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OFED

OFED, short for OpenFabrics Enterprise Distribution, is a software stack that provides the drivers, libraries, and utilities needed to deploy InfiniBand and RDMA networking on Linux and other platforms. It is designed to enable low-latency, high-throughput communication across InfiniBand fabrics as well as RDMA over Converged Ethernet (RoCE) and, to some extent, iWARP networks. The distribution is maintained by the OpenFabrics Alliance and community contributors, with packaging and integration across various Linux environments.

The core components of OFED include kernel drivers for InfiniBand adapters and related devices, along with

Historically, OFED played a central role in standardizing and distributing the InfiniBand/RDMA software stack for Linux.

See also InfiniBand, RDMA, RoCE, OpenFabrics Alliance.

user-space
libraries
such
as
libibverbs
and
the
RDMA
core
stack
(librdmacm
and
related
utilities).
OFED
also
provides
tools
for
configuring,
monitoring,
and
diagnosing
InfiniBand
networks,
as
well
as
support
for
high-performance
communication
used
by
message-passing
interfaces
like
Open
MPI
and
MVAPICH.
By
offering
a
common
stack,
OFED
simplifies
deployment
of
RDMA-enabled
networks
in
data
centers,
HPC
clusters,
and
other
environments
requiring
fast
inter-node
data
transfer.
Over
time,
the
ecosystem
has
evolved
with
the
development
of
newer
components
such
as
rdma-core
and
vendor-specific
driver
packages,
but
OFED
components
continue
to
influence
how
RDMA-enabled
systems
are
deployed
and
maintained.
The
stack
remains
relevant
for
users
seeking
a
unified,
interoperable
foundation
for
InfiniBand
and
RDMA
networking.