README.md

Amazon FPGA Image (AFI) Management Tools

AWS provides the following set of command-line tools for Amazon FPGA Image (AFI) managment while running on an FPGA-enabled EC2 instance (e.g., F1). The tools currently support Linux Instances only.

• fpga-describe-local-image-slots

  • Returns the FPGA image slot numbers and device mappings to use for the fpga-load-local-image, fpga-clear-local-image, and fpga-describe-local-image commands.

• fpga-describe-local-image

  • Returns the status of the FPGA image for a specified FPGA image slot number. The fpga-image-slot parameter is an index that represents a given FPGA within an instance. Use fpga-describe-local-image-slots to return the available FPGA image slots for the instance.

• fpga-load-local-image

  • Loads the specified FPGA image to the specified slot number, and returns the status of the command. The fpga-image-slot parameter is an index that represents a given FPGA within an instance. Use fpga-describe-local-image to return the FPGA image status, and fpga-describe-local-image-slots to return the available FPGA image slots for the instance.

• fpga-clear-local-image

  • Clears the specified FPGA image slot, including FPGA internal and external memories that are used by the slot. The fpga-image-slot parameter is an index that represents a given FPGA within an instance. Use fpga-describe-local-image to return the FPGA image status, and fpga-describe-local-image-slots to return the available FPGA image slots for the instance.

All of the AFI Management Tools support a -help option that may be used to display the full set of options.

####sudo or root Privileges

The tools require sudo (or root) access since AFI loads and clears are modifying the underlying system hardware (also see the FAQ section "Q: How do the AFI Management Tools work?".

Installs or Updates to the AFI Management Tools

The tools come pre-installed in /usr/bin for Amazon Linux, version 2016.09 or later.

Alternatively, the tools can be downloaded and installed from AWS SDK/HDK GitHub repository aws-fpga, as follows:

$ git clone https://github.com/aws/aws-fpga
$ cd aws-fpga
$ source sdk_setup.sh

The sdk_setup.sh script will build the AFI Management Tools and install them in /usr/bin.

Quickstart

Once you have the AFI Management Tools installed onn your F1 instance, you can display the FPGA slot numbers and PCIe mappings for driver attachment (e.g., PCI Domain:Bus:Device:Function).

Getting Inventory of the Available FPGA Slots

$ sudo fpga-describe-local-image-slots -H

Type  FpgaImageSlot  VendorId    DeviceId    DBDF
AFIDEVICE    0       0x1d0f      0x1042      0000:00:17.0
AFIDEVICE    1       0x1d0f      0x1042      0000:00:18.0
AFIDEVICE    2       0x1d0f      0x1042      0000:00:19.0
AFIDEVICE    3       0x1d0f      0x1042      0000:00:1a.0
AFIDEVICE    4       0x1d0f      0x1042      0000:00:1b.0
AFIDEVICE    5       0x1d0f      0x1042      0000:00:1c.0
AFIDEVICE    6       0x1d0f      0x1042      0000:00:1d.0
AFIDEVICE    7       0x1d0f      0x1042      0000:00:1e.0

• The list displayed above is for F1.16xl instance that have 8 FPGAs on slot 0 through 7.

• The VendorId is the PCIe Configuration space Vendor ID, with 0x1d0f representing the Amazon registered PCIe Vendor ID. The developer can choose the Vendor ID for their own AFIs.

• The DeviceId is the PCIe Configuration space Device ID, with 0x1042 being the default.

• The DBDF is the common PCIe bus topology representating the Domain:Bus#:Device#:Function#.

** NOTE: ** While each FPGA has more than one PCIe Physical Function, the AFI Management Tools will present the VendorId and DeviceId of the first PF only.

Describing the AFI Content Loaded on a Specific FPGA Slot

The following command displays the current state for the given FPGA slot number. The output shows that the FPGA in the “cleared” state right after instance create.

$ sudo fpga-describe-local-image -S 0 -H

Type  FpgaImageSlot  FpgaImageId             StatusName    StatusCode   ShVersion
AFI          0       none                    cleared           1        0x11241611
Type  FpgaImageSlot  VendorId    DeviceId    DBDF
AFIDEVICE    0       0x1d0f      0x1042      0000:00:17.0

Loading an AFI to a Specific FPGA Slot

To load the AFI, use the FPGA slot number and Amazon Global FPGA Image ID parameters (see FAQ for AGFI).

$ sudo fpga-load-local-image -S 0 -I agfi-0123456789abcdefg

Describing the AFI content loaded on a specific FPGA slot after load

Displays the current state for the given FPGA slot number. The output shows the FPGA in the “loaded” state after the FPGA image "load" operation.

$ sudo fpga-describe-local-image -S 0 -H

Type  FpgaImageSlot  FpgaImageId             StatusName    StatusCode   ShVersion
AFI          0       agfi-0123456789abcdefg  loaded            0        0x11241611
Type  FpgaImageSlot  VendorId    DeviceId    DBDF
AFIDEVICE    0       0x1d0f      0x1042      0000:00:17.0

Clearing the FPGA Image on Specific Slot

The following command will clear the FPGA image, including internal and external memories.

$ sudo fpga-clear-local-image -S 0

Describing the AFI content loaded on a specific FPGA slot after clear

The following command displays the current state for the given FPGA slot number. It shows that the FPGA is in the “cleared” state after the FPGA image "clear" operation.

$ sudo fpga-describe-local-image -S 0 -H

Type  FpgaImageSlot  FpgaImageId             StatusName    StatusCode   ShVersion
AFI          0       none                    cleared           1        0x11241611
Type  FpgaImageSlot  VendorId    DeviceId    DBDF
AFIDEVICE    0       0x1d0f      0x1042      0000:00:17.0

Looking at Metrics

The fpga-describe-local-image metrics option may be used to display FPGA image hardware metrics including FPGA PCI and DDR ECC metrics.

Additionally, the fpga-describe-local-image clear-metrics option may be used to display and clear FPGA image hardware metrics (clear on read).

Supported Metrics

The following FPGA image hardware metrics are provided. PCIe related counters have ps or pm prefix which indicates a PCIe slave access (the instance CPU or other FPGAs accessing this FPGA) or PCIe master access (the FPGA is mastering an outbound transaction toward the instance memory or other FPGAs).

• ps-timeout-count (32-bit)

  • The CustomLogic (CL) did not respond to memory-mapped I/O (MMIO) read access from the instance. In most cases this indicated a design flaw in the AFI.

• ps-timeout-addr (64-bit)

  • The first address that triggered a ps-timeout-count event. This is a relative address as the upper bits of the address matching the PCIe BAR are set to zero.

• pm-range-error-count (32-bit)

  • The CustomLogic (CL) trying to initiate outbound Read/Write (PCI master) to instance memory space or other FPGAs on the PCIe fabric, but has illegal address

• pm-range-error-addr (64-bit)

  • The first address that triggered a pm-range-error-count event.

• pm-len-error-count (32-bit)

  • The CustomLogic violated AXI-4 protocol/length (Refer to AWS Shell Interface Specifications)

• pm-len-error-addr (64-bit)

  • The first address that triggered a pm-len-error-count event.

• pm-write-count (64-bit)

  • The number of Doublewords/DW (4 Bytes) data written by the AFI toward the instance memory or other FPGAs. DW with partial byte-enable bit-vector is still counted as whole DW in this counter. This counter will not increment when any of the pm-???-error-count events happen.

• pm-read-count (64-bit)

  • The number of Doublewords/DW (4 Bytes) data read by the AFI from the instance memory or other FPGAs. DW with partial byte-enable bit-vector is still counted as whole DW in this counter. This counter will not increment when any of the pm-???-error-count events happen.

• DDR-A write-count or DDR-A read-count (64-bit) (same for DDR-B, DDR-C or DDR-D)

  • Counting the number of bus-beats (512-bit or 64Bytes) on the DRAM controller interface.

FAQ

• Q: What is the Amazon Global FPGA Image ID (AGFI)?

  • The AGFI is an AWS globally unique identifier that is used to reference a specific Amazon FPGA Image (AFI).
  • It is used to refer to a specific AFI when using the FPGA Management tools from within an EC2 instance.
  • In the examples, agfi-0123456789abcdefg is specified in the fpga-load-local-image command in order to load a specific AFI into the given fpga-image-slot.
  • AGFI IDs should not be confused with AFI IDs. The latter are regional IDs that are used to refer to a specific AFI when using the AWS EC2 APIs to create or manage and AFI. For example, when copying an AFI across regions, it will preserve the same AGFI ID, but get a new regional AFI ID.

• Q: What is a fpga-image-slot?

  • The fpga-image-slot is an index that represents a given FPGA within an instance. Use fpga-describe-local-image-slots to return the available FPGA image slots for the instance.

• Q: What are the Vendor and Device IDs listed in the fpga-describe-local-image-slots and fpga-describe-local-image output?

  • The VendorId and DeviceId represent the unique identifiers for a PCI device as seen in the PCI Configuration Header Space. These identifiers are typically used by device drivers to know which devices to attach to. The identifiers are assigned by PCI-SIG. You can use Amazon's default DeviceId, or use your own during the CreateFpgaImage EC2 API.

• Q: What is a DBDF?

  • A DBDF is simply an acronym for Domain:Bus:Device.Function (also see PF).

• Q: What is a PF?

  • A PF refers to a PCI Physical Function that is exposed by the FPGA hardware. For example, it is accessable by user-space programs via the sysfs filesystem in the path /sys/bus/pci/devices/Domain:Bus:Device.Function. The Domain:Bus:Device.Function syntax is the same as returned from lspci program output. Examples: FPGA application PF 0000:00:17.0, FPGA management PF 0000:00:17.1.

• Q: What is a BAR?

  • A PCI Base Address Register (BAR) specifies the memory region where FPGA memory space may be accessed by an external entity (like the instance CPU or other FPGAs). Multiple BARs may be supported by a given PCI device. In this FAQ section (also see PF), BAR0 from a device may be accessed (for example) by opening and memory mapping the resource0 sysfs file in the path /sys/bus/pci/devices/Domain:Bus:Device.Function/resource0. Once BAR0 has been memory mapped, the BAR0 registers may be accessed through a pointer to the memory mapped region (refer to the open and mmap system calls).

• Q: What is the AFIDEVICE and how is it used?

  • Within the fpga-describe-local-image-slots and fpga-describe-local-image commands the AFIDEVICE represents the PCI PF that is used to communicate with the AFI. The AFIDEVICE functionality exposed through the PF is dependent on the AFI that is loaded via the fpga-load-local-image command. For example, DMA and/or memory-mapped IO (MMIO) may be supported depending on the loaded AFI, which is then used to communicate with the AFI in order to perform an accelerated application-dependent task within the FPGA. User-space applications may access the AFIDEVICE PF through sysfs as is noted above in this FAQ section (also see PF).

• Q: How do the AFI Management Tools work?

  • Though most customers do not need to understand the internals of the tools, a short overview is provided here:
  • Within the F1 instance, the FPGAs expose a management PF (e.g. 0000:00:17.1) that is used for control channel communication between the instance and AWS.
  • The FPGA management PF BAR0 is reserved for this communication path.
  • The FPGA application drivers should not access the FPGA management PF BAR0.
  • The AFI Management Tools memory map the FPGA management PF BAR0 and communicate with AWS using internally defined messages and hardware registers.
  • The Amazon FPGA Image Tools require sudo (or root) access since AFI loads and clears are modifying the underlying system hardware.
  • sudo (or root) privilege is also required since the tools access the sysfs PCI subsystem and /dev/kmsg for dmesg logging.
  • For more information on the Amazon FPGA Image Mangement Tool software and FPGA hardware see aws-fpga.

• Q: Can the AFI Management Tools work concurently on multiple FPGA image slots?

  • The tools can be executed on multiple FPGAs concurrently. This may be done without synchronization between processes that are using the tools.

• Q: Can the AFI Management Tools work concurrently from multiple processes on the same FPGA?

  • Without synchronization between processes, the tools should only be executed as one worker process per FPGA (highest level of concurrency), or one worker process accross all FPGAs (least level of concurrency).
  • Multiple concurrent process access to the tools using the same FPGA without proper synchronization between processes will cause response timeouts, and other indeterminate results.

• Q: How can I reset the AFI?

  • The application PF supports PCI Function Level Reset (FLR). User-space programs may trigger a FLR for the application PF via the sysfs filesystem in the path /sys/bus/pci/devices/Domain:Bus:Device.Function/reset
  • Alternatively, the AFI may be reloaded via fpga-load-local-image, and/or reset back to a fully clean slate via fpga-clear-local-image and fpga-load-local-image.

References

• AWS FPGA SDK/HDK on github aws-fpga

AWS EC2 References

• AWS EC2 Getting Started
• AWS EC2 Instance Types
• AWS EC2 User Guide
• AWS EC2 Networking and Security
• AWS EC2 Key Pairs
• AWS EC2 Attach EBS Volume
• AWS EC2 Troubleshooting