Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1757083AbXFMUlf (ORCPT ); Wed, 13 Jun 2007 16:41:35 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S1752180AbXFMUlZ (ORCPT ); Wed, 13 Jun 2007 16:41:25 -0400 Received: from nz-out-0506.google.com ([64.233.162.226]:60898 "EHLO nz-out-0506.google.com" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1751857AbXFMUlX (ORCPT ); Wed, 13 Jun 2007 16:41:23 -0400 DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; c=nofws; d=gmail.com; s=beta; h=received:message-id:date:from:to:subject:cc:in-reply-to:mime-version:content-type:content-transfer-encoding:content-disposition:references; b=Ik04mZP2eMsMLTkXMOHFaRqcT/RXzyt7vDjDFcKLpl9s752rPJcrzxhMC4HkACwVWc+ueNaxykBS0fdo5FikSyfJoTdZIIo+/59b2FXSqbOnY9Ky+rd9G4a+SUL1SMOtzfLN/Ta9GGjTbyC6qmmLLwcwSK4G/BJBLR320/K/AdM= Message-ID: Date: Thu, 14 Jun 2007 02:11:22 +0530 From: "Satyam Sharma" To: "Keiichi KII" Subject: Re: [RFC][PATCH -mm take5 6/7] add ioctls for adding/removing target Cc: "Matt Mackall" , "Andrew Morton" , "David Miller" , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, netdev@vger.kernel.org In-Reply-To: <466FC76A.6050006@bx.jp.nec.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline References: <466FC455.5060001@bx.jp.nec.com> <466FC76A.6050006@bx.jp.nec.com> Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Length: 1677 Lines: 37 Hi Keiichi, On 6/13/07, Keiichi KII wrote: > From: Keiichi KII > > We add ioctls for adding/removing target. > If we use NETCONSOLE_ADD_TARGET ioctl, > we can dynamically add netconsole target. > If we use NETCONSOLE_REMOVE_TARGET ioctl, > we can dynamically remoe netconsole target. *ugh*. I was wondering what a show-stopper this particular patch was -- introduces a couple of ioctl()'s, exports a new structure to userspace, adds a hitherto-unneeded header file, brings in tty_struct/tty_operations and ends up adding so much complexity/ bloat to netconsole.c. Not only that, it must live together (and side-by-side) with the sysfs interface also, because the two of them do different things: sysfs to be able to modify target parameters at run-time and the ioctl()'s to dynamically add/remove targets. We can't really mkdir(2) or rmdir(2) in sysfs so the ioctl()'s are needed. So may I suggest: Just lose *both* the sysfs and ioctl() interfaces and use _configfs_. It is *precisely* the thing you need in your driver here -- the ability to create / destroy kernel objects (or config_items in configfs lingo) from _userspace_ via simple mkdir(2) and rmdir(2). And configfs makes changing multiple configurable parameters atomically trivial too, via rename(2) ... not to mention a sysfs+ioctls -> configfs conversion would help your patchset lose some weight too :-) Satyam - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/