Re: [PATCH V2 0/4] misc: xgene: Add support for APM X-Gene SoC Queue Manager/Traffic Manager

[Greg KH <gregkh@linuxfoundation.org>]

On Sat, Jan 04, 2014 at 03:59:46PM -0800, Ravi Patel wrote:
> On Sat, Dec 21, 2013 at 11:03 PM, Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de> wrote:
> > On Saturday 21 December 2013 17:00:51 Loc Ho wrote:
> >> On Sat, Dec 21, 2013 at 12:11 PM, Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de> wrote:
> >> > On Saturday 21 December 2013, Ravi Patel wrote:
> >> >> This patch adds support for APM X-Gene SoC Queue Manager/Traffic Manager.
> >> >>  QMTM is required by APM X-Gene SoC Ethernet, PktDMA (XOR Engine) and
> >> >>  Security Engine subsystems. All subsystems communicate with QMTM using
> >> >>  messages which include information about the work to be performed and
> >> >>  the location of associated data buffers.
> >> >
> >> > Please describe here what the purpose of the qmtm is, as this is not
> >> > entirely clear from the code.
> >> >
> >> > In particular, please describe how this differs from a dmaengine driver
> >> > and why it is not possible to extend the dma slave API to describe qmtm
> >> > as a dma engine.
> >> >
> >> [Loc Ho]
> >> If the QM driver implements the DMA API, what about the actual DMA
> >> engine driver which interfaces with this QM driver. We would have DMA
> >> client interfaces with the X-Gene DMA driver (not available yet) via
> >> DMA API which in turn interfaces with this QM driver via DMA API.
> >> Won't this be kind of awkward? Also, the QM only manage messages (or
> >> descriptors) which are 32-bytes or 64-bytes. It doesn't actually do
> >> any data transfer of various sizes.
> >
> > Please describe here what the purpose of the qmtm is, as this is not
> > entirely clear from the code or from your reply.
> >
> > Greg was guessing that it's a bus controller, my best guess is a DMA
> > engine. If it's something completely different, you have to let
> > us know what it is so we can do a proper review rather than guessing.
> >
> > Please provide a link to the data sheet if you are unable to explain.
> 
> Here is URL to a text document explaining role of QMTM device with CPU, Ethernet
> subsystem.
> 
> https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B28TgQZ3JLoRRGNnbjJoUGNHWW8/edit?usp=sharing

There is nothing at this link :(

> PktDMA and Security subsystem interfaces with QMTM in the same way as Ethernet.

How does a "security" subsystem have anything to do with ethernet?

confused,

greg k-h