bge(7D)
NAME
bge - SUNW,bge Gigabit Ethernet driver for Broadcom BCM5704
SYNOPSIS
/dev/bge*
DESCRIPTION
The bge Gigabit Ethernet driver is a multi-threaded, load-
able, clonable, GLD-based STREAMS driver supporting the Data
Link Provider Interface, dlpi(7P), on Broadcom BCM5703C,
BCM5704, BCM5714, or BCM5715 Gigabit Ethernet controllers
fitted to the system motherboard. These devices incorporate
both MAC and PHY functions and provide three-speed (copper)
Ethernet operation on the RJ-45 connectors.
The bge driver functions include controller initialization,
frame transmit and receive, promiscuous and multicast sup-
port, and error recovery and reporting.
The bge driver and hardware support 'auto-negotiation,' a
protocol specified by the 1000Base-T standard. Auto-
negotiation allows each device to advertise its capabilities
and discover those of its peer (link partner). The highest
common denominator supported by both link partners is
automatically selected, yielding the greatest available
throughput, while requiring no manual configuration. The bge
driver also allows you to configure the advertised capabili-
ties to less than the maximum (where the full speed of the
interface is not required), or to force a specific mode of
operation, irrespective of the link partner's advertised
capabilities.
APPLICATION PROGRAMMING INTERFACE
The cloning character-special device, /dev/bge, is used to
access all BCM570x and BCM571x devices fitted to the system
motherboard.
The bge driver is dependent on /kernel/misc/gld, a loadable
kernel module that provides the bge driver with the DLPI and
STREAMS functionality required of a LAN driver. See gld(7D)
for more details on the primitives supported by the driver.
You must send an explicit DL_ATTACH_REQ message to associate
the opened stream with a particular device (PPA). The PPA ID
is interpreted as an unsigned integer data type and indi-
cates the corresponding device instance (unit) number. The
driver returns an error (DL_ERROR_ACK) if the PPA field
value does not correspond to a valid device instance number
for the system. The device is initialized on first attach
and de-initialized (stopped) at last detach.
The values returned by the driver in the DL_INFO_ACK primi-
tive in response to a DL_INFO_REQ are:
o Maximum SDU is 1500 (ETHERMTU - defined in
<sys/ethernet.h>).
o Minimum SDU is 0.
o DLSAP address length is 8.
o MAC type is DL_ETHER.
o SAP length value is -2, meaning the physical address
component is followed immediately by a 2-byte SAP com-
ponent within the DLSAP address.
o Broadcast address value is the Ethernet/IEEE broadcast
address (FF:FF:FF:FF:FF:FF).
Once in the DL_ATTACHED state, you must send a
DL_BIND_REQ to associate a particular Service Access Point
(SAP) with the stream.
CONFIGURATION
By default, the bge driver performs auto-negotiation to
select the link speed and mode. Link speed and mode can be
any one of the following, (as described in the IEEE803.2
standards):
o 1000 Mbps, full-duplex
o 1000 Mbps, half-duplex
o 100 Mbps, full-duplex
o 100 Mbps, half-duplex
o 10 Mbps, full-duplex
o 10 Mbps, half-duplex
The auto-negotiation protocol automatically selects:
o Speed (1000 Mbps, 100 Mbps, or 10 Mbps)
o Operation mode (full-duplex or half-duplex)
as the highest common denominator supported by both link
partners. Because the bge device supports all modes, the
effect is to select the highest throughput mode supported by
the other device.
Alternatively, you can set the capabilities advertised by
the bge device using ndd(1M). The driver supports a number
of parameters whose names begin with adv_ (see below). Each
of these parameters contains a boolean value that determines
whether the device advertises that mode of operation. In
addition, the adv_autoneg_cap parameter controls whether
autonegotiation is performed. If adv_autoneg_cap is set to
0, the driver forces the mode of operation selected by the
first non-zero parameter in priority order as listed below:
(highest priority/greatest throughput)
adv_1000fdx_cap 1000Mbps full duplex
adv_1000hdx_cap 1000Mpbs half duplex
adv_100fdx_cap 100Mpbs full duplex
adv_100hdx_cap 100Mpbs half duplex
adv_10fdx_cap 10Mpbs full duplex
adv_10hdx_cap 10Mpbs half duplex
(lowest priority/least throughput)
For example, to prevent the device 'bge2' from advertising
gigabit capabilities, enter (as super-user):
# ndd -set /dev/bge2 adv_1000hdx_cap 0
# ndd -set /dev/bge2 adv_1000fdx_cap 0
All capabilities default to enabled. Note that changing any
capability parameter will cause the link to go down while
the link partners renegotiate the link speed/duplex
using the newly changed capabilities.
The current settings of the parameters may be found using
ndd -get. In addition, the driver exports the current
state, speed, and duplex setting of the link via ndd parame-
ters (these are read only and may not be changed). For
example, to check link state of device bge0:
# ndd -get /dev/bge0 link_status
1
# ndd -get /dev/bge0 link_speed
100
# ndd -get /dev/bge0 link_duplex
1
The output above indicates that the link is up and running
at 100Mbps full-duplex.
FILES
/dev/bge*
Character special device
/kernel/drv/sparcv9/bge
bge driver binary
/platform/platform-name/kernel/drv/bge.conf
bge configuration file
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for a description of the following attri-
butes:
____________________________________________________________
| ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
|_____________________________|_____________________________|
| Architecture | SPARC |
|_____________________________|_____________________________|
SEE ALSO
attributes(5), gld(7D), streamio(7I), dlpi(7P)
Writing Device Drivers
STREAMS Programming Guide
Network Interfaces Programmer's Guide
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