dpdk-top

Real-time terminal monitoring for DPDK applications.

Connects to any running DPDK process via the telemetry Unix socket and displays live port stats, throughput rates, per-queue distribution, mempool utilization, and historical charts — without modifying the monitored application or linking against DPDK.

Works with testpmd, l3fwd, and any custom DPDK application that has telemetry enabled (default since DPDK 19.11).

Install

Pre-built binary (Linux / macOS):

curl -sSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/njenia/dpdk-top/main/install.sh | bash

Downloads a static binary from GitHub Releases — no dependencies, no Rust toolchain needed.

With cargo:

cargo install dpdk-top

From source:

git clone https://github.com/njenia/dpdk-top.git
cd dpdk-top
cargo build --release
sudo cp target/release/dpdk-top /usr/local/bin/

Quick start

# Auto-detect DPDK socket and launch TUI
sudo dpdk-top

# Point to a specific socket
dpdk-top -s /var/run/dpdk/rte/dpdk_telemetry.v2

# One-shot JSON output (for scripting)
dpdk-top --once

# Stream JSON every 500ms
dpdk-top --json -i 0.5

TUI views

Key	View	Description
d	Dashboard	Overview of all ports and mempools
p	Port detail	Counters, rates, and per-queue distribution for selected port
g	Graphs	Rolling sparkline charts for pps, throughput, errors
m	Mempools	Detailed mempool utilization with color-coded bars
x	Xstats	Full extended statistics table
?	Help	All keybindings

Navigation:

• ↑/↓ or j/k — select port
• Tab / Shift-Tab — cycle views forward / backward
• [ / ] or 1–9 — switch DPDK instance (when multiple are discovered)
• q or Esc — quit

Multi-instance support

When multiple DPDK processes are running (e.g. separate testpmd instances with different --file-prefix), dpdk-top auto-discovers all telemetry sockets and lets you switch between them:

Found 3 DPDK processes:
  [1] /var/run/dpdk/pmd0/dpdk_telemetry.v2
  [2] /var/run/dpdk/pmd1/dpdk_telemetry.v2
  [3] /var/run/dpdk/pmd2/dpdk_telemetry.v2

Press 1, 2, 3 or [ / ] to switch between instances in the TUI.

CLI options

Option	Description
-s, --socket <PATH>	Telemetry socket path (default: auto-detect)
-i, --interval <SECS>	Poll interval in seconds (default: 1.0)
--port <ID>	Start with this port selected
--once	Print one snapshot with rates and exit
--json	Stream JSON to stdout
--smooth <ALPHA>	EMA smoothing 0.0–1.0 (default: 0.8)
--no-color	Disable colors
-a, --alert <RULE>	Alert rule, e.g. rx_missed_errors>0

How it works

dpdk-top communicates with the DPDK telemetry Unix socket (/var/run/dpdk/<prefix>/dpdk_telemetry.v2). This socket is exposed by any DPDK application that calls rte_eal_init() with telemetry enabled (the default).

It queries these endpoints:

Endpoint	Data
/ethdev/list	Port IDs
/ethdev/info,<id>	Port configuration (driver, MAC, queues)
/ethdev/stats,<id>	Packet/byte counters
/ethdev/xstats,<id>	Extended per-queue stats
/mempool/list	Mempool names
/mempool/info,<name>	Mempool size and utilization

Rates are computed as deltas between polls with configurable EMA smoothing.

Requirements

• A running DPDK application with telemetry enabled
• Access to the telemetry socket (may require sudo if the DPDK app runs as root)
• Linux (primary) or macOS (for development; socket connection uses fallback mode)

License

Apache-2.0 OR MIT