LIBARCHIVE_INTERNALS(3) manual page 
== NAME == 
'''libarchive_internals''' 
- description of libarchive internal interfaces 
== OVERVIEW == 
The 
'''libarchive''' 
library provides a flexible interface for reading and writing 
streaming archive files such as tar and cpio. 
Internally, it follows a modular layered design that should 
make it easy to add new archive and compression formats. 
== GENERAL ARCHITECTURE == 
Externally, libarchive exposes most operations through an 
opaque, object-style interface. 
The 
'''archive_entry'''(3) 
objects store information about a single filesystem object. 
The rest of the library provides facilities to write 
'''archive_entry'''(3) 
objects to archive files, 
read them from archive files, 
and write them to disk. 
(There are plans to add a facility to read 
'''archive_entry'''(3) 
objects from disk as well.) 

The read and write APIs each have four layers: a public API 
layer, a format layer that understands the archive file format, 
a compression layer, and an I/O layer. 
The I/O layer is completely exposed to clients who can replace 
it entirely with their own functions. 

In order to provide as much consistency as possible for clients, 
some public functions are virtualized. 
Eventually, it should be possible for clients to open 
an archive or disk writer, and then use a single set of 
code to select and write entries, regardless of the target. 
== READ ARCHITECTURE == 
From the outside, clients use the 
'''archive_read'''(3) 
API to manipulate an 
'''archive''' 
object to read entries and bodies from an archive stream. 
Internally, the 
'''archive''' 
object is cast to an 
'''archive_read''' 
object, which holds all read-specific data. 
The API has four layers: 
The lowest layer is the I/O layer. 
This layer can be overridden by clients, but most clients use 
the packaged I/O callbacks provided, for example, by 
'''archive_read_open_memory'''(3), 
and 
'''archive_read_open_fd'''(3). 
The compression layer calls the I/O layer to 
read bytes and decompresses them for the format layer. 
The format layer unpacks a stream of uncompressed bytes and 
creates 
'''archive_entry''' 
objects from the incoming data. 
The API layer tracks overall state 
(for example, it prevents clients from reading data before reading a header) 
and invokes the format and compression layer operations 
through registered function pointers. 
In particular, the API layer drives the format-detection process: 
When opening the archive, it reads an initial block of data 
and offers it to each registered compression handler. 
The one with the highest bid is initialized with the first block. 
Similarly, the format handlers are polled to see which handler 
is the best for each archive. 
(Prior to 2.4.0, the format bidders were invoked for each 
entry, but this design hindered error recovery.) 
=== I/O Layer and Client Callbacks=== 
The read API goes to some lengths to be nice to clients. 
As a result, there are few restrictions on the behavior of 
the client callbacks. 

The client read callback is expected to provide a block 
of data on each call. 
A zero-length return does indicate end of file, but otherwise 
blocks may be as small as one byte or as large as the entire file. 
In particular, blocks may be of different sizes. 

The client skip callback returns the number of bytes actually 
skipped, which may be much smaller than the skip requested. 
The only requirement is that the skip not be larger. 
In particular, clients are allowed to return zero for any 
skip that they don't want to handle. 
The skip callback must never be invoked with a negative value. 

Keep in mind that not all clients are reading from disk: 
clients reading from networks may provide different-sized 
blocks on every request and cannot skip at all; 
advanced clients may use 
'''mmap'''(2) 
to read the entire file into memory at once and return the 
entire file to libarchive as a single block; 
other clients may begin asynchronous I/O operations for the 
next block on each request. 
=== Decompresssion Layer=== 
The decompression layer not only handles decompression, 
it also buffers data so that the format handlers see a 
much nicer I/O model. 
The decompression API is a two stage peek/consume model. 
A read_ahead request specifies a minimum read amount; 
the decompression layer must provide a pointer to at least 
that much data. 
If more data is immediately available, it should return more: 
the format layer handles bulk data reads by asking for a minimum 
of one byte and then copying as much data as is available. 

A subsequent call to the 
'''consume'''() 
function advances the read pointer. 
Note that data returned from a 
'''read_ahead'''() 
call is guaranteed to remain in place until 
the next call to 
'''read_ahead'''(). 
Intervening calls to 
'''consume'''() 
should not cause the data to move. 

Skip requests must always be handled exactly. 
Decompression handlers that cannot seek forward should 
not register a skip handler; 
the API layer fills in a generic skip handler that reads and discards data. 

A decompression handler has a specific lifecycle: 
<dl> 
<dt>Registration/Configuration</dt><dd> 
When the client invokes the public support function, 
the decompression handler invokes the internal 
'''__archive_read_register_compression'''() 
function to provide bid and initialization functions. 
This function returns 
'''NULL''' 
on error or else a pointer to a 
'''struct''' decompressor_t. 
This structure contains a 
''void'' * config 
slot that can be used for storing any customization information. 
</dd><dt>Bid</dt><dd> 
The bid function is invoked with a pointer and size of a block of data. 
The decompressor can access its config data 
through the 
''decompressor'' 
element of the 
'''archive_read''' 
object. 
The bid function is otherwise stateless. 
In particular, it must not perform any I/O operations. 

The value returned by the bid function indicates its suitability 
for handling this data stream. 
A bid of zero will ensure that this decompressor is never invoked. 
Return zero if magic number checks fail. 
Otherwise, your initial implementation should return the number of bits 
actually checked. 
For example, if you verify two full bytes and three bits of another 
byte, bid 19. 
Note that the initial block may be very short; 
be careful to only inspect the data you are given. 
(The current decompressors require two bytes for correct bidding.) 
</dd><dt>Initialize</dt><dd> 
The winning bidder will have its init function called. 
This function should initialize the remaining slots of the 
''struct'' decompressor_t 
object pointed to by the 
''decompressor'' 
element of the 
''archive_read'' 
object. 
In particular, it should allocate any working data it needs 
in the 
''data'' 
slot of that structure. 
The init function is called with the block of data that 
was used for tasting. 
At this point, the decompressor is responsible for all I/O 
requests to the client callbacks. 
The decompressor is free to read more data as and when 
necessary. 
</dd><dt>Satisfy I/O requests</dt><dd> 
The format handler will invoke the 
''read_ahead'', 
''consume'', 
and 
''skip'' 
functions as needed. 
</dd><dt>Finish</dt><dd> 
The finish method is called only once when the archive is closed. 
It should release anything stored in the 
''data'' 
and 
''config'' 
slots of the 
''decompressor'' 
object. 
It should not invoke the client close callback. 
</dd></dl> 
=== Format Layer=== 
The read formats have a similar lifecycle to the decompression handlers: 
<dl> 
<dt>Registration</dt><dd> 
Allocate your private data and initialize your pointers. 
</dd><dt>Bid</dt><dd> 
Formats bid by invoking the 
'''read_ahead'''() 
decompression method but not calling the 
'''consume'''() 
method. 
This allows each bidder to look ahead in the input stream. 
Bidders should not look further ahead than necessary, as long 
look aheads put pressure on the decompression layer to buffer 
lots of data. 
Most formats only require a few hundred bytes of look ahead; 
look aheads of a few kilobytes are reasonable. 
(The ISO9660 reader sometimes looks ahead by 48k, which 
should be considered an upper limit.) 
</dd><dt>Read header</dt><dd> 
The header read is usually the most complex part of any format. 
There are a few strategies worth mentioning: 
For formats such as tar or cpio, reading and parsing the header is 
straightforward since headers alternate with data. 
For formats that store all header data at the beginning of the file, 
the first header read request may have to read all headers into 
memory and store that data, sorted by the location of the file 
data. 
Subsequent header read requests will skip forward to the 
beginning of the file data and return the corresponding header. 
</dd><dt>Read Data</dt><dd> 
The read data interface supports sparse files; this requires that 
each call return a block of data specifying the file offset and 
size. 
This may require you to carefully track the location so that you 
can return accurate file offsets for each read. 
Remember that the decompressor will return as much data as it has. 
Generally, you will want to request one byte, 
examine the return value to see how much data is available, and 
possibly trim that to the amount you can use. 
You should invoke consume for each block just before you return it. 
</dd><dt>Skip All Data</dt><dd> 
The skip data call should skip over all file data and trailing padding. 
This is called automatically by the API layer just before each 
header read. 
It is also called in response to the client calling the public 
'''data_skip'''() 
function. 
</dd><dt>Cleanup</dt><dd> 
On cleanup, the format should release all of its allocated memory. 
</dd></dl> 
=== API Layer=== 
XXX to do XXX 
== WRITE ARCHITECTURE == 
The write API has a similar set of four layers: 
an API layer, a format layer, a compression layer, and an I/O layer. 
The registration here is much simpler because only 
one format and one compression can be registered at a time. 
=== I/O Layer and Client Callbacks=== 
XXX To be written XXX 
=== Compression Layer=== 
XXX To be written XXX 
=== Format Layer=== 
XXX To be written XXX 
=== API Layer=== 
XXX To be written XXX 
== WRITE_DISK ARCHITECTURE == 
The write_disk API is intended to look just like the write API 
to clients. 
Since it does not handle multiple formats or compression, it 
is not layered internally. 
== GENERAL SERVICES == 
The 
'''archive_read''', 
'''archive_write''', 
and 
'''archive_write_disk''' 
objects all contain an initial 
'''archive''' 
object which provides common support for a set of standard services. 
(Recall that ANSI/ISO C90 guarantees that you can cast freely between 
a pointer to a structure and a pointer to the first element of that 
structure.) 
The 
'''archive''' 
object has a magic value that indicates which API this object 
is associated with, 
slots for storing error information, 
and function pointers for virtualized API functions. 
== MISCELLANEOUS NOTES == 
Connecting existing archiving libraries into libarchive is generally 
quite difficult. 
In particular, many existing libraries strongly assume that you 
are reading from a file; they seek forwards and backwards as necessary 
to locate various pieces of information. 
In contrast, libarchive never seeks backwards in its input, which 
sometimes requires very different approaches. 

For example, libarchive's ISO9660 support operates very differently 
from most ISO9660 readers. 
The libarchive support utilizes a work-queue design that 
keeps a list of known entries sorted by their location in the input. 
Whenever libarchive's ISO9660 implementation is asked for the next 
header, checks this list to find the next item on the disk. 
Directories are parsed when they are encountered and new 
items are added to the list. 
This design relies heavily on the ISO9660 image being optimized so that 
directories always occur earlier on the disk than the files they 
describe. 

Depending on the specific format, such approaches may not be possible. 
The ZIP format specification, for example, allows archivers to store 
key information only at the end of the file. 
In theory, it is possible to create ZIP archives that cannot 
be read without seeking. 
Fortunately, such archives are very rare, and libarchive can read 
most ZIP archives, though it cannot always extract as much information 
as a dedicated ZIP program. 
== SEE ALSO == 
'''archive'''(3), 
'''archive_entry'''(3), 
'''archive_read'''(3), 
'''archive_write'''(3), 
'''archive_write_disk'''(3) 
== HISTORY == 
The 
'''libarchive''' 
library first appeared in 
FreeBSD 5.3. 
== AUTHORS == 
The 
'''libarchive''' 
library was written by 
Tim Kientzle  &lt;kientzle@acm.org.&gt; 
