Received-SPF: pass (google.com: domain of linux-kernel+bounces-126654-linux.lists.archive=gmail.com@vger.kernel.org designates 2604:1380:45e3:2400::1 as permitted sender) client-ip=2604:1380:45e3:2400::1;
Date: Mon, 1 Apr 2024 15:30:03 +0300
From: Leon Romanovsky <leon@kernel.org>
To: David Ahern <dsahern@kernel.org>
Cc: Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org>,
	Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@linuxfoundation.org>,
	Jason Gunthorpe <jgg@nvidia.com>,
	Christoph Hellwig <hch@infradead.org>,
	Saeed Mahameed <saeed@kernel.org>, Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de>,
	Jiri Pirko <jiri@nvidia.com>, Leonid Bloch <lbloch@nvidia.com>,
	Itay Avraham <itayavr@nvidia.com>,
	Saeed Mahameed <saeedm@nvidia.com>,
	Aron Silverton <aron.silverton@oracle.com>,
	linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org,
	"netdev@vger.kernel.org" <netdev@vger.kernel.org>,
	Andy Gospodarek <andrew.gospodarek@broadcom.com>
Subject: Re: [PATCH V4 0/5] mlx5 ConnectX control misc driver
Message-ID: <20240401123003.GC73174@unreal>
References: <20240214175735.GG1088888@nvidia.com>
 <20240304160237.GA2909161@nvidia.com>
 <9cc7127f-8674-43bc-b4d7-b1c4c2d96fed@kernel.org>
 <2024032248-ardently-ribcage-a495@gregkh>
 <510c1b6b-1738-4baa-bdba-54d478633598@kernel.org>
 <Zf2n02q0GevGdS-Z@C02YVCJELVCG>
 <20240322135826.1c4655e2@kernel.org>
 <e5c61607-4d66-4cd8-bf45-0aac2b3af126@kernel.org>
 <20240322154027.5555780a@kernel.org>
 <1cd2a70c-17b8-4421-b70b-3c0199a84a6a@kernel.org>
Precedence: bulk
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Disposition: inline
In-Reply-To: <1cd2a70c-17b8-4421-b70b-3c0199a84a6a@kernel.org>

On Tue, Mar 26, 2024 at 08:57:29AM -0600, David Ahern wrote:
> On 3/22/24 4:40 PM, Jakub Kicinski wrote:
> > On Fri, 22 Mar 2024 15:18:09 -0600 David Ahern wrote:
> >> can you respond to Jason's email with the proposal for the new fwctl
> >> subsystem and identify places you do not agree? That would provide more
> >> concrete discussion points. Thanks,
> > 
> > Respond in what way, David? Comment on technical aspects of whether 
> > a common class device with a discovery mechanism and a sprinkling of
> > semantically meaningless fields can be implemented? Some trivial object
> > hierarchy?
> > 
> > On whether someone can actually enforce any of the 4 "don't"s, and
> > whether this interface is basically encouraging and giving a leg up
> > to those willing to be dishonest?
> > 
> > Or should we go for another loop of me talking about openness and
> > building common abstractions, and vendors saying how their way of
> > doing basic configuration is so very special, and this is just for
> > debug and security and because others.
> > 
> > There's absolutely no willingness to try and build a common interface
> > here.
> 
> The proposal is an attempt at a common interface and common tooling to a
> degree but independent of any specific subsystem of which many are
> supported by the device.
> 
> Your responses continue to align with the notion that because the device
> can spit out ethernet frames, all diagnostics, debugging, configuration,
> etc. MUST go through networking APIs.
> 
> You seem unwilling to acknowledge that devices can work for various use
> cases without a netdev driver, and thus aspects of managing that device
> should be done outside of a netdev driver.

HNS driver is a good example of such device. It has nothing to do with
netdev and needs common and reliable way to configure FW.

https://lore.kernel.org/all/20240308105443.1130283-1-huangjunxian6@hisilicon.com/
https://lore.kernel.org/all/20240322163201.GF66976@ziepe.ca/

Thanks