4 files changed, 149 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/examples/CMakeLists.txt b/examples/CMakeLists.txt
index f421769c..b40ee4cc 100644
--- a/examples/CMakeLists.txt
+++ b/examples/CMakeLists.txt
@@ -49,4 +49,7 @@ else()
         add_subdirectory(server)
     endif()
     add_subdirectory(export-lora)
+    if (LLAMA_RPC)
+        add_subdirectory(rpc)
+    endif()
 endif()
diff --git a/examples/rpc/CMakeLists.txt b/examples/rpc/CMakeLists.txt
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..ae48fb98
--- /dev/null
+++ b/examples/rpc/CMakeLists.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
+add_executable(rpc-server rpc-server.cpp)
+target_link_libraries(rpc-server PRIVATE ggml llama)
diff --git a/examples/rpc/README.md b/examples/rpc/README.md
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..325d0abc
--- /dev/null
+++ b/examples/rpc/README.md
@@ -0,0 +1,74 @@
+## Overview
+
+The `rpc-server` allows  running `ggml` backend on a remote host.
+The RPC backend communicates with one or several instances of `rpc-server` and offloads computations to them.
+This can be used for distributed LLM inference with `llama.cpp` in the following way:
+
+```mermaid
+flowchart TD
+    rpcb---|TCP|srva
+    rpcb---|TCP|srvb
+    rpcb-.-|TCP|srvn
+    subgraph hostn[Host N]
+    srvn[rpc-server]-.-backend3["Backend (CUDA,Metal,etc.)"]
+    end
+    subgraph hostb[Host B]
+    srvb[rpc-server]---backend2["Backend (CUDA,Metal,etc.)"]
+    end
+    subgraph hosta[Host A]
+    srva[rpc-server]---backend["Backend (CUDA,Metal,etc.)"]
+    end
+    subgraph host[Main Host]
+    ggml[llama.cpp]---rpcb[RPC backend]
+    end
+    style hostn stroke:#66,stroke-width:2px,stroke-dasharray: 5 5
+```
+
+Each host can run a different backend, e.g. one with CUDA and another with Metal.
+You can also run multiple `rpc-server` instances on the same host, each with a different backend.
+
+## Usage
+
+On each host, build the corresponding backend with `cmake` and add `-DLLAMA_RPC=ON` to the build options.
+For example, to build the CUDA backend with RPC support:
+
+```bash
+mkdir build-rpc-cuda
+cd build-rpc-cuda
+cmake .. -DLLAMA_CUDA=ON -DLLAMA_RPC=ON
+cmake --build . --config Release
+```
+
+Then, start the `rpc-server` with the backend:
+
+```bash
+$ bin/rpc-server 0.0.0.0 50052
+create_backend: using CUDA backend
+ggml_cuda_init: GGML_CUDA_FORCE_MMQ:   no
+ggml_cuda_init: CUDA_USE_TENSOR_CORES: yes
+ggml_cuda_init: found 1 CUDA devices:
+  Device 0: NVIDIA T1200 Laptop GPU, compute capability 7.5, VMM: yes
+Starting RPC server on 0.0.0.0:50052
+```
+
+When using the CUDA backend, you can specify the device with the `CUDA_VISIBLE_DEVICES` environment variable, e.g.:
+```bash
+$ CUDA_VISIBLE_DEVICES=0 bin/rpc-server 0.0.0.0 50052
+```
+This way you can run multiple `rpc-server` instances on the same host, each with a different CUDA device.
+
+
+On the main host build `llama.cpp` only with `-DLLAMA_RPC=ON`:
+
+```bash
+mkdir build-rpc
+cd build-rpc
+cmake .. -DLLAMA_RPC=ON
+cmake --build . --config Release
+```
+
+Finally, use the `--rpc` option to specify the host and port of each `rpc-server`:
+
+```bash
+$ bin/main -m ../models/tinyllama-1b/ggml-model-f16.gguf -p "Hello, my name is" --repeat-penalty 1.0 -n 64 --rpc 192.168.88.10:50052,192.168.88.11:50052 -ngl 99
+```
diff --git a/examples/rpc/rpc-server.cpp b/examples/rpc/rpc-server.cpp
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..496af849
--- /dev/null
+++ b/examples/rpc/rpc-server.cpp
@@ -0,0 +1,70 @@
+#ifdef GGML_USE_CUDA
+#include "ggml-cuda.h"
+#endif
+
+#ifdef GGML_USE_METAL
+#include "ggml-metal.h"
+#endif
+
+#include "ggml-rpc.h"
+#include <string>
+#include <stdio.h>
+
+static ggml_backend_t create_backend() {
+    ggml_backend_t backend = NULL;
+#ifdef GGML_USE_CUDA
+    fprintf(stderr, "%s: using CUDA backend\n", __func__);
+    backend = ggml_backend_cuda_init(0); // init device 0
+    if (!backend) {
+        fprintf(stderr, "%s: ggml_backend_cuda_init() failed\n", __func__);
+    }
+#elif GGML_USE_METAL
+    fprintf(stderr, "%s: using Metal backend\n", __func__);
+    backend = ggml_backend_metal_init();
+    if (!backend) {
+        fprintf(stderr, "%s: ggml_backend_metal_init() failed\n", __func__);
+    }
+#endif
+
+    // if there aren't GPU Backends fallback to CPU backend
+    if (!backend) {
+        fprintf(stderr, "%s: using CPU backend\n", __func__);
+        backend = ggml_backend_cpu_init();
+    }
+    return backend;
+}
+
+static void get_backend_memory(size_t * free_mem, size_t * total_mem) {
+#ifdef GGML_USE_CUDA
+    ggml_backend_cuda_get_device_memory(0, free_mem, total_mem);
+#else
+    // TODO: implement for other backends
+    *free_mem = 1;
+    *total_mem = 1;
+#endif
+}
+
+int main(int argc, char * argv[]) {
+    if (argc < 3) {
+        fprintf(stderr, "Usage: %s <host> <port>\n", argv[0]);
+        return 1;
+    }
+    const char * host = argv[1];
+    int port = std::stoi(argv[2]);
+    if (port <= 0 || port > 65535) {
+        fprintf(stderr, "Invalid port number: %d\n", port);
+        return 1;
+    }
+    ggml_backend_t backend = create_backend();
+    if (!backend) {
+        fprintf(stderr, "Failed to create backend\n");
+        return 1;
+    }
+    printf("Starting RPC server on %s:%d\n", host, port);
+    size_t free_mem, total_mem;
+    get_backend_memory(&free_mem, &total_mem);
+    std::string endpoint = std::string(host) + ":" + std::to_string(port);
+    start_rpc_server(backend, endpoint.c_str(), free_mem, total_mem);
+    ggml_backend_free(backend);
+    return 0;
+}