Date:	Tue, 23 Feb 2016 10:20:09 -0500
From:	Andy Gospodarek <gospo@...ulusnetworks.com>
To:	Jiri Pirko <jiri@...nulli.us>
Cc:	Hannes Frederic Sowa <hannes@...essinduktion.org>,
	netdev@...r.kernel.org, davem@...emloft.net, idosch@...lanox.com,
	eladr@...lanox.com, yotamg@...lanox.com, ogerlitz@...lanox.com,
	yishaih@...lanox.com, dledford@...hat.com, sean.hefty@...el.com,
	hal.rosenstock@...il.com, eugenia@...lanox.com,
	roopa@...ulusnetworks.com, nikolay@...ulusnetworks.com,
	hadarh@...lanox.com, jhs@...atatu.com, john.fastabend@...il.com,
	jeffrey.t.kirsher@...el.com, brouer@...hat.com, ivecera@...hat.com,
	rami.rosen@...el.com
Subject: Re: [patch net-next 3/9] mlx4: Implement port type setting via
 devlink interface

On Tue, Feb 23, 2016 at 03:26:27PM +0100, Jiri Pirko wrote:
> Tue, Feb 23, 2016 at 02:28:05PM CET, hannes@...essinduktion.org wrote:
> >On 23.02.2016 13:21, Jiri Pirko wrote:
> >>Tue, Feb 23, 2016 at 12:26:00PM CET, hannes@...essinduktion.org wrote:
> >>>Hi Jiri,
> >>>
> >>>On 22.02.2016 19:31, Jiri Pirko wrote:
> >>>>From: Jiri Pirko <jiri@...lanox.com>
> >>>>
> >>>>So far, there has been an mlx4-specific sysfs file allowing user to
> >>>>change port type to either Ethernet of InfiniBand. This is very
> >>>>inconvenient.
> >>>
> >>>Again, I want to express my concerns regarding all of this until this will be
> >>>integrated into udev/systemd for stable device names. While one can build
> >>>wrapper code around devlink to have stable devlink ports, I don't see a
> >>>reason to include kernel code which actually has more problems than the sysfs
> >>>approach. This harms admins to use those devices and will additionally
> >>>require user space to write boiler plate code.
> >>
> >>Sysfs is not the place to do this things. It was already discussed here
> >>multiple times. There was and attempt to use configfs, which was also
> >>refused. Netlink is the only place to go. For multiple reasons,
> >>including well defined api and behaviour, notifications, etc.
> >
> >I am not against netlink at all. My fear with this interface is simply:
> >
> >1) we introduce another ifindex/name like identifiers. It took a long time
> >until this stuff finally worked fine with linux. It needs persistent storage
> >in userspace being applied at boot time. Why this complications for this
> >probably lesser often used interface?
> 
> Lesser often where? On switches, this interface will be used all the
> time. You have to have some handle to manipulate the chip-wide stuff. In
> our case it is devlink0. Similar to wireless, they have phy0. I believe
> it is completely legit.
> 
> 
> >
> >2) The actual devlink attributes get managed from inside devlink and not the
> >driver. So driver need to modify devlink.c/devlink.h in core to add new
> >attributes.
> 
> That is exactly the point! Vendors cannot add their own specific crap,
> they have to do things in generic way and extend devlink iface
> accordingly. That's what we do now with ASIC shared buffer configuration
> via devlink for example (in addition to port type and splitter).
> 
> 
> >
> >1) is easily solvable, just drop the ifindex style attributes and always
> >force the user to enter the bus and bus-topology id.
> 
> But why? Use can easily get that info and map it to devlink index. It
> aligns with nl80211 iface.
> 
> Do you really want to do commands like:
> myhost:~$ dl dev show pci_0000:01:00.0
> ?
> 
> 
> >
> >For 2) I don't really know what drivers want, not sure if it is easier to add
> >some small helper functions to add sysfs attributes to kobjects without
> >necessarily holding a net_device. Thus mellanox drivers can use it and I am
> >not sure how many other networking cards allow switching ports between ib and
> >eth type. Port splitting only happens for interfaces which already have a
> >net_device, no?
> 
> Not necessarily. IB ports that has no net_device could be split as well.
> Hannes, again, sysfs approach was refused couple of times in past for this
> purpose. Please leave sysfs alone.
> 
> 
> >
> >>I think it is quite trivial to teach udev to name devlinkX devices
> >>according to pci address (or any other address). That's all what is
> >>needed here. I don't understand your concerns.
> >
> >I don't think that this interface needs the same complexity as network
> >interfaces.
> 
> Again, it aligns nicely with what they to in wireless in nl80211
> interface. I don't see any complexity.
> 
> 
> >
> >I am not sure, but one of the initial problems was that this information
> >should already be there before the driver actually gets loaded, no? These
> >changes don't solve this problem either?
> 
> This is planned to be implemented in near future. Basically there would
> be possible to use DEVLINK_CMD_NEW to add devlink iface for specific device
> even before the driver gets loaded to serve as a place holder to set values
s/driver/network driver/ right?

> of some predefined set of options. Once the driver registers, it can read
> those and act accordingly. For example, we need that to set "profile" of
> our asic. This is a substitute to module options which are completely
> inappropriate for this usecase.

FWIW, I DO like the idea that the PCI driver contains this information
and netdev creation in the network driver depends on this mapping.  We
see these issues on a regular basis and while have solved it other
ways (rtnl_link_ops and genl which is why I like a cross-vendor way to
do it like this).

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