netdev - Re: [PATCH net 4/4] docs: net: dsa: replace TODO section with info about history and devel ideas

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Date: Fri, 8 Dec 2023 23:40:50 +0100
From: Linus Walleij <linus.walleij@...aro.org>
To: Vladimir Oltean <vladimir.oltean@....com>
Cc: netdev@...r.kernel.org, "David S. Miller" <davem@...emloft.net>, 
	Eric Dumazet <edumazet@...gle.com>, Jakub Kicinski <kuba@...nel.org>, Paolo Abeni <pabeni@...hat.com>, 
	Andrew Lunn <andrew@...n.ch>, Florian Fainelli <f.fainelli@...il.com>, 
	Luiz Angelo Daros de Luca <luizluca@...il.com>, Alvin Šipraga <alsi@...g-olufsen.dk>, 
	Madhuri Sripada <madhuri.sripada@...rochip.com>, Marcin Wojtas <mw@...ihalf.com>, 
	Tobias Waldekranz <tobias@...dekranz.com>, Arun Ramadoss <arun.ramadoss@...rochip.com>, 
	"Russell King (Oracle)" <rmk+kernel@...linux.org.uk>, Jonathan Corbet <corbet@....net>
Subject: Re: [PATCH net 4/4] docs: net: dsa: replace TODO section with info
 about history and devel ideas

On Fri, Dec 8, 2023 at 8:36 PM Vladimir Oltean <vladimir.oltean@....com> wrote:

> It was a bit unclear to me what the TODO is about and what is even
> actionable about it. I had a discussion with Florian about it at NetConf
> 2023, and it seems that it's about the amount of boilerplate code that
> exists in switchdev drivers, and how that could be maybe made common
> with DSA, through something like another library.
>
> I think we are seeing a lot of people who are looking at DSA now,
> and there is a lot of misunderstanding about why things are the way
> they are, and which are the changes that would benefit the subsystem,
> compared to the changes that go against DSA's past development trend.
>
> I think what is missing is the context, which is admittedly a bit
> hard to grasp considering there are 15 years of development.
> Based on the git log and on the discussions where I participated,
> I tried to cobble up a section about DSA's history. Here and there,
> I've mentioned the limitations that I am aware of, and some possible
> ways forward.
>
> I'm also personally surprised by the amount of change in DSA over the
> years, and I hope that putting things into perspective will also
> encourage others to not think that it's set in stone the way it is now.
>
> Signed-off-by: Vladimir Oltean <vladimir.oltean@....com>

Adding documentation is always good, and the kernel definitely
looks better after this patch than before so:
Reviewed-by: Linus Walleij <linus.walleij@...aro.org>

For ease of reading I would personally restructure it a bit, by
putting in three sections:

- History
  Pure development history (for the old code maybe add examples
  of which switches brought about the changes, in the same way
  that the Ocelot driver is mentioned?)

- Policy
  Do this, don't do that. The text has a few paragraphs that read
  like so.

- Future directions
  What we want to do next, or can be expected for the future,
  again the text has a few paragraphs that read like that.

Yours,
Linus Walleij