Re: [PATCH] dmi: Let dmi_walk() users pass private data

Andrew Morton
2009-02-03T11:00:23Z

On Tue, 3 Feb 2009 10:52:22 +0100 Jean Delvare <khali@linux-fr.org> wrote:

> On Tue, 3 Feb 2009 00:42:10 -0800, Andrew Morton wrote:
> > On Sun, 1 Feb 2009 22:46:59 +0100 Jean Delvare <khali@linux-fr.org> wrote:
> >
> > > At the moment, dmi_walk() lacks flexibility, users can't pass data to
> > > the callback function. Add a pointer for private data to make this
> > > function more flexible.
> >
> > That new argument is sometimes called "priv", other times called "data"
> > and other times called "dummy". It would be good to come up with a nice
> > meaningful name and stick to it.
> >
> > (The "dummy" thing probably makes sense, as long as people think to
> > rename it to the chosen identifier if they later actually use it for
> > something).
>
> Indeed, naming things "dummy" when they are required for prototype
> reasons but otherwise unused is a rather common strategy.
>
> As for "priv" vs. "data", I wanted to use "data" everywhere, but it
> happens that we already have a local variable named "data" in function
> dmi_table(). I didn't want to change it, to not make the patch bigger
> and harder to read. If you think this is such a big issue, I could
> either rename that local variable nevertheless, or use "priv"
> everywhere (with the open question whether we should also use "priv"
> instead of "data" in <linux/dmi.h> or not.) Let me know what you prefer.
>

Could use `private_data' everywhere. There's a lot of precedent:

y:/usr/src/25> grep private_data Tags | wc -l
228