xemu/docs
Markus Armbruster 39a1815816 qapi: New QMP command query-qmp-schema for QMP introspection
qapi/introspect.json defines the introspection schema.  It's designed
for QMP introspection, but should do for similar uses, such as QGA.

The introspection schema does not reflect all the rules and
restrictions that apply to QAPI schemata.  A valid QAPI schema has an
introspection value conforming to the introspection schema, but the
converse is not true.

Introspection lowers away a number of schema details, and makes
implicit things explicit:

* The built-in types are declared with their JSON type.

  All integer types are mapped to 'int', because how many bits we use
  internally is an implementation detail.  It could be pressed into
  external interface service as very approximate range information,
  but that's a bad idea.  If we need range information, we better do
  it properly.

* Implicit type definitions are made explicit, and given
  auto-generated names:

  - Array types, named by appending "List" to the name of their
    element type, like in generated C.

  - The enumeration types implicitly defined by simple union types,
    named by appending "Kind" to the name of their simple union type,
    like in generated C.

  - Types that don't occur in generated C.  Their names start with ':'
    so they don't clash with the user's names.

* All type references are by name.

* The struct and union types are generalized into an object type.

* Base types are flattened.

* Commands take a single argument and return a single result.

  Dictionary argument or list result is an implicit type definition.

  The empty object type is used when a command takes no arguments or
  produces no results.

  The argument is always of object type, but the introspection schema
  doesn't reflect that.

  The 'gen': false directive is omitted as implementation detail.

  The 'success-response' directive is omitted as well for now, even
  though it's not an implementation detail, because it's not used by
  QMP.

* Events carry a single data value.

  Implicit type definition and empty object type use, just like for
  commands.

  The value is of object type, but the introspection schema doesn't
  reflect that.

* Types not used by commands or events are omitted.

  Indirect use counts as use.

* Optional members have a default, which can only be null right now

  Instead of a mandatory "optional" flag, we have an optional default.
  No default means mandatory, default null means optional without
  default value.  Non-null is available for optional with default
  (possible future extension).

* Clients should *not* look up types by name, because type names are
  not ABI.  Look up the command or event you're interested in, then
  follow the references.

  TODO Should we hide the type names to eliminate the temptation?

New generator scripts/qapi-introspect.py computes an introspection
value for its input, and generates a C variable holding it.

It can generate awfully long lines.  Marked TODO.

A new test-qmp-input-visitor test case feeds its result for both
tests/qapi-schema/qapi-schema-test.json and qapi-schema.json to a
QmpInputVisitor to verify it actually conforms to the schema.

New QMP command query-qmp-schema takes its return value from that
variable.  Its reply is some 85KiBytes for me right now.

If this turns out to be too much, we have a couple of options:

* We can use shorter names in the JSON.  Not the QMP style.

* Optionally return the sub-schema for commands and events given as
  arguments.

  Right now qmp_query_schema() sends the string literal computed by
  qmp-introspect.py.  To compute sub-schema at run time, we'd have to
  duplicate parts of qapi-introspect.py in C.  Unattractive.

* Let clients cache the output of query-qmp-schema.

  It changes only on QEMU upgrades, i.e. rarely.  Provide a command
  query-qmp-schema-hash.  Clients can have a cache indexed by hash,
  and re-query the schema only when they don't have it cached.  Even
  simpler: put the hash in the QMP greeting.

Signed-off-by: Markus Armbruster <armbru@redhat.com>
Reviewed-by: Eric Blake <eblake@redhat.com>
2015-09-21 09:56:49 +02:00
..
qmp migration: create migration event 2015-07-07 14:54:55 +02:00
specs typofixes - v4 2015-09-11 10:45:43 +03:00
aio_notify.promela AioContext: fix broken ctx->dispatching optimization 2015-07-22 12:41:40 +01:00
aio_notify_accept.promela AioContext: optimize clearing the EventNotifier 2015-07-22 12:41:40 +01:00
aio_notify_bug.promela AioContext: fix broken placement of event_notifier_test_and_clear 2015-07-22 12:41:40 +01:00
atomics.txt docs/atomics.txt: fix two typos 2015-04-30 16:05:48 +03:00
bitmaps.md qapi: Rename 'dirty-bitmap' mode to 'incremental' 2015-07-02 09:20:18 +01:00
blkdebug.txt block: Rename BlockDriverCompletionFunc to BlockCompletionFunc 2014-10-20 13:41:27 +02:00
blkverify.txt blkverify: Add block driver for verifying I/O 2010-09-21 17:00:53 +02:00
bootindex.txt Typo, spelling and grammatical fixes 2013-04-12 14:33:20 +02:00
ccid.txt libcacard: improve documentation 2014-06-10 07:44:01 +02:00
ich9-ehci-uhci.cfg usb: update documentation 2011-07-08 11:25:56 +02:00
image-fuzzer.txt docs: List all image elements currently supported by the fuzzer 2014-09-22 11:39:35 +01:00
libcacard.txt maint: remove / fix many doubled words 2015-09-11 10:21:38 +03:00
live-block-ops.txt docs: describe live block operations 2012-01-26 14:49:18 +01:00
memory-hotplug.txt docs: update documentation for memory hot unplug 2015-04-27 21:07:38 +02:00
memory.txt docs: clarify memory region lifecycle 2015-02-16 17:30:19 +01:00
migration.txt migration: Use normal VMStateDescriptions for Subsections 2015-06-12 06:53:57 +02:00
multi-thread-compression.txt docs: Add a doc about multiple thread compression 2015-05-06 17:36:57 +02:00
multiple-iothreads.txt docs/multiple-iothreads.txt: add documentation on IOThread programming 2014-08-15 15:07:13 +02:00
multiseat.txt maint: remove / fix many doubled words 2015-09-11 10:21:38 +03:00
pci_expander_bridge.txt docs: Add PXB documentation 2015-06-03 18:19:19 +02:00
q35-chipset.cfg q35: Add PCIe switch to example q35 configuration 2013-08-21 12:39:15 +03:00
qapi-code-gen.txt qapi: New QMP command query-qmp-schema for QMP introspection 2015-09-21 09:56:49 +02:00
qcow2-cache.txt docs: document how to configure the qcow2 L2/refcount caches 2015-09-04 21:00:32 +02:00
qdev-device-use.txt docs: Fix qdev-device-use.txt typo in -chardev serial, path=COM<NUM> 2011-09-09 09:43:17 +01:00
qemupciserial.inf Docs: Introduce multiport serial support in qemupciserial.inf. 2014-03-12 10:33:23 +01:00
rcu.txt rcu: add g_free_rcu 2015-02-16 17:30:19 +01:00
rdma.txt rdma: Fix incorrect description in comments 2014-09-20 17:55:53 +04:00
spice-port-fqdn.txt docs: add spice-port-fqdn.txt 2012-12-17 14:01:41 +01:00
tracing.txt Tracing docs fix configure option and description 2014-11-18 14:05:54 +00:00
usb-storage.txt Fix typos and misspellings 2013-03-22 13:25:07 +01:00
usb2.txt usb: update docs for bus name change 2013-04-03 11:39:43 +02:00
virtio-balloon-stats.txt virtio-balloon: return empty data when no stats are available 2014-05-25 12:46:58 +03:00
vnc-ledstate-Pseudo-encoding.txt doc: document the Pseudo-encoding of LED state 2013-04-29 08:28:51 -05:00
writing-qmp-commands.txt qapi: Rename qmp_marshal_input_FOO() to qmp_marshal_FOO() 2015-09-21 09:56:48 +02:00
xbzrle.txt xbzrle: optimize XBZRLE to decrease the cache misses 2015-01-15 17:49:43 +05:30
xen-save-devices-state.txt Introduce "xen-save-devices-state" 2012-03-19 18:21:00 +00:00