Re: [PATCH net-next v2 1/7] net: devlink: Add unused port flavour

Florian Fainelli
2020-09-28T23:14:44Z

On 9/28/2020 3:35 PM, Jakub Kicinski wrote:
> On Tue, 29 Sep 2020 00:07:30 +0200 Andrew Lunn wrote:
>> On Mon, Sep 28, 2020 at 10:05:08PM +0000, Vladimir Oltean wrote:
>>> On Mon, Sep 28, 2020 at 02:31:55PM -0700, Jakub Kicinski wrote:
>>>> On Sat, 26 Sep 2020 23:06:26 +0200 Andrew Lunn wrote:
>>>>> Not all ports of a switch need to be used, particularly in embedded
>>>>> systems. Add a port flavour for ports which physically exist in the
>>>>> switch, but are not connected to the front panel etc, and so are
>>>>> unused.
>>>>
>>>> This is missing the explanation of why reporting such ports makes sense.
>>>
>>> Because this is a core devlink patch, we're talking really generalistic
>>> here.
>>
>> Hi Vladimir
>>
>> I don't think Jakub is questioning the why. He just wants it in the
>> commit message.
>
> Ack, I think we need to clearly say when those should be exposed.
> Most ASICs will have disabled ports, and we don't expect NICs to
> suddenly start reporting ports for all PCI PFs they may have.
>
> Also I keep thinking that these ports and all their objects should
> be hidden under some switch from user space perspective because they
> are unlikely to be valuable to see for a normal user. Thoughts?

Hidden in what sense? They are already hidden in that there is no
net_device object being created for them. Are you asking for adding
another option to say, devlink show like:

devlink show -a

which would also show the ports that are disabled during a dump?
--
Florian