28-128 IPC ConfigurationWhen configuring IPC, go to these sections for information you are interested in:z IPC Overviewz Enabling IPC Performance Statisticsz Displaying and Maintaining IPCIPC OverviewIntroduction to IPCInter-Process Communication (IPC) is a reliable communication mechanism among different nodes.The following are the basic concepts in IPC.NodeAn IPC node is an entity supporting IPC; it is an independent processing unit. In actual application, anIPC node corresponds to one CPU.z One centralized device has only one CPU, therefore corresponding to one node.z An Intelligent Resilient Framework (IRF) is an interconnection of several centralized devices, witheach member device corresponding to one node. Therefore, an IRF corresponds to multiplenodes.z Typically a distributed device is available with multiple boards, each having one CPU, someboards are available with multiple CPUs. Some distributed devices may be available with multipleCPUs, for example service CPU and OAM CPU. Therefore, a distributed device corresponds tomultiple nodes.Therefore, in actual application, IPC is mainly applied on an IRF or distributed device; it provides areliable transmission mechanism between different devices and boards.LinkAn IPC link is a connection between any two IPC nodes. There is one and only one link between anytwo nodes for packet sending and receiving. All IPC nodes are fully connected.IPC links are created when the system is initialized: When a node starts up, it sends handshakepackets to other nodes; a connection is established between them if the handshake succeeds.The system identifies the link connectivity between two nodes using link status. An IPC node can havemultiple links, each having its own status.ChannelA channel is a communication interface for an upper layer application module of a node tocommunicate with an application module of a peer node. Each node assigns a locally unique channelnumber to each upper layer application module.
