plcfwd.1
Author: cmaier@cmassoc.net

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

    NAME
           plcfwd - Qualcomm Atheros Forward Configuration

    SYNOPSIS
           plcfwd [options] [device] [device] [...]

    DESCRIPTION
           Set  VLAN  and MAC address lookup for tx path traffic.  Setup requests are processed by master PLC device attached to the
           local device.  Upon receiving the request MME, the PLC device will send a confirm MME back with the results to the origi‐
           nating host.

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

    OPTIONS
           -A     Add VLANIDs of multiple slaves to memory.

           -C     Commit configruation to flash memory.

           -D VLANID
                  Set the default VLAN ID expressed as a 32-bit decimal value.

           -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.

           -f filename
                  Read  additional device addresses and VLAN IDs from the named file.  This option may appear multiple times and may
                  appear in addition option -z.  Each occurance of this option adds one or more entries to the VLANID table used  by
                  options -A or -R.  The format used on each line of this file is identical to that used by option -z.

           -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.

           -l length
                  The read data length in bytes.  This option is ignored during other operations.  The length is expressed in  deci‐
                  mal.  The default is 0 bytes.

           -M state
                  Enable  or  disable VLANID forwarding on the master.  Valid states are 0 to disable and 1 but values up to 255 are
                  permitted.  Keywords "on" and "enable" are the same as 1.  Keywords "off" and "disable" are the same as 0.

           -o offset
                  The read data offset in bytes.  This option is ignored during other operations.  The offset is expressed in  hexa‐
                  decimal.  The default is 0 bytes;

           -q     Suppresses status messages on stderr.

           -R     Remove VLANIDs of multiple slaves from memory.

           -S state
                  Enable  or  disable VLANID forwarding on all slaves.  Valid states are 0 to disable and 1 but values up to 255 are
                  permitted.  Keywords "on" and "enable" are the same as 1.  Keywords "off" and "disable" are the same as 0.

           -t timeout

           -v     Prints additional information on stdout.  In particular, this option dumps outgoing Ethernet packets on stdout.

           -z address,id[,id[,...]]
                  A device address and associated VLAN IDs separated by commas.  This option  may  appear  multiple  times  and  may
                  appear in addition option -f.  Each occurance of this option adds one entry to the VLANID table used by options -A
                  or -R.  The string format used here is identical to that used on each line of input files named by option -f.

           -?,--help
                  Displays program help information on stderr.  This option takes precedence over all other options on  the  command
                  line except version information.

           -!,--version
                  Displays  program  version information on stderr.  This option takes precedence over all other options on the com‐
                  mand line except help information.  Use this option when sending screen dumps to Atheros technical staff.

    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 technical information.

    DISCLAIMER
           Atheros HomePlug AV Vendor Specific Management Message 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 message
           structure and content in future firmware releases without any obligation to notify or compensate users of this program.

    EXAMPLES
           The following example reads 100 bytes starting at offset 0x24.  The operation is  read  because  no  other  operation  is
           specifed using -A, -C, -R, -M or -S.  The offset is always in hexadecimal and length is always in decimal.

              # plcfwd -o 24 -l 100

           The following example adds three VLAN IDs to the VLANID table on  device 00:B0:52:CA:FE:08.  Option -z creates the VLANID
           table and option -A adds table content to the device.  This program supports up to 10 VLAN IDs per entry but PLC firmware
           supports 8 maximum.

              # plcfwd -A -z 00:B0:52:CA:FE:08,2300,2313,2415

           The  following  example  does the same thing but adds three table entries.  The first entry is enclosed in quotes because
           spaces appear in the entry.  The third entry has more than 10 VLAN IDs.  The program will discard  the  last  ID  without
           indication but PLC firmware should report an error because there are more than 8 IDs reported in the request message.

              #     plcfwd     -A     -z     "00:B0:52:CA:FE:08,     2300,     2313     ,     2415"    -z    00B052BABE01,0100    -z
           00B052888888,100,200,300,400,500,600,700,800,900,1000,1100

           To avoid typing the above command line many times, you can save the entries in file plcfwd.txt, like so ...

              00:B0:52:CA:FE:08, 2300, 2313 , 2415
              00B052BABE01,0100
              00B052888888,100,200,300,400,500,600,700,800,900,1000,1100

           The next example adds these entries to the VLANID table by naming the file that contains the entries using option -f.

              # plcfwd -A -f plcfwd.txt

           The next example removes the same entries to the VLANID table.

              # plcfwd -R -f plcfwd.txt

           Of course, you can combine options -z and -f to cumulative effect.

    SEE ALSO
           PLC(1),

    CREDITS
            Charles Maier <cmaier@qca.qualcomm.com>

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

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