plcrate.1
Author: cmaier@cmassoc.net

    plcrate(1)                                   Qualcomm Atheros Open Powerline Toolkit                                  plcrate(1)

    NAME
           plcrate - Qualcomm Atheros AR7x00 PHY Rate Monitor

    SYNOPSIS
           plcrate [options] [device] [device] [...]

    DESCRIPTION
           The  Atheros  PHY  Rate Utility polls one or more devices and prints the average transmit and receive PHY rates between a
           device and each neighboring network device.  Output is column-oriented and suitable for loading  into  a  spreadsheet  or
           being read by a simple program.

           This  program  is  part of the Qualcomm Atheros Powerline Toolkit.  See the plc man page for an overview and installation
           instructions.

    CHIPSETS
           QCA6410, QCA7000, QCA7420

    OPTIONS
           -c     Display coded PHY rates.  Coded PHY rates are displayed by default so this option is redundant  but  it  has  been
                  kept for backword compatibility.  This option and option -u are mutually exclusive.

           -d seconds
                  Traffic  duration in seconds per connection.  Directional traffic is systematically sent between each pair of pow‐
                  erline network devices for this period of time.  Consequently, the total time needed to generate  traffic  between
                  all network devices will be approximately n! times this value, so don''t get carried away.  The minimum value is 1
                  second and the maximum value is 60 seconds.

           -e     Redirects stderr messages to stdout.  By convention status and error messages are printed on stderr while  primary
                  program output is printed on stdout.  This option prints all output on stdout in cases where this is desired.

           -i interface
                  Select  the host Ethernet interface.  All requests are sent via this host interface and only reponses received via
                  this host interface are recognized.  The default interface is eth1 because most people use eth0 as their principle
                  network  connection;  however,  if  environment  string "PLC" is defined then it takes precedence over the default
                  interface.  This option then takes precedence over either default.

           -n     Reads the average transmit and receive PHY rate for wach device using VS_NW_INFO and prints it  on  stdout.   Each
                  output  line  displays  the  ethernet  interface,  source  address, destination address and either the transmit or
                  receive PHY rate.

           -o milliseconds
                  Read timeout in milliseconds.  Values range from 0 through UINT_MAX.  This is  the  maximum  time  allowed  for  a
                  response.  The default is shown in brackets on the program menu.

           -q     Enter quiet mode.  Progress messages are suppressed.

           -r     Reads device hardware and software revision information using VS_SW_VER and prints it on stdout.

           -R     Resets the device using VS_RS_DEV.

           -t     Generate  powerline traffic between the local device and each remote device on each powerline network connected to
                  the host.  It does not generate any traffic between remote powerline device pairs.  This option is especially use‐
                  ful  when  remote  powerline  devices are not connected to Ethernet devices capable of sending traffic back to the
                  host.

           -T     Generate powerline traffic between all devices on each powerline network connected to the host.   This  option  is
                  similar  to  option  -t  but it takes much longer because traffic is systematically generated between each pair of
                  powerline devices.  Consequently, the time to complete will increase factorially as the number of network  devices
                  increases.  Such complete traffic path coverage is not always needed.

           -u     Display  un-coded  PHY  rates.   Coded PHY rates are displayed by default.  This option and option -c are mutually
                  exclusive.

           -v     Enter verbose mode.  All Etherenet frames sent or received by the program are displayed on stdout.

           -x     Exit program on first error with a non-zero exit code.  This option allows  shell  scripts  to  detect  failed  or
                  incomplete operations and take the appropriate action.

           -?,--help
                  Print program help summary on stdout.  This option takes precedence over other options on the command line.

           -!,--version
                  Print program version information on stdout.  This option takes precedence over other options on the command line.
                  Use this option when sending screen dumps to Atheros Technical Support so that they know exactly which version  of
                  the Linux Toolkit you are using.

    ARGUMENTS
           device The  MAC  address  of some powerline device.  More than one address may be specified.  If more than one address is
                  specified then operations are performed on each device in turn.  The default address is local.   See  DEVICES  for
                  information about symbolic device addresses.

    DEVICES
           Powerline devices use Ethernet Media Access Control (MAC) addresses.  A MAC address is a 48-bit value entered as 12 hexa‐
           decimal digits in upper, lower or mixed character case.  Octets may be separated with colons for clarity.   For  example,
           "00b052000001", "00:b0:52:00:00:01" and "00b052:000001" are valid and equivalent.

           The following MAC addresses are special and may be entered by name instead of number.

           all    Same as "broadcast".

           broadcast
                  A  synonym  for  the Ethernet broadcast address, FF:FF:FF:FF:FF:FF.  All devices, whether local, remote or foreign
                  recognize messages sent to this address.  A remote device is any device at the far end of a powerline  connection.
                  A foreign device is any device not manufactured by Atheros.

           local  A  synonym  for the Qualcomm Atheros vendor specific Local Management Address (LMA), 00:B0:52:00:00:01.  All local
                  Atheros devices recognize this address but remote and foreign devices do not.  A remote device is  any  device  at
                  the far end of a powerline connection.  A foreign device is any device not manufactured by Atheros.

    REFERENCES
           See the Qualcomm Atheros HomePlug AV Firmware Technical Reference Manual for more information.

    EXAMPLES
           The  following  example  displays  the  average  transmit and receive PHY rates from each of two devices.  One is a local
           device connected to interface eth2 and the other is a remote device at the far end of the powerline.  In this case,  they
           are the only two devices on the powerline network.  Observe the recipricol rates shown.

              # plcrate -ni eth2 00:B0:52:00:00:AA 00:B0:52:00:00:BB
              eth2 00:B0:52:00:00:AA 00:B0:52:00:00:BB TX 163 mbps
              eth2 00:B0:52:00:00:AA 00:B0:52:00:00:BB RX 176 mbps
              eth2 00:B0:52:00:00:BB 00:B0:52:00:00:AA TX 176 mbps
              eth2 00:B0:52:00:00:BB 00:B0:52:00:00:AA RX 163 mbps

           The  following  example  generates powerline traffic between the local device and each remote device because option -t is
           present.  It then displays the PHY rate read from the local device.

              # plcrate -tni eth2
              eth2 00:B0:52:00:00:AA 00:B0:52:00:00:BB TX 163 mbps
              eth2 00:B0:52:00:00:AA 00:B0:52:00:00:BB RX 176 mbps

    DISCLAIMER
           Atheros HomePlug AV Vendor Specific Management Message Entry structure and content is proprietary  to  Qualcomm  Atheros,
           Ocala FL USA.  Consequently, public information may not be available.  Qualcomm Atheros reserves the right to modify mes‐
           sage structure and content in future firmware releases without any obligation to notify or compensate users of this  pro‐
           gram.

    SEE ALSO
           PLC(1), amprate(1), int6krate(1)

    CREDITS
            Nathaniel Houghton <nhoughto@qca.qualcomm.com>
            Charles Maier <cmaier@qca.qualcomm.com>

    open-plc-utils-0.0.3                                        Mar 2014                                                  plcrate(1)

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