Re: QAPI sync meeting

[Markus Armbruster <armbru@redhat.com>]

Paolo Bonzini <pbonzini@redhat.com> writes:

> On 07/10/21 12:01, Kevin Wolf wrote:
>>    * -chardev: I have patches that QAPIfy the option based on
>> aliases,
>>      getting rid of the old handwritten parser that is inconsistent with
>>      QMP in non-obvious ways and replacing it with translation to QMP
>>      (both using aliases and a little C code) that makes the differences
>>      obvious.
>>      First posted in November 2020, more details in the cover
>> letter:
>>      https://patchew.org/QEMU/20201112175905.404472-1-kwolf@redhat.com/
>>      Later versions (not yet posted as a series because I'm waiting
>> for
>>      aliases) also make -chardev accept JSON syntax, which is what
>>      libvirt really wants to use.
>
> I'm still not sure about this...  It's an awful lot of code if the
> aliases are only used by -chardev,

We might use them for replacing other ad hoc parsers.  We have a bunch,
but -chardev's one is perhaps the worst one.  Whether aliases could be
useful for replacing others is not yet clear.

I initially hoped that they could help us clean up QMP some, but further
(and sadly much later) thought led me to obstacles.

>                                    and I'd rather use
> -object/object-add for chardevs if that's at all possible.

How far are we from making -object the preferred machine-friendly
interface for creating character devices?