This document specifies version 1.0 of the eBPF instruction set.
+Documentation conventions
+=========================
+
+For brevity, this document uses the type notion "u64", "u32", etc.
+to mean an unsigned integer whose width is the specified number of bits.
Registers and calling convention
================================
eBPF has two instruction encodings:
* the basic instruction encoding, which uses 64 bits to encode an instruction
-* the wide instruction encoding, which appends a second 64-bit immediate value
- (imm64) after the basic instruction for a total of 128 bits.
+* the wide instruction encoding, which appends a second 64-bit immediate (i.e.,
+ constant) value after the basic instruction for a total of 128 bits.
+
+The fields conforming an encoded basic instruction are stored in the
+following order::
+
+ opcode:8 src_reg:4 dst_reg:4 offset:16 imm:32 // In little-endian BPF.
+ opcode:8 dst_reg:4 src_reg:4 offset:16 imm:32 // In big-endian BPF.
+
+**imm**
+ signed integer immediate value
+
+**offset**
+ signed integer offset used with pointer arithmetic
-The basic instruction encoding looks as follows:
+**src_reg**
+ the source register number (0-10), except where otherwise specified
+ (`64-bit immediate instructions`_ reuse this field for other purposes)
-============= ======= =============== ==================== ============
-32 bits (MSB) 16 bits 4 bits 4 bits 8 bits (LSB)
-============= ======= =============== ==================== ============
-immediate offset source register destination register opcode
-============= ======= =============== ==================== ============
+**dst_reg**
+ destination register number (0-10)
+
+**opcode**
+ operation to perform
+
+Note that the contents of multi-byte fields ('imm' and 'offset') are
+stored using big-endian byte ordering in big-endian BPF and
+little-endian byte ordering in little-endian BPF.
+
+For example::
+
+ opcode offset imm assembly
+ src_reg dst_reg
+ 07 0 1 00 00 44 33 22 11 r1 += 0x11223344 // little
+ dst_reg src_reg
+ 07 1 0 00 00 11 22 33 44 r1 += 0x11223344 // big
Note that most instructions do not use all of the fields.
Unused fields shall be cleared to zero.
+As discussed below in `64-bit immediate instructions`_, a 64-bit immediate
+instruction uses a 64-bit immediate value that is constructed as follows.
+The 64 bits following the basic instruction contain a pseudo instruction
+using the same format but with opcode, dst_reg, src_reg, and offset all set to zero,
+and imm containing the high 32 bits of the immediate value.
+
+This is depicted in the following figure::
+
+ basic_instruction
+ .-----------------------------.
+ | |
+ code:8 regs:8 offset:16 imm:32 unused:32 imm:32
+ | |
+ '--------------'
+ pseudo instruction
+
+Thus the 64-bit immediate value is constructed as follows:
+
+ imm64 = (next_imm << 32) | imm
+
+where 'next_imm' refers to the imm value of the pseudo instruction
+following the basic instruction. The unused bytes in the pseudo
+instruction are reserved and shall be cleared to zero.
+
Instruction classes
-------------------
============== ====== =================
4 bits (MSB) 1 bit 3 bits (LSB)
============== ====== =================
-operation code source instruction class
+code source instruction class
============== ====== =================
-The 4th bit encodes the source operand:
+**code**
+ the operation code, whose meaning varies by instruction class
- ====== ===== ========================================
- source value description
- ====== ===== ========================================
- BPF_K 0x00 use 32-bit immediate as source operand
- BPF_X 0x08 use 'src_reg' register as source operand
- ====== ===== ========================================
+**source**
+ the source operand location, which unless otherwise specified is one of:
-The four MSB bits store the operation code.
+ ====== ===== ==============================================
+ source value description
+ ====== ===== ==============================================
+ BPF_K 0x00 use 32-bit 'imm' value as source operand
+ BPF_X 0x08 use 'src_reg' register value as source operand
+ ====== ===== ==============================================
+**instruction class**
+ the instruction class (see `Instruction classes`_)
Arithmetic instructions
-----------------------
``BPF_ALU`` uses 32-bit wide operands while ``BPF_ALU64`` uses 64-bit wide operands for
otherwise identical operations.
-The 'code' field encodes the operation as below:
+The 'code' field encodes the operation as below, where 'src' and 'dst' refer
+to the values of the source and destination registers, respectively.
======== ===== ==========================================================
code value description
BPF_ADD 0x00 dst += src
BPF_SUB 0x10 dst -= src
BPF_MUL 0x20 dst \*= src
-BPF_DIV 0x30 dst /= src
+BPF_DIV 0x30 dst = (src != 0) ? (dst / src) : 0
BPF_OR 0x40 dst \|= src
BPF_AND 0x50 dst &= src
BPF_LSH 0x60 dst <<= src
BPF_RSH 0x70 dst >>= src
BPF_NEG 0x80 dst = ~src
-BPF_MOD 0x90 dst %= src
+BPF_MOD 0x90 dst = (src != 0) ? (dst % src) : dst
BPF_XOR 0xa0 dst ^= src
BPF_MOV 0xb0 dst = src
BPF_ARSH 0xc0 sign extending shift right
BPF_END 0xd0 byte swap operations (see `Byte swap instructions`_ below)
======== ===== ==========================================================
+Underflow and overflow are allowed during arithmetic operations, meaning
+the 64-bit or 32-bit value will wrap. If eBPF program execution would
+result in division by zero, the destination register is instead set to zero.
+If execution would result in modulo by zero, for ``BPF_ALU64`` the value of
+the destination register is unchanged whereas for ``BPF_ALU`` the upper
+32 bits of the destination register are zeroed.
+
``BPF_ADD | BPF_X | BPF_ALU`` means::
- dst_reg = (u32) dst_reg + (u32) src_reg;
+ dst = (u32) ((u32) dst + (u32) src)
+
+where '(u32)' indicates that the upper 32 bits are zeroed.
``BPF_ADD | BPF_X | BPF_ALU64`` means::
- dst_reg = dst_reg + src_reg
+ dst = dst + src
``BPF_XOR | BPF_K | BPF_ALU`` means::
- dst_reg = (u32) dst_reg ^ (u32) imm32
+ dst = (u32) dst ^ (u32) imm32
``BPF_XOR | BPF_K | BPF_ALU64`` means::
- dst_reg = dst_reg ^ imm32
+ dst = dst ^ imm32
+Also note that the division and modulo operations are unsigned. Thus, for
+``BPF_ALU``, 'imm' is first interpreted as an unsigned 32-bit value, whereas
+for ``BPF_ALU64``, 'imm' is first sign extended to 64 bits and the result
+interpreted as an unsigned 64-bit value. There are no instructions for
+signed division or modulo.
Byte swap instructions
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
``BPF_ALU | BPF_TO_LE | BPF_END`` with imm = 16 means::
- dst_reg = htole16(dst_reg)
+ dst = htole16(dst)
``BPF_ALU | BPF_TO_BE | BPF_END`` with imm = 64 means::
- dst_reg = htobe64(dst_reg)
+ dst = htobe64(dst)
Jump instructions
-----------------
``BPF_MEM | <size> | BPF_STX`` means::
- *(size *) (dst_reg + off) = src_reg
+ *(size *) (dst + offset) = src
``BPF_MEM | <size> | BPF_ST`` means::
- *(size *) (dst_reg + off) = imm32
+ *(size *) (dst + offset) = imm32
``BPF_MEM | <size> | BPF_LDX`` means::
- dst_reg = *(size *) (src_reg + off)
+ dst = *(size *) (src + offset)
Where size is one of: ``BPF_B``, ``BPF_H``, ``BPF_W``, or ``BPF_DW``.
``BPF_ATOMIC | BPF_W | BPF_STX`` with 'imm' = BPF_ADD means::
- *(u32 *)(dst_reg + off16) += src_reg
+ *(u32 *)(dst + offset) += src
``BPF_ATOMIC | BPF_DW | BPF_STX`` with 'imm' = BPF ADD means::
- *(u64 *)(dst_reg + off16) += src_reg
+ *(u64 *)(dst + offset) += src
In addition to the simple atomic operations, there also is a modifier and
two complex atomic operations:
The ``BPF_FETCH`` modifier is optional for simple atomic operations, and
always set for the complex atomic operations. If the ``BPF_FETCH`` flag
-is set, then the operation also overwrites ``src_reg`` with the value that
+is set, then the operation also overwrites ``src`` with the value that
was in memory before it was modified.
-The ``BPF_XCHG`` operation atomically exchanges ``src_reg`` with the value
-addressed by ``dst_reg + off``.
+The ``BPF_XCHG`` operation atomically exchanges ``src`` with the value
+addressed by ``dst + offset``.
The ``BPF_CMPXCHG`` operation atomically compares the value addressed by
-``dst_reg + off`` with ``R0``. If they match, the value addressed by
-``dst_reg + off`` is replaced with ``src_reg``. In either case, the
-value that was at ``dst_reg + off`` before the operation is zero-extended
+``dst + offset`` with ``R0``. If they match, the value addressed by
+``dst + offset`` is replaced with ``src``. In either case, the
+value that was at ``dst + offset`` before the operation is zero-extended
and loaded back to ``R0``.
64-bit immediate instructions
``BPF_LD | BPF_DW | BPF_IMM`` means::
- dst_reg = imm64
+ dst = imm64
Legacy BPF Packet access instructions