From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Andi Kleen Subject: Re: [PATCH 9/15] BE NIC driver - Linux system abstraction files Date: Thu, 15 May 2008 19:49:27 +0200 Message-ID: <20080515174927.GC30216@one.firstfloor.org> References: <87mymrztse.fsf@basil.nowhere.org> <20080515173841.A0A48189004A@one.firstfloor.org> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Cc: 'Andi Kleen' , netdev@vger.kernel.org To: subbu Return-path: Received: from one.firstfloor.org ([213.235.205.2]:38362 "EHLO one.firstfloor.org" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1751948AbYEORlq (ORCPT ); Thu, 15 May 2008 13:41:46 -0400 Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <20080515173841.A0A48189004A@one.firstfloor.org> Sender: netdev-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: On Thu, May 15, 2008 at 11:00:46PM +0530, subbu wrote: > The reason why we have these abstractions is > because beclib functions are written as > OS neutral code and that needs a helper to > do OS specific functions. By eliminating > SA, we will need to make beclib Linux > dependent - something that we would like avoid > for ease of maintenance. Is this approach > not acceptable ? What will is the recommended > way to have part so a driver OS independent ? We do not recommend it, but recommend to write Linux specific drivers. Operating systems are quite different and you get far better drivers if you really optimize them for specific OS. That's especially important for performance critical drivers like yours for high speed networking. Also splitting drivers into generic and OS specific parts typically leads to poor and overcomplicated design. Anyways if you really want abstraction elsewhere then use the Linux names for it. But it's really not recommended. -Andi