From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Jeff Garzik Subject: Re: Kernel Summit request for Discussion of future of ATA (libata) and IDE Date: Sun, 03 Aug 2008 19:10:25 -0400 Message-ID: <48963AE1.8080308@garzik.org> References: <1217779055.4179.10.camel@localhost.localdomain> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Return-path: Received: from srv5.dvmed.net ([207.36.208.214]:53201 "EHLO mail.dvmed.net" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1758725AbYHCXKa (ORCPT ); Sun, 3 Aug 2008 19:10:30 -0400 In-Reply-To: <1217779055.4179.10.camel@localhost.localdomain> Sender: linux-ide-owner@vger.kernel.org List-Id: linux-ide@vger.kernel.org To: James Bottomley Cc: ksummit-2008-discuss@lists.linux-foundation.org, linux-kernel , linux-ide James Bottomley wrote: > Right at the moment, we have two separate subsystems for running IDE > type devices: driver/ide and drivers/ata. The claim I've seen is that > drivers/ata can do everything drivers/ide can do plus it does sata. I > also note that no major distribution seems to enable anything in > drivers/ide anymore, so given this is it time to deprecate drivers/ide? > > A counter argument to the above is that not all drivers (particularly > the older ones where hw is scarce) are converted to drivers/ata, so > drivers/ide seems to be needed for some legacy systems (in which case it > can be deprecated but not removed). I've also noted that some embedded > distributions seem to be using drivers/ide, but I'm not really sure > whether this is inertia or some overriding need. > > The proposal is to discuss the future of these two subsystems and arrive > at a consensus what's happening to each going forwards. I'm not in any rush to change the status quo as I see it: don't remove drivers/ide but encourage new drivers to be under libata. I am a bit disappointed at all the drivers/ide churn. I had hoped it would sit around and be a stable alternative, a fallback to libata. Jeff