From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1758804AbYEONmY (ORCPT ); Thu, 15 May 2008 09:42:24 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S1753192AbYEONmO (ORCPT ); Thu, 15 May 2008 09:42:14 -0400 Received: from earthlight.etchedpixels.co.uk ([81.2.110.250]:35454 "EHLO lxorguk.ukuu.org.uk" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-FAIL) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1751563AbYEONmO (ORCPT ); Thu, 15 May 2008 09:42:14 -0400 Date: Thu, 15 May 2008 14:30:48 +0100 From: Alan Cox To: Andi Kleen Cc: Linus Torvalds , Jonathan Corbet , Ingo Molnar , Andrew Morton , Peter Zijlstra , Thomas Gleixner , Alexander Viro , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: [announce] "kill the Big Kernel Lock (BKL)" tree Message-ID: <20080515143048.13a137ea@core> In-Reply-To: <482B65FE.4040402@firstfloor.org> References: <20080514174955.GA515@elte.hu> <6457.1210801515@vena.lwn.net> <87bq387cyn.fsf@basil.nowhere.org> <482B65FE.4040402@firstfloor.org> X-Mailer: Claws Mail 3.3.1 (GTK+ 2.12.5; x86_64-redhat-linux-gnu) Organization: Red Hat UK Cyf., Amberley Place, 107-111 Peascod Street, Windsor, Berkshire, SL4 1TE, Y Deyrnas Gyfunol. Cofrestrwyd yng Nghymru a Lloegr o'r rhif cofrestru 3798903 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org > own lock_kernel calls, but why in the old drivers? For those it's very > unlikely they are used on any SMP system anyways (e.g. anything > depending on CONFIG_ISA) or if they do only on 2 CPU systems. Because - You need to verify the locking assumptions that remain are entirely driver internal - At the point you achieve that you've done *ALL* the work required to add a driver specific lock