Re: [PATCHv2 net-next 1/3] net: Add provision to specify pf number while assigning VF mac

[Hariprasad Shenai <hariprasad@chelsio.com>]

On Thu, Jun 30, 2016 at 19:04:16 +0000, Yuval Mintz wrote:
> > Chelsio T4/T5 cards have SR-IOV Capabilities on Physical Functions
> > 0..3 and the administrative Driver(cxgb4) attaches to Physical Function 4.
> > Each of the Physical Functions 0..3 can support up to 16 Virtual
> > Functions. With the current Linux APIs, a 2-Port card would only be
> > able to use the Virtual Functions on Physical Functions 0..1 and not
> > allow the Virtual Functions on Physical Functions 2..3 to be used since
> > there are no Ports 2..3 on a 2-Port card.
> >
> > Also the current ip commands takes netdev as one of the argument, and
> > it assumes a 1-to-1 mapping of Network Ports, Physical Functions and the
> > SR-IOV Virtual Functions of those Physical Functions. But it is not
> > true in our case and won't work for us.
> > 
> > Added a new argument to specify the PF number associated with the VF, to
> > fix this.
> 
> I don't get it - what's the exact definition of 'Physical Function'?
> Are we talking PCI functions? Logical partitons? Something else?

Its PCIe physical function. Physical functions (PFs) are full-featured
PCIe functions; virtual functions (VFs) are “lightweight” functions that
lack configuration resource.