[Xen-devel] [PATCH] xen-netfront: transmit fully GSO-sized packets

[Jonathan Davies <jonathan.davies@xxxxxxxxxx>]

xen-netfront limits transmitted skbs to be at most 44 segments in size. However,
GSO permits up to 65536 bytes, which means a maximum of 45 segments of 1448
bytes each. This slight reduction in the size of packets means a slight loss in
efficiency.

Since c/s 9ecd1a75d, xen-netfront sets gso_max_size to
    XEN_NETIF_MAX_TX_SIZE - MAX_TCP_HEADER,
where XEN_NETIF_MAX_TX_SIZE is 65535 bytes.

The calculation used by tcp_tso_autosize (and also tcp_xmit_size_goal since c/s
6c09fa09d) in determining when to split an skb into two is
    sk->sk_gso_max_size - 1 - MAX_TCP_HEADER.

So the maximum permitted size of an skb is calculated to be
    (XEN_NETIF_MAX_TX_SIZE - MAX_TCP_HEADER) - 1 - MAX_TCP_HEADER.

Intuitively, this looks like the wrong formula -- we don't need two TCP headers.
Instead, there is no need to deviate from the default gso_max_size of 65536 as
this already accommodates the size of the header.

Currently, the largest skb transmitted by netfront is 63712 bytes (44 segments
of 1448 bytes each), as observed via tcpdump. This patch makes netfront send
skbs of up to 65160 bytes (45 segments of 1448 bytes each).

Fixes: 9ecd1a75d977 ("xen-netfront: reduce gso_max_size to account for max TCP 
header")
Signed-off-by: Jonathan Davies <jonathan.davies@xxxxxxxxxx>
---
 drivers/net/xen-netfront.c | 2 --
 1 file changed, 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/drivers/net/xen-netfront.c b/drivers/net/xen-netfront.c
index e9b960f..fb6e978 100644
--- a/drivers/net/xen-netfront.c
+++ b/drivers/net/xen-netfront.c
@@ -1279,8 +1279,6 @@ static struct net_device *xennet_create_dev(struct 
xenbus_device *dev)
        netdev->ethtool_ops = &xennet_ethtool_ops;
        SET_NETDEV_DEV(netdev, &dev->dev);
 
-       netif_set_gso_max_size(netdev, XEN_NETIF_MAX_TX_SIZE - MAX_TCP_HEADER);
-
        np->netdev = netdev;
 
        netif_carrier_off(netdev);
-- 
1.9.1


_______________________________________________
Xen-devel mailing list
Xen-devel@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://lists.xen.org/xen-devel