Re: [patch 1/7] net_device list cleanup: core

[Andrey Savochkin <saw@swsoft.com>]

Christoph,

On Mon, Jul 03, 2006 at 06:46:50PM +0100, Christoph Hellwig wrote:
> On Mon, Jul 03, 2006 at 12:18:51PM +0400, Andrey Savochkin wrote:
> > Cleanup of net_device list use in net_dev core and IP.
> > The cleanup consists of
> >  - converting the to list_head, to make the list double-linked (thus making
> >    remove operation O(1)), and list walks more readable;
> >  - introducing of for_each_netdev wrapper over list_for_each.
> 
> When you change all this please make sure dev_base_head is never directly
> accessed anymore, not even through macros and dev_base_head is not exported
> anymore.  That's the only way to keep drivers messing with it.
> 
> Yes, it's a little more work as you need to audit all drivers to see what
> they are doing and find suitable abstractions but it's a must have that
> should have been done a lot earlier.

Hiding dev_base_head can be done by converting first_netdev/next_netdev into
functions and implementing for_each_netdev loop through them.

Or are you talking about abstractions like functions
for_each_netdev/find_netdev with callbacks?
Do you think that hiding the list internals is worth the additional
complexity and substantial increase of the patch size?

	Andrey