From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Stephen Hemminger Subject: Re: Silicom bypass driver promote from staging Date: Thu, 7 Aug 2014 09:55:45 -0700 Message-ID: <20140807095545.2dd60024@haswell.linuxnetplumber.net> References: <3BFAEADE799AF145974162DF00E013AF018F80FFCF@exchange2010.silicom.local> <20140805150957.GC27303@kroah.com> <3BFAEADE799AF145974162DF00E013AF018F814DAB@exchange2010.silicom.local> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: "netdev@vger.kernel.org" , "arnd@arndb.de" , Anna Lukin , "gregkh@linuxfoundation.org" To: David Hendel Return-path: Received: from mail-pa0-f65.google.com ([209.85.220.65]:48529 "EHLO mail-pa0-f65.google.com" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S932567AbaHGQzs (ORCPT ); Thu, 7 Aug 2014 12:55:48 -0400 Received: by mail-pa0-f65.google.com with SMTP id kx10so2728416pab.0 for ; Thu, 07 Aug 2014 09:55:48 -0700 (PDT) In-Reply-To: <3BFAEADE799AF145974162DF00E013AF018F814DAB@exchange2010.silicom.local> Sender: netdev-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: On Thu, 7 Aug 2014 09:26:54 +0000 David Hendel wrote: > Let me know how we can proceed with that. what should be the next step. > ------------- > Theory of Operation: > The Silicom Bypass Network Interface Cards (NICs) are network cards with paired ports (2 or 4). > The pairs either act as a "wire" allowing the network packets to pass or insert the device in between the two ports. When paired with the on-board hardware watchdog or other failsafe, they provide high availability for the network in the face of software outages or maintenance. > > The software requirements are for a kernel level driver that interfaces with the bypass and watchdog, as well as for control software. User control can be either the provided standalone executable > (/bin/bpctl) or the API exposed by the Silicom library. The current driver uses a device specific /proc interface. That API programming model will not likely be acceptable in a standard network driver. Please consider doing something generic with netlink.