Re: [PATCH] crypto: qce - Replace with stub driver

[Krzysztof Kozlowski <krzk@kernel.org>]

On 31/07/2026 07:08, Eric Biggers wrote:
> None of the algorithms the QCE driver registers with the crypto API are
> even close to being useful.  They're massively outperformed by the

The amount of patches you send towards removal of QCE is really
stunning. Or rather worrying. This is like third approach or so.

Your previous approaches received valid feedback, including even fixes
and committment of new maintainer.

But you even complained that it does receive fixes! [1]

We removed the driver temporarily from typical configurations, so no one
will be affected, by whatever is found now and not yet fixed. Still not
enough! For you this was reason to remove the driver (AGAIN!) [2]

This is beyond comprehension and very unpleasant, because you actively
work against the community with this approach.

NAK

Nacked-by: Krzysztof Kozlowski <krzk@kernel.org>


[1] https://lore.kernel.org/all/20260728152241.GA4281@quark/
[2] https://lore.kernel.org/all/20260724050645.223799-1-ebiggers@kernel.org/

> CPU-based crypto (even actually using far more CPU cycles than the
> CPU-based crypto, due to the massive driver overhead), don't provide any
> security benefits over the CPU-based crypto, and have various other
> issues.  They're also unrelated to the Inline Crypto Engine which works
> far better and is what is actually being used these days.
> 
> Due to the major performance problems people experienced when
> accidentally using this driver, the algorithms were already demoted to
> below the priority of ARMv8 CE in the crypto API several years ago.
> Regardless of priority, these algorithms also aren't compatible with the
> most common uses of in-kernel crypto; for example, they don't support
> dm-crypt because they allocate memory, and they don't support IPsec
> since they take a mutex which isn't compatible with softirq context.
> 
> It's time to move on and just drop this obsolete functionality entirely.

Best regards,
Krzysztof