8.3.1.8. Other features

8.3.1.8.1. Introduction

As you may have observed, the example network layer implementation from the previous tutorial is just over 400 lines in length, while the reference implementation is over 2000 lines long. You may be wondering what do these thousands of lines account for, if the shorter version already implements all features used by Anjay.

This largely owes to the fact that the network layer in avs_commons has been designed not just for Anjay, but for generic use in multiple projects. For example, it is also used in LibCWMP, another AVSystem product; it can also be used to build third-party applications.

Most of the additional functionality that is not used by Anjay has been developed in part or in full due to LibCWMP requirements.

This article will try to sum up the additional functionality that the reference implementation provides on top of the IP address stickiness support example.

8.3.1.8.2. avs_net_addrinfo support

The reference implementation in avs_commons provides its own wrapper over getaddrinfo() - the avs_net_addrinfo_resolve() family of functions, that is both used internally by the socket implementation, and might be used by user code.

Additionally, this custom wrapper randomizes the list of addresses returned by getaddrinfo(), which is a requirement of the CWMP protocol.

8.3.1.8.3. Additional operations

The following operations, not present in the tutorial implementation, are added:

  • send_to

  • receive_from

  • accept, including a non-standard implementation for UDP

  • get_interface_name

  • get_local_host

Additionally, more options are supported for the get_opt operation:

  • AVS_NET_SOCKET_OPT_ADDR_FAMILY

  • AVS_NET_SOCKET_OPT_MTU

8.3.1.8.4. Socket configuration support

The reference implementation includes full support for the avs_net_socket_configuration_t structure. No configuration options except reuse_addr and preferred_endpoint are directly used by Anjay, but they can be directly specified by the user through the socket_config field in anjay_configuration_t.

In the tutorial implementation all such configuration is ignored.

8.3.1.8.5. More polished implementation

Methods that exist in the tutorial implementation, are implemented in a more polished way in the reference one. Some of such details have been already mentioned in notes during the tutorial. These include:

  • Proper handling of errno codes is included.

  • Connect operation falls back to other IP addresses returned by getaddrinfo() in case of an error.

  • Proper timeout handling is included for connect and send operations.

  • Send operation is implemented using recvmsg() if possible, resulting in better handling of truncated datagrams.

  • Send operation for TCP implements a loop to handle short writes properly.

8.3.1.8.6. Additional portability

These tutorials have been written with readability in mind, designed only to work on a typical Linux system. The reference implementation, on the other hand, is designed to be highly portable and work not only on any POSIX-compliant system, but also e.g. on lwIP and Windows Sockets.

For this reason, the reference implementation includes multiple alternate implementations for various functions, selected as needed at compile time but contributing to the source code size:

  • Support for IPv4 and IPv6 can be separately enabled or disabled at compile time.

    • Additional special handling of IPv4-mapped IPv6 addresses is provided for better interoperability.

  • A custom implementation of inet_ntop() is provided for compatibility with platform that do not provide one.

  • Timeout handling in “receive” and similar operations may be performed using either poll() or select(), depending on which one is available.

  • avs_net_resolved_endpoint_get_host_port() may use either getnameinfo() or inet_ntop(), depending on which one is available.

  • Receive operation might use either recvmsg() or recvfrom(), depending on which one is available.

  • Network interface name handling might use either getifaddrs() or ioctl(SIOCGIFCONF), depending on which one is available.