Subject: Re: [PATCH 1/3] [RFC] genhd: add a new attribute in device
 structure
From: James Bottomley <James.Bottomley@HansenPartnership.com>
To: Greg KH <greg@kroah.com>
Cc: Kay Sievers <kay.sievers@vrfy.org>,
        Nao Nishijima <nao.nishijima.xt@hitachi.com>,
        linux-scsi@vger.kernel.org, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org,
        jcm@redhat.com, hare@suse.de, stefanr@s5r6.in-berlin.de,
        yrl.pp-manager.tt@hitachi.com
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Date: Sat, 18 Jun 2011 14:40:17 -0500
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On Fri, 2011-06-17 at 09:22 -0700, Greg KH wrote:
> On Fri, Jun 17, 2011 at 06:12:14PM +0200, Kay Sievers wrote:
> > On Fri, Jun 17, 2011 at 17:39, Kay Sievers <kay.sievers@vrfy.org> wrote:
> > > On Fri, Jun 17, 2011 at 16:49, James Bottomley
> > 
> > >> So this is subsystem specific.  For the case of a SCSI enclosure, I can
> > >> answer that it's actually burned into the enclosure firmware.  When you
> > >> build an enclosure with labels, the label names are stored in a
> > >> diagnostic page.  We can actually interrogate the enclosure directly or
> > >> use the ses driver to get these names mapped to current devices.
> > >
> > > To me this sounds like a nice name on top of the current bunch of
> > > names, not like a 'preferred' name.
> > >
> > > I still don't like to introduce any new facility to the kernel that
> > > can handle only one single name. Reality the last years has taught us
> > > a very different story, and we've walked a long way to get where we
> > > are. I really don't believe single names will ever work, it's just a
> > > nice theory.
> > 
> > I might need to clarify this a bit.
> > 
> > I have no problem in general to add a 'alias' to every disk, and use
> > that when stuff is logged. Just the same way the netifs have an alias.
> > Sure, it might be useful for some use cases. And if that helps to
> > solve any real problem, we should just do it.
> > 
> > I just want to make clear, that I don't think that it is anywhere near
> > to a solution for the problems which are described here. And that
> > nobody should see this as an excuse not to get their stuff together
> > and work on the problem, which is that we don't have machine-readable
> > error and debug from the kernel and a smart syslog.
> > 
> > If we had that, I'm very sure nobody would even ask for a 'pretty
> > name' in the kernel, and I think that is a good indication that we are
> > not on the right track here.
> 
> And I totally agree here, which is why I don't want to accept this
> change to the driver core to add this, as it's not the correct solution.

OK, fine ... we'll do it as gendisk only then.  I suppose that is the
95% use case anyway.

Thanks,

James


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