree on the format by some out of band contract (like for
+the AF_XDP use case, see below).
+
+AF_XDP
+======
+
+:doc:`af_xdp` use-case implies that there is a contract between the BPF
+program that redirects XDP frames into the ``AF_XDP`` socket (``XSK``) and
+the final consumer. Thus the BPF program manually allocates a fixed number of
+bytes out of metadata via ``bpf_xdp_adjust_meta`` and calls a subset
+of kfuncs to populate it. The userspace ``XSK`` consumer computes
+``xsk_umem__get_data() - METADATA_SIZE`` to locate that metadata.
+Note, ``xsk_umem__get_data`` is defined in ``libxdp`` and
+``METADATA_SIZE`` is an application-specific constant (``AF_XDP`` receive
+descriptor does _not_ explicitly carry the size of the metadata).
+
+Here is the ``AF_XDP`` consumer layout (note missing ``data_meta`` pointer)::
+
+  +----------+-----------------+------+
+  | headroom | custom metadata | data |
+  +----------+-----------------+------+
+                               ^
+                               |
+                        rx_desc->address
+
+XDP_PASS
+========
+
+This is the path where the packets processed by the XDP program are passed
+into the kernel. The kernel creates the ``skb`` out of the ``xdp_buff``
+contents. Currently, every driver has custom kernel code to parse
+the descriptors and populate ``skb`` metadata when doing this ``xdp_buff->skb``
+conversion, and the XDP metadata is not used by the kernel when building
+``skbs``. However, TC-BPF programs can access the XDP metadata area using
+the ``data_meta`` pointer.
+
+In the future, we'd like to support a case where an XDP program
+can override some of the metadata used for building ``skbs``.
+
+bpf_redirect_map
+================
+
+``bpf_redirect_map`` can redirect the frame to a different device.
+Some devices (like virtual ethernet links) support running a second XDP
+program after the redirect. However, the final consumer doesn't have
+access to the original hardware descriptor and can't access any of
+the original metadata. The same applies to XDP programs installed
+into devmaps and cpumaps.
+
+This means that for redirected packets only custom metadata is
+currently supported, which has to be prepared by the initial XDP program
+before redirect. If the frame is eventually passed to the kernel, the
+``skb`` created from such a frame won't have any hardware metadata populated
+in its ``skb``. If such a packet is later redirected into an ``XSK``,
+that will also only have access to the custom metadata.
+
+bpf_tail_call
+=============
+
+Adding programs that access metadata kfuncs to the ``BPF_MAP_TYPE_PROG_ARRAY``
+is currently not supported.
+
+Example
+=======
+
+See ``tools/testing/selftests/bpf/progs/xdp_metadata.c`` and
+``tools/testing/selftests/bpf/prog_tests/xdp_metadata.c`` for an example of
+BPF program that handles XDP metadata.