Missing snd_pcm_link() for the rate plugin

[Christian Gruber <christian.gruber@voiceinterconnect.de>]

Dear ALSA community,

does anybody know, why the rate plugin does not support the snd_pcm_link() function?

As I can see from the ALSA-Lib source code, snd_pcm_link() calls the fast_op "link", which 
is a function pointer, whose destination depends on the type of pcm device/plugin to be 
linked.

If the device is a HW-device for instance, the function snd_pcm_hw_link() is called. 
Several other plugins (e.g. mmap_emul, linear, lfloat, mulaw, alaw, route) use the generic 
function snd_pcm_generic_link(), which forwards the function call to their slave 
devices/plugins.

The rate plugin instead does not support snd_pcm_link(), since the function pointer "link" 
is not assigned in the definition of snd_pcm_rate_fast_ops.

Is their any reason to not use the generic function snd_pcm_generic_link() within the rate 
plugin?

Thanks in advance for answering this question,

Christian