Re: Re: [PATCH] Add support for a configuration file

[Paul Brook <paul@codesourcery.com>]

On Wednesday 14 May 2008, Anthony Liguori wrote:
> Paul Brook wrote:
> >> the "class" field is used to select the device model. Then all the other
> >> parameters are used to initialize the device model. That way it is
> >> possible to keep the compatibility with the existing options and add a
> >> provision to instanciate arbitrary new device models, such as:
> >
> > I like the idea, but I'm not so keen on the automatic allocation. I
> > generally prefer explicit declaration over implicit things. The latter
> > makes it very easy to not notice when you make a typo.
> >
> > It sounds like what you really want is something similar to an OF device
> > tree. So you have something like:
> >
> > # pciide0 may be an alias (possibly provided by qemu)
> > # e.g. pci0.slot1.func1.ide
> > alias hda ide0.primary.master
>
> What I don't like about the ide0.primary.master syntax is that there
> isn't enough structure.  I would prefer:
>
> alias hda ide,bus=0,primary,master
>
> If you combine this with your magic variable idea, you could also do:
>
> alias hda ide,bus=0,unit=$next
>
> But you could also just fold that into Fabrice's syntax (which I prefer):

What I dislike about this is that it's a flat format, where you identify 
things by setting some combination of attributes. I really like the idea of 
having a tree structure.

Paul