# rrddmma
> **A Rust RDMA library.**
[](https://crates.io/crates/rrddmma)
[](https://crates.io/crates/rrddmma)
[](LICENSE-MIT)
This library is more for academic use than for industry.
It is highly specialized to Mellanox/NVIDIA ConnectX network adapter series.
**WARNING: the interfaces are unstable and under continuous change!**
## Linkage
This library supports multiple linkage types to the `ibverbs` library.
1. First, this library respects
existing [MLNX_OFED](https://network.nvidia.com/products/infiniband-drivers/linux/mlnx_ofed/) installations.
It works on both v4.9-x and v5.x versions.
- ~~MLNX_OFED v4.9-x will enable experimental verbs.~~ (TODO)
- ~~MLNX_OFED v5.x will enable `mlx5dv_*` features.~~ (TODO)
2. Otherwise, `rrddmma` will try to find an existing `libibverbs` installation via `pkg-config`.
- ~~This will enable enable `mlx5dv_*` features.~~ (TODO)
3. Otherwise, `rrddmma` will try to download [rdma-core](https://github.com/linux-rdma/rdma-core) and build from source.
You need to ensure that the dependencies are properly installed.
In Ubuntu and other Debian-derived OSs, these are:
```shell
sudo apt install -y build-essential cmake gcc libclang-dev libudev-dev libsystemd-dev \
libnl-3-dev libnl-route-3-dev ninja-build pkg-config valgrind \
python3-dev cython3 python3-docutils pandoc
```
Building from source is different from the previous two approaches in that `libibverbs` is linked statically and
cannot detect providers at runtime.
This library currently only allows the `mlx5` provider.
- ~~This will enable enable `mlx5dv_*` features.~~ (TODO)
## Some Design Principles
### Panics in Fallible Methods
It is widely recognized as a bad design pattern to panic in fallible methods (i.e., methods that return a `Result`).
However, in RDMA, this is not the case because there are actually two different types of errors:
- **Programming errors**: These are logic errors caused by the programmers who do not follow the instructions of the
manual.
Examples include forgetting to bind a QP to a local port before making or binding a peer for it.
These errors should be caught during development and testing, should never happen in production, and is never
recoverable.
`rrddmma` panics for these errors.
- **Runtime errors**: These are errors reported by the `libibverbs` library, such as failing to create a QP due to
resource exhaustion.
These errors are recoverable and should be handled by the caller.
`rrddmma` returns `Err` for these errors.