RE: [EXTERNAL] Re: [PATCH v3 0/7] Rework device probing

Morten Brørup
2026-04-11T07:30:16Z

> From: Long Li [mailto:longli@microsoft.com]
> Sent: Friday, 10 April 2026 23.14
>
> > On Fri, 10 Apr 2026 16:34:56 +0200
> > Morten Brørup <mb@smartsharesystems.com> wrote:
> >
> > > Is there a workaround until this patch is added, if I don't want
> rte_eal_init() to
> > probe any devices, but I want my application to probe devices later
> by calling
> > rte_bus_scan() followed by rte_bus_probe()?
> > >
> > > It's not something we really need, so if you don't know it off the
> top of your
> > head, don't spend time trying to figure it out.
> > >
> > >
> > > Venlig hilsen / Kind regards,
> > > -Morten Brørup
> >
> > We do need it because of the problems with vdev_netvsc.
> > The issue is that vdev_netvsc tries to setup failsafe on all netvsc
> devices it sees,
> > and it determines which ones are used by OS based on somewhat fragile
> OS
> > probes with netlink.
> >
> > I would recommend getting rid of vdev_netvsc, or make the the auto
> scanning
> > there something that has to be forced by devargs.
> > But that really is up to the netvsc maintainers.
>
> Hi Morten,
>
> Can you use --vdev=net_vdev_netvsc,ignore=1? The ignore devarg is
> already supported by the vdev_netvsc PMD — when set, the probe function
> skips all netvsc interface discovery and returns early.
>
> Long

Thanks for the suggestion, Long.
I'm not looking for a netvsc solution, I'm looking for a general solution to not probe any drivers at EAL initialization, but at a later stage, controlled by the application.

-Morten