From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1751920AbbBKC41 (ORCPT ); Tue, 10 Feb 2015 21:56:27 -0500 Received: from mail.linuxfoundation.org ([140.211.169.12]:53036 "EHLO mail.linuxfoundation.org" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1751366AbbBKC40 (ORCPT ); Tue, 10 Feb 2015 21:56:26 -0500 Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2015 08:44:59 +0800 From: Greg Kroah-Hartman To: Andy Lutomirski Cc: Arnd Bergmann , Jiri Kosina , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, linux-api@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: [RFC] simple_char: New infrastructure to simplify chardev management Message-ID: <20150211004459.GA30746@kroah.com> References: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.23 (2014-03-12) Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org On Tue, Feb 10, 2015 at 03:44:05PM -0800, Andy Lutomirski wrote: > This isn't adequately tested, and I don't have a demonstration (yet). > It's here for review for whether it's a good idea in the first place > and for weather the fully_dynamic mechanism is a good idea. > > The current character device interfaces are IMO awful. That's a total understatement. Redoing the char interface has been in my todo list for a decade now. It's the complexity that happens to be used by just a handful of drivers that have prevented me from doing the rework in the past. Creating a "new" interface that we then port code to is a very good idea, as it can happen over time in a much more orderly way. And we can throw the kernel-janitors people at it once it's working, to convert the rest of the tree, providing them a useful outlet for their need for patch cleanups :) So yes, I'm all for this, thanks so much for looking into this. I'm at a conference this week, but will go over it on the plane home and give you some review comments. greg k-h