netdev - Re: [PATCH v2 net-next] net: stmmac: add drop transmit status feature

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Date:   Wed, 12 Apr 2017 16:58:33 +0200
From:   Andrew Lunn <andrew@...n.ch>
To:     Joao Pinto <Joao.Pinto@...opsys.com>
Cc:     davem@...emloft.net, netdev@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [PATCH v2 net-next] net: stmmac: add drop transmit status feature

On Wed, Apr 12, 2017 at 01:07:02PM +0100, Joao Pinto wrote:
> Hi Andrew,
> 
> Às 12:56 PM de 4/12/2017, Andrew Lunn escreveu:
> > On Wed, Apr 12, 2017 at 10:26:20AM +0100, Joao Pinto wrote:
> >> When the Drop Transmit Status bit is set, the Tx packet status
> >> received from the MAC is dropped in the MTL. When this bit is reset,
> >> the Tx packet status received from the MAC is forwarded to the
> >> application. This feature will cause a performance improvement.
> >>
> >> Signed-off-by: Joao Pinto <jpinto@...opsys.com>
> >> ---
> >> changes v1->v2:
> >> - removed mask from dwmac4_enable_tx_drop()
> >>
> >>  Documentation/devicetree/bindings/net/stmmac.txt      |  1 +
> >>  drivers/net/ethernet/stmicro/stmmac/common.h          |  2 ++
> >>  drivers/net/ethernet/stmicro/stmmac/dwmac4.h          |  1 +
> >>  drivers/net/ethernet/stmicro/stmmac/dwmac4_core.c     | 12 ++++++++++++
> >>  drivers/net/ethernet/stmicro/stmmac/stmmac_main.c     |  3 +++
> >>  drivers/net/ethernet/stmicro/stmmac/stmmac_platform.c |  2 ++
> >>  include/linux/stmmac.h                                |  1 +
> >>  7 files changed, 22 insertions(+)
> >>
> >> diff --git a/Documentation/devicetree/bindings/net/stmmac.txt b/Documentation/devicetree/bindings/net/stmmac.txt
> >> index f652b0c..dbcb2cc 100644
> >> --- a/Documentation/devicetree/bindings/net/stmmac.txt
> >> +++ b/Documentation/devicetree/bindings/net/stmmac.txt
> >> @@ -60,6 +60,7 @@ Optional properties:
> >>  		 and MAC2MAC connection.
> >>  - snps,tso: this enables the TSO feature otherwise it will be managed by
> >>  		 MAC HW capability register. Only for GMAC4 and newer.
> >> +- snps,drop-tx-status: this enables drop tx status
> > 
> > Hi Joao
> > 
> > Was the conclusion from testing that this cannot be turned on by
> > default?
> 
> This feature is great for applications that need good performance, but has a
> drawback since it has an impact in timestamp feature in Tx. There are some
> operations in PTP where the timestamp is given to the host through the TX status
> in the descriptor, so this will have an impact.
> 
> There's a way of solving this of course by making the driver checking the
> timestamp in the MAC_Tx_Timestamp_Status_XXX registers, but I can only look into
> that feature later in the future.

So the numbers you show, even if they are not on real hardware that
anybody uses, do look good.

But i don't like this DT property, it sounds like it can potential do
bad things to PTP, and you say it can be done without the DT or PTP
problems. So I would personally NACK this patch, and ask you to
re-submit when you have solved these issues.

But i don't use this driver, don't have any hardware, and i'm not a
maintainer for it....

    Andrew