From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1758582AbXLNTBZ (ORCPT ); Fri, 14 Dec 2007 14:01:25 -0500 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S1754859AbXLNTBQ (ORCPT ); Fri, 14 Dec 2007 14:01:16 -0500 Received: from terminus.zytor.com ([198.137.202.10]:45141 "EHLO terminus.zytor.com" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1754753AbXLNTBP (ORCPT ); Fri, 14 Dec 2007 14:01:15 -0500 Message-ID: <4762D2CC.1030109@zytor.com> Date: Fri, 14 Dec 2007 11:00:28 -0800 From: "H. Peter Anvin" User-Agent: Thunderbird 2.0.0.9 (X11/20071115) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Greg KH CC: "Huang, Ying" , akpm@linux-foundation.org, Thomas Gleixner , Ingo Molnar , Andi Kleen , "Eric W. Biederman" , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: [PATCH -mm -v3] x86 boot : export boot_params via sysfs References: <1197620206.12999.12.camel@caritas-dev.intel.com> <20071214155228.GA13342@kroah.com> <4762C78D.9080107@zytor.com> In-Reply-To: <4762C78D.9080107@zytor.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org H. Peter Anvin wrote: > Greg KH wrote: >> >> But it ignored the fact that I said I didn't want this binary file in >> sysfs :) >> >> Please take Eric's suggestion and split it up into the different pieces. >> Some of the fields can be binary files, as they come directly from the >> firmware, but the others should be text. >> > > But PLEASE include the full structure as a ready-to-eat object. PLEASE. > I should clarify this. By all means go ahead and provide broken-out fields where it makes sense. However: - this *IS* a structure defined by protocol, and which, for all users except the 16-bit entry, comes from outside the kernel (bootloader or firmware.) - a newer kernel version can add fields to this structure, but can never remove them. This would cause a potential information loss if the current kernel doesn't have all fields available. - the binary structure is the format that the majority of users will need. This is directly analogous to how we treat identity information in IDE, or PCI configuration space -- some fields are pre-digested, but the entire raw information is also available. -hpa