Re: [RFC PATCH] ethtool: add FEC bins histogramm report

[Gal Pressman <gal@nvidia.com>]

On 30/07/2025 12:29, Vadim Fedorenko wrote:
> On 30/07/2025 06:54, Gal Pressman wrote:
>> On 29/07/2025 13:23, Vadim Fedorenko wrote:
>>> diff --git a/drivers/net/netdevsim/ethtool.c b/drivers/net/netdevsim/
>>> ethtool.c
>>> index f631d90c428ac..7257de9ea2f44 100644
>>> --- a/drivers/net/netdevsim/ethtool.c
>>> +++ b/drivers/net/netdevsim/ethtool.c
>>> @@ -164,12 +164,25 @@ nsim_set_fecparam(struct net_device *dev,
>>> struct ethtool_fecparam *fecparam)
>>>       ns->ethtool.fec.active_fec = 1 << (fls(fec) - 1);
>>>       return 0;
>>>   }
>>> +static const struct ethtool_fec_hist_range netdevsim_fec_ranges[] = {
>>> +    {  0,  0},
>>> +    {  1,  3},
>>> +    {  4,  7},
>>> +    { -1, -1}
>>> +};
>>
>> The driver-facing API works nicely when the ranges are allocated as
>> static arrays, but I expect most drivers will need to allocate it
>> dynamically as the ranges will be queried from the device.
>> In that case, we need to define who is responsible of freeing the ranges
>> array.
> 
> Well, the ranges will not change during link operation, unless the type
> of FEC is changed. You may either have static array of FEC ranges per
> supported FEC types. Or query it on link-up event and reuse it on every
> call for FEC stats. In this case it's pure driver's responsibility to
> manage memory allocations. There is definitely no need to re-query
> ranges on every single call for stats.

This is just adding unnecessary complexity to the drivers, trying to
figure out the right lifetime for this array.
It will be much simpler if the core passes an array for the drivers to
fill. That way both static and dynamic ranges would work the same.