pw_stream

A foundational interface for streaming data

Stable C++ Rust

pw_stream provides a foundational interface for streaming data from one part of a system to another. In the simplest use cases, this is basically a memcpy behind a reusable interface that can be passed around the system. On the other hand, the flexibility of this interface means a pw_stream could terminate is something more complex, like a UART stream or flash memory.

Overview

At the most basic level, pw_stream’s interfaces provide very simple handles to enabling streaming data from one location in a system to an endpoint.

Example:

Status DumpSensorData(pw::stream::Writer& writer) {
  static char temp[64];
  ImuSample imu_sample;
  imu.GetSample(&info);
  size_t bytes_written = imu_sample.AsCsv(temp, sizeof(temp));
  return writer.Write(temp, bytes_written);
}

In this example, DumpSensorData() only cares that it has access to a Writer that it can use to stream data to using Writer::Write(). The Writer itself can be backed by anything that can act as a data “sink.”

pw::stream Interfaces

There are three basic capabilities of a stream:

• Reading – Bytes can be read from the stream.

• Writing – Bytes can be written to the stream.

• Seeking – The position in the stream can be changed.

pw_stream provides a family of stream classes with different capabilities. The most basic class, Stream guarantees no functionality, while the most capable class, SeekableReaderWriter supports reading, writing, and seeking.

Usage overview

pw::stream Interfaces	Accept in APIs?	Extend to create new stream?
pw::stream::Stream	❌	❌
pw::stream::Reader pw::stream::Writer pw::stream::ReaderWriter	✅	❌
pw::stream::SeekableReader pw::stream::SeekableWriter pw::stream::SeekableReaderWriter	✅	✅
pw::stream::RelativeSeekableReader pw::stream::RelativeSeekableWriter pw::stream::RelativeSeekableReaderWriter	✅ (rarely)	✅
pw::stream::NonSeekableReader pw::stream::NonSeekableWriter pw::stream::NonSeekableReaderWriter	❌	✅

API reference

Moved: pw_stream

Why use pw_stream?

Standard API

pw_stream provides a standard way for classes to express that they have the ability to write data. Writing to one sink versus another sink is a matter of just passing a reference to the appropriate Writer.

As an example, imagine dumping sensor data. If written against a random HAL or one-off class, there’s porting work required to write to a different sink (imagine writing over UART vs dumping to flash memory). Building a “dumping” implementation against the Writer interface prevents a dependency on a bespoke API that would require porting work.

Similarly, after building a Writer implementation for a Sink that data could be dumped to, that same Writer can be reused for other contexts that already write data to the pw::stream::Writer interface.

Before:

// Not reusable, depends on `Uart`.
void DumpSensorData(Uart& uart) {
  static char temp[64];
  ImuSample imu_sample;
  imu.GetSample(&info);
  size_t bytes_written = imu_sample.AsCsv(temp, sizeof(temp));
  uart.Transmit(temp, bytes_written, /*timeout_ms=*/ 200);
}

After:

// Reusable; no more Uart dependency!
Status DumpSensorData(Writer& writer) {
  static char temp[64];
  ImuSample imu_sample;
  imu.GetSample(&info);
  size_t bytes_written = imu_sample.AsCsv(temp, sizeof(temp));
  return writer.Write(temp, bytes_written);
}

Reduce intermediate buffers

Often functions that write larger blobs of data request a buffer is passed as the destination that data should be written to. This requires a buffer to be allocated, even if the data only exists in that buffer for a very short period of time before it’s written somewhere else.

In situations where data read from somewhere will immediately be written somewhere else, a Writer interface can cut out the middleman buffer.

Before:

// Requires an intermediate buffer to write the data as CSV.
void DumpSensorData(Uart& uart) {
  char temp[64];
  ImuSample imu_sample;
  imu.GetSample(&info);
  size_t bytes_written = imu_sample.AsCsv(temp, sizeof(temp));
  uart.Transmit(temp, bytes_written, /*timeout_ms=*/ 200);
}

After:

// Both DumpSensorData() and RawSample::AsCsv() use a Writer, eliminating the
// need for an intermediate buffer.
Status DumpSensorData(Writer& writer) {
  RawSample imu_sample;
  imu.GetSample(&info);
  return imu_sample.AsCsv(writer);
}

Prevent buffer overflow

When copying data from one buffer to another, there must be checks to ensure the copy does not overflow the destination buffer. As this sort of logic is duplicated throughout a codebase, there’s more opportunities for bound-checking bugs to sneak in. Writers manage this logic internally rather than pushing the bounds checking to the code that is moving or writing the data.

Similarly, since only the Writer has access to any underlying buffers, it’s harder for functions that share a Writer to accidentally clobber data written by others using the same buffer.

Before:

Status BuildPacket(Id dest, span<const std::byte> payload,
                   span<std::byte> dest) {
  Header header;
  if (dest.size_bytes() + payload.size_bytes() < sizeof(Header)) {
    return Status::ResourceExhausted();
  }
  header.dest = dest;
  header.src = DeviceId();
  header.payload_size = payload.size_bytes();

  memcpy(dest.data(), &header, sizeof(header));
  // Forgetting this line would clobber buffer contents. Also, using
  // a temporary span instead could leave `dest` to be misused elsewhere in
  // the function.
  dest = dest.subspan(sizeof(header));
  memcpy(dest.data(), payload.data(), payload.size_bytes());
}

After:

Status BuildPacket(Id dest, span<const std::byte> payload, Writer& writer) {
  Header header;
  header.dest = dest;
  header.src = DeviceId();
  header.payload_size = payload.size_bytes();

  writer.Write(header);
  return writer.Write(payload);
}

Design notes

Sync & Flush

The pw::stream::Stream API does not include Sync() or Flush() functions. There no mechanism in the Stream API to synchronize a Reader’s potentially buffered input with its underlying data source. This must be handled by the implementation if required. Similarly, the Writer implementation is responsible for flushing any buffered data to the sink.

Flush() and Sync() were excluded from Stream for a few reasons:

• The semantics of when to call Flush()/Sync() on the stream are unclear. The presence of these methods complicates using a Reader or Writer.

• Adding one or two additional virtual calls increases the size of all Stream vtables.

Class hierarchy

All pw_stream classes inherit from a single, common base with all possible functionality: pw::stream::Stream. This structure has some similarities with Python’s io module and C#’s Stream class.

An alternative approach is to have the reading, writing, and seeking portions of the interface provided by different entities. This is how Go’s io package and C++’s input/output library are structured.

We chose to use a single base class for a few reasons:

• The inheritance hierarchy is simple and linear. Despite the linear hierarchy, combining capabilities is natural with classes like ReaderWriter.

  In C++, separate interfaces for each capability requires either a complex virtual inheritance hierarchy or entirely separate hierarchies for each capability. Separate hierarchies can become cumbersome when trying to combine multiple capabilities. A SeekableReaderWriter would have to implement three different interfaces, which means three different vtables and three vtable pointers in each instance.

• Stream capabilities are clearly expressed in the type system, while naturally supporting optional functionality. A Reader may or may not support Stream::Seek(). Applications that can handle seek failures gracefully way use seek on any Reader. If seeking is strictly necessary, an API can accept a SeekableReader instead.

  Expressing optional functionality in the type system is cumbersome when there are distinct interfaces for each capability. Reader, Writer, and Seeker interfaces would not be sufficient. To match the flexibility of the current structure, there would have to be separate optional versions of each interface, and classes for various combinations. Stream would be an “OptionalReaderOptionalWriterOptionalSeeker” in this model.

• Code reuse is maximized. For example, a single Stream::ConservativeLimit() implementation supports many stream implementations.

Virtual interfaces

pw_stream uses virtual functions. Virtual functions enable runtime polymorphism. The same code can be used with any stream implementation.

Virtual functions have inherently has more overhead than a regular function call. However, this is true of any polymorphic API. Using a C-style struct of function pointers makes different trade-offs but still has more overhead than a regular function call.

For many use cases, the overhead of virtual calls insignificant. However, in some extremely performance-sensitive contexts, the flexibility of the virtual interface may not justify the performance cost.

Asynchronous APIs

At present, pw_stream is synchronous. All Stream API calls are expected to block until the operation is complete. This might be undesirable for slow operations, like writing to NOR flash.

Pigweed has not yet established a pattern for asynchronous C++ APIs. The Stream class may be extended in the future to add asynchronous capabilities, or a separate AsyncStream could be created.

Dependencies

• pw_assert

• pw_preprocessor

• pw_status

• pw_span

Zephyr

To enable pw_stream for Zephyr add CONFIG_PIGWEED_STREAM=y to the project’s configuration.

Rust

Pigweed centric analogs to Rust std’s Read, Write, Seek traits as well as a basic Cursor implementation are provided by the pw_stream crate.

Python

There are legacy Python utilities used for reading and writing a serial device for RPC purposes.