Doca Common
NVIDIAOfficialCreated by NVIDIA
- Skill
- Tool integration
- Software development
- Apache-2.0
- Medium risk
AutoGineer summary
Written by AutoGineer from the skill’s own files, not by the author
The doca-common skill serves as the essential foundation for all DOCA-based development. It covers the core primitives required before interacting with higher-level libraries like Flow, RDMA, or Ethernet. This includes managing the doca_ctx lifecycle, discovering hardware via doca_dev and doca_devinfo, implementing zero-copy I/O with doca_buf and doca_mmap, driving the progress engine (doca_pe), and configuring the two-tier logging system. It is designed to be loaded alongside per-library skills to provide the underlying context and structural requirements for any DOCA application.
What it does
- Guides the initialization and lifecycle management of doca_ctx and doca_dev.
- Explains the wiring of doca_buf, doca_mmap, and doca_buf_inventory for zero-copy I/O.
- Provides patterns for driving the doca_pe progress engine to ensure task completion.
- Clarifies the two-tier DOCA logging model for effective application debugging.
- Assists in capability discovery using doca_devinfo and doca_*_cap_* functions.
- Helps interpret common DOCA_ERROR_* codes encountered during application startup.
When to use it
- When setting up the initial skeleton for a new DOCA application.
- When debugging task submission issues where tasks are submitted but never complete.
- When needing to share buffers across different DOCA libraries.
- When troubleshooting initialization errors like DOCA_ERROR_BAD_STATE.
- When configuring logging levels to capture application-specific debug output.
- When verifying hardware capabilities before executing library-specific features.
Advantages
- Ensures a consistent and correct foundation for all DOCA library interactions.
- Reduces debugging time by addressing lifecycle and primitive-level issues first.
- Provides a unified approach to zero-copy buffer management across libraries.
- Standardizes the integration of the progress engine and logging across projects.
Usage examples
- “My DOCA RDMA tasks are submitted but nothing completes. What am I missing?”
- The agent will guide you through the doca_pe (progress engine) connection and the required run-loop pattern to ensure tasks are drained correctly.
- “I am getting a DOCA_ERROR_BAD_STATE from doca_ctx_start. How do I fix this?”
- The agent will help you verify the lifecycle order of your context initialization and ensure all required dependencies are configured before starting.
- “How do I share a buffer between doca_dma and doca_rdma?”
- The agent will explain the wiring of doca_mmap and doca_buf_inventory to create a shared buffer surface that both libraries can reference.
- “My DOCA_LOG_DBG lines are not appearing even with --sdk-log-level 60.”
- The agent will explain the two-tier logging model and how to correctly register your application-side log levels.
Install
Download the skill as a ZIP:
https://autogineer.com/agent-skills/nvidia/doca-common/downloadUnzip it into the cross-client skills folder of your project:
mkdir -p .agents/skills && unzip doca-common.zip -d .agents/skills
Documentation by NVIDIA
DOCA Common
Examples
"Tasks submit but nothing completes." — start at the progress engine and ctx lifecycle, not a per-library rewrite.
"DOCA_ERROR_BAD_STATE from doca_ctx_start." — walk the Common lifecycle order before blaming Flow or RDMA.
Instructions
Follow Loading order below. Open the tasks companion for configure / build / run. Open the capabilities companion for ctx / buf / pe / log. Do not open every companion file.
Where to start: This skill is the foundation every DOCA app
loads first — before doca-flow, doca-rdma, doca-eth, doca-comch, or
any other higher-level library. Every doca_<library>_* context is
built on top of doca_ctx, every device handle is a doca_dev
discovered through doca_devinfo, every zero-copy buffer is a
doca_buf from a doca_buf_inventory over a doca_mmap, every
task completion drains through a doca_pe, and every log line emits
through doca_log. Open the capabilities companion when
the question is what does Common express on this install; open
the tasks companion when the user wants to do something
(configure / build / modify / run / test / debug). If the user has
not installed DOCA yet, route to
doca-setup/SKILL.md first. If the user is
already past the foundation and asking a library-specific question
(e.g. "how do I program a Flow pipe"), load the matching per-library
skill alongside this one — they cross-link back here for the shared
primitives.
Example questions this skill answers well
The CLASSES of doca-common questions this skill is built to answer, each with one worked example. The agent should treat the class as the load-bearing piece — the worked example is a single instance.
"What is the doca-common foundation I have to set up BEFORE I open a doca-flow / doca-rdma / doca-eth / … context?" — worked example: "I'm starting a brand-new DOCA Flow program on BlueField-3; what's the doca-common skeleton I need before I open the Flow port?". Answered by the universal foundation walk in
configure +
ctx +
dev +
progress engine.
"How do I discover a device and gate on its capabilities before trusting the public docs?" — worked example: "I want to use
doca_eth_txqbut the docs hint at a feature only on certain firmware bands". Answered by the capability-discovery rule (doca_devinfo_create_list→doca_*_cap_*against the activedoca_devinfois the runtime authority) indev +
use.
"What's the doca_buf / doca_mmap / doca_buf_inventory wiring for zero-copy I/O, and what's the lifecycle order?" — worked example: "I want to register a user-space buffer with my device, carve it into N data-plane buffers, and reference-count them across multiple DOCA libraries". Answered by the zero-copy buffer model in
buf +
the buffer-lifecycle walk in
configure +
use.
"How does the progress engine work and where do I have to call it?" — worked example: "my doca_rdma task submits cleanly but nothing completes — what loop am I missing?". Answered by the PE surface in
progress engine
the run-loop pattern in ## run.
"Why don't my DOCA log lines appear at the level I expect, and what's the difference between
--sdk-log-leveland the app-side setter?" — worked example: "I set--sdk-log-level 60(DEBUG), my ownDOCA_LOG_DBGlines still don't print". Answered by the two-tier log model in ## logthe tier-flip iteration in ## log.
"What does this
DOCA_ERROR_*from adoca_buf_*/doca_ctx_*/doca_dev_*/doca_pe_*/doca_log_*call mean?" — worked example: "DOCA_ERROR_BAD_STATEfromdoca_ctx_start". Answered by the Common overlay on the cross-libraryDOCA_ERROR_*taxonomy inError taxonomy
the layered ladder in
debug that escalates to
doca-debug/SKILL.md.
Audience
This skill serves every external developer building applications
that consume any DOCA library — i.e., users whose code calls any
doca_* symbol (directly in C/C++, or through FFI/bindings from
another language). Whether the user's primary library is doca-flow,
doca-rdma, doca-eth, doca-comch, doca-dma, doca-rmax, doca-sha,
doca-aes-gcm, doca-erasure-coding, or any other, the doca-common
surface is under it and the user will hit doca_buf, doca_ctx,
doca_dev, doca_pe, and doca_log as part of the first-app
journey. It is not for NVIDIA developers contributing to DOCA
Common itself.
Language scope
DOCA Common ships as a C library with pkg-config module name
doca-common. The shipped samples that demonstrate Common primitives
live inside every per-library samples tree (any
/opt/mellanox/doca/samples/<library>/<sample>/*_main.c is a worked
example of the universal foundation — doca_devinfo_create_list
→ doca_dev_open → per-library doca_ctx create → doca_pe_create
→ doca_pe_connect_ctx → doca_ctx_start → submit work → drive
doca_pe_progress → drain completions → doca_ctx_stop → destroy).
C and C++ consumers are the canonical case and the worked examples
in the tasks companion assume that path. Other-language consumers (Rust, Go,
Python, …) consume the same *.so through FFI or language-specific
bindings; the skill's contribution in that case is to keep the
universal foundation walk, the lifecycle, the capability-discovery
rule, the PE-drives-completion rule, and the two-tier log model
language-neutral, and to route the agent to the public C ABI as the
authoritative surface that any wrapper will eventually call.
When to load this skill
Load this skill whenever the user is doing any hands-on DOCA work — it is the foundation. Concretely:
Setting up the universal DOCA-side skeleton before opening any per-library context (Flow, RDMA, Eth, Comch, DMA, Rmax, …).
Discovering devices and representors and gating capability use on the active
doca_devinfovia thedoca_*_cap_*family.Wiring
doca_mmap+doca_buf_inventory+doca_buffor zero-copy I/O that crosses libraries (e.g. doca-eth feeds doca-dma feeds doca-rdma — they share the same buf surface).Driving the progress engine (
doca_pe_create/doca_pe_connect_ctx/doca_pe_progress) — the universal task-completion drain every DOCA Core context relies on.Wiring DOCA Log into a fresh app or modifying a shipped sample to add the user's own per-component log lines via the two-tier (
--sdk-log-levelvs app-side registry) model.Debugging a
DOCA_ERROR_*returned from anydoca_buf_*/doca_ctx_*/doca_dev_*/doca_pe_*/doca_log_*call — the Common surface is where most lifecycle / capability / permission errors first surface for higher-level libraries.Designing or extending non-C bindings (Rust, Go, Python, …) that wrap any DOCA library — for the universal foundation surface (buf, ctx, dev, pe, log) the wrapper has to expose first.
Do not load this skill for library-specific Flow, RDMA, Eth,
Comch, DMA, Rmax, … questions in isolation — load the matching
per-library skill alongside this one. Do not load this skill for
general DOCA orientation, install of DOCA itself, or
"where do I find docs". For those, use
doca-public-knowledge-map/SKILL.md
or doca-setup/SKILL.md.
What this skill provides
This is a thin loader. The body keeps only the orientation needed to pick the right next file. The substantive Common material lives in two companion files:
the capabilities companion — what doca-common expresses on this install: the
## Capabilities and modesoverview of the universal primitives every DOCA application touches; the five subsystem H2s (## log,## buf,## ctx,## dev,## progress engine) that own the per-primitive surface; the## Version compatibilitydoca-common-specific overlay; the## Error taxonomyCommon-side view of the universalDOCA_ERROR_*set; the## Observabilitysurface (logs, PE events, capability snapshots); and the## Safety policyoverlay on the bundle-wide hardware-safety meta-policy.the tasks companion — step-by-step workflows for the universal verbs (
configure,build,modify,run,test,debug,use) PLUS a## logverb-side that covers the two-tier log model in workflow form. Plus aDeferred task verbsblock that points install / deploy / rollback questions at the right next skill.
The skill assumes a host or BlueField where DOCA is already
installed at the standard location and the user has the privileges
their public install profile expects. It does not cover installing
DOCA — that path goes through
doca-setup/SKILL.md.
What this skill deliberately does not ship
This skill is agent guidance, not a samples or templates bundle. To keep the boundary clean, it deliberately does not contain — and pull requests should not add:
Pre-written DOCA application source code, in any language. The verified Common usage shows up inside every shipped DOCA sample at
/opt/mellanox/doca/samples/<library>/<sample>/*_main.cand inside every shipped reference application. The agent's job is to route the user to those files and prescribe a minimum-diff modification on them via the universal modify-a-sample workflow indoca-programming-guide/SKILL.md.Standalone build manifests (
meson.build,CMakeLists.txt,Cargo.toml,setup.py,go.mod, …) parked inside the skill. The agent constructs the build manifest in the user's project directory against the user's installed DOCA, wherepkg-config --modversion doca-commonis the source of truth.A
samples/,bindings/, orreference/subtree of any kind. A mock or incomplete artifact in this skill's tree, even one labeled "reference", is misleading: users will read it as buildable.
Loading order
Read this skill first to confirm the user's question is in scope.
For the universal primitives (
log/buf/ctx/dev/progress engine), thepkg-config --modversion doca-commonanchor, the Common error overlay, observability, and safety policy, see the capabilities companion.For step-by-step workflows — configure, build, modify, run, test, debug, use, log — see the tasks companion.
Both companion files cross-link to each other,
doca-version/SKILL.md for the canonical
version-handling rules,
doca-programming-guide/SKILL.md
for the universal modify-a-shipped-sample workflow and the
cross-library DOCA_ERROR_* taxonomy,
doca-debug/SKILL.md for the cross-cutting
debug ladder, and
doca-public-knowledge-map/SKILL.md
whenever the right answer is "look it up in the public docs or the
installed package layout" rather than "Common-specific guidance".
Related skills
doca-public-knowledge-map/SKILL.md— the routing table for every public DOCA documentation source and the on-disk layout of an installed DOCA package. Always available alongside this skill; this skill expects to be able to defer documentation-finding and install-layout questions there instead of duplicating them.doca-setup/SKILL.md— env preparation, install verification, and the I have no install yet path with the public NGC DOCA container (nvcr.io/nvidia/doca/doca) as the universal Stage-1 fallback. This skill assumes its preconditions are satisfied.doca-version/SKILL.md— canonical DOCA version-handling rules (four-way match, NGC semantics, headers-win-over-docs).pkg-config --modversion doca-commonis the build-time anchor every DOCA install carries; this skill's## Version compatibilityoverlays the Common-specific notes on top.doca-programming-guide/SKILL.md— general DOCA programming patterns shared by every library: the canonicalpkg-config+ meson build pattern, the universal modify-a-shipped-sample first-app workflow, the universal lifecycle, the cross-libraryDOCA_ERROR_*taxonomy, and the program-side debug order. This skill is the primitives layer the programming-guide patterns rest on.doca-debug/SKILL.md— the cross-cutting debug ladder (install / version / build / link / runtime / program / driver) and the verbosity-escalation surface. DOCA Log is the foundationdoca-debugbuilds its runtime-debug story on; this skill is where the two-tier log model and the universal lifecycle errors first surface, anddoca-debugcross-links here for both.doca-structured-tools-contract/SKILL.md— the bundle's structured-tools precedence rule (detect / prefer / fall back / report). The Command appendix in the tasks companion honors this contract.doca-hardware-safety/SKILL.md— the cross-cutting hardware-safety meta-policy this skill's## Safety policyoverlays.Per-library skills (
doca-flow,doca-rdma,doca-eth,doca-comch,doca-dma,doca-rmax,doca-sha,doca-aes-gcm,doca-erasure-coding,doca-compress,doca-dpa,doca-gpunetio,doca-pcc,doca-sta,doca-telemetry,doca-urom,doca-verbs,doca-argp,doca-devemu,doca-dpdk-bridge, …) — every per-library skill cross-links back to this skill for the foundation primitives. Loading this skill alongside any of them is the recommended default.
Files
- ATTRIBUTION.mdAdded by AutoGineer891 B
- BENCHMARK.md10.0 KiB
- CAPABILITIES.md42.3 KiB
- LICENSELicence file added by AutoGineer11.2 KiB
- SKILL.md14.7 KiB
- SKILLCARD.yaml2.7 KiB
- TASKS.md35.1 KiB
- evals/evals.json2.8 KiB
- skill-card.md4.4 KiB
- skill.oms.sig5.1 KiB
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Requirements and compatibility
Works with: Claude Code, Claude apps, OpenAI Codex, GitHub Copilot, Cursor, Gemini CLI, Kiro, OpenCode, Goose, Amp, Roo Code, JetBrains Junie, Factory Droid, Devin (ex-Windsurf), Mistral Vibe, OpenHands, Letta
“Works with” means the tool reads the open Agent Skills format; a skill written for one tool may use features others lack.
The author says: Requires DOCA SDK installed at /opt/mellanox/doca on Linux (Ubuntu 22.04/24.04 or RHEL/SLES) with a BlueField DPU or ConnectX NIC attached. doca-common is present on every healthy DOCA install; reads the user's local install via `pkg-config --modversion doca-common` and inspects /opt/mellanox/doca/{lib,include,samples,applications}. The validation steps require a live DOCA install.
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Attribution and licence
- Created by
- NVIDIA
- Publisher
- NVIDIA (Official)
- Source
- NVIDIA/skills · skills/doca-common · commit fce3cca
- Licence
- Apache License 2.0 (redistribution allowed)
- LICENSE (added by AutoGineer from LICENSE-APACHE)
- ATTRIBUTION.md (written by AutoGineer)
- Synced
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