netdev - RE: Use of ENOTSUPP in drivers?

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Date:	Mon, 13 Jan 2014 09:41:57 +0000
From:	David Laight <David.Laight@...LAB.COM>
To:	'Ben Hutchings' <bhutchings@...arflare.com>,
	Sabrina Dubroca <sd@...asysnail.net>
CC:	"netdev@...r.kernel.org" <netdev@...r.kernel.org>
Subject: RE: Use of ENOTSUPP in drivers?

From: Ben Hutchings
> I believe they should all be patched.  According to
> include/linux/errno.h, ENOTSUPP is meant for use in the NFSv3 code only.
> (But it's apparently erroneously used *all over* the tree, not just in
> net drivers!)

The 'real' problem is that there are quite a few very specific errno
values, but very few general ones.
I suspect that once (way back in the 1980s - the definitions predate linux)
adding new errno values was easy, and some that might have been general
got documented for their single use - the text for EAGAIN used to be
"No more processes".
New errno values were added for some subsystems (like NFS) but documented
with subsystem-specific texts.
So there are few generic errno codes except EINVAL and ENXIO - neither
of which is helpful.
Nothing for thinks like:
- I don't understand the request.
- I don't support the request.
- Some internal limit reached.
etc.

	David