Re: [RFC] NAPI as kobject proposal

Al Viro
2010-02-03T21:26:46Z

On Wed, Feb 03, 2010 at 09:23:36PM +0000, Ben Hutchings wrote:
> On Fri, 2010-01-29 at 10:18 -0800, Stephen Hemminger wrote:
> > The NAPI interface structure in current kernels is managed by the driver.
> > As part of receive packet steering there is a requirement to add an
> > additional parameter to this for the CPU map. And this map needs to
> > have an API to set it.
> >
> > The right way to do this in the kernel model is to make NAPI into
> > a kobject and associate it back with the network device (parent).
> > This isn't wildly difficult but does change some of the API for
> > network device drivers because:
> > 1. They need to handle another possible error on setup
> > 2. NAPI object needs to be dynamically allocated
> > separately (not as part of netdev_priv)
> > 3. Driver should pass index that can be uses as part of
> > name (easier than scanning)

4. Lifetime rules become oh-so-fscking-interesting?