From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Matt Domsch Subject: Re: [PATCH] Export ACPI _DSM provided firmware instance number and string name to sysfs Date: Thu, 23 Dec 2010 08:32:03 -0600 Message-ID: <20101223143203.GA12256@auslistsprd01.us.dell.com> References: <20101222170737.GA2428@fedora14-r610.oslab.blr.amer.dell.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Cc: linux-pci@vger.kernel.org, linux-hotplug@vger.kernel.org, netdev@vger.kernel.org, Jordan_Hargrave@Dell.com, Charles_Rose@Dell.com, Vijay_Nijhawan@Dell.com To: Narendra_K@Dell.com Return-path: Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <20101222170737.GA2428@fedora14-r610.oslab.blr.amer.dell.com> Sender: linux-pci-owner@vger.kernel.org List-Id: netdev.vger.kernel.org On Wed, Dec 22, 2010 at 08:42:39AM -0800, Narendra_K@Dell.com wrote: > Hello, > > This patch exports ACPI _DSM provided firmware instance number and > string name to sysfs. > > Please review - There are now two different meanings for the 'index' file: 1) SMBIOS-provided "type instance" value, which I've only seen in range [1..N] for N devices, monotonically stepwise increasing. 2) ACPI-provided "index" value, which per spec only needs to be a "sort key", not starting at 0 or 1, and while monotonically increasing, not necessarily stepwise. It's perfectly valid for the values to be (12, 16, 27, 29) if that's convenient for BIOS to generate. Therefore, a consumer of this value (such as biosdevname) must know which of the two it's dealing with, and either accept the value as-is, or sort the value list. While I suppose it could sort the value list in either case, I'd prefer the ACPI value to be exposed in its own file, perhaps 'acpi_index', to make this explicit rather than implicit. 'label' is fine for either case, with ACPI taking priority over SMBIOS if both happen to be present. Thanks, Matt -- Matt Domsch Technology Strategist Dell | Office of the CTO