From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Jeff Garzik Subject: Re: [PATCH] drivers/net: remove network drivers' last few uses of IRQF_SAMPLE_RANDOM Date: Thu, 15 May 2008 18:42:06 -0400 Message-ID: <482CBC3E.8060305@garzik.org> References: <20080515142154.0595e475@core> <36D9DB17C6DE9E40B059440DB8D95F52052D71BB@orsmsx418.amr.corp.intel.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: Alan Cox , Chris Peterson , netdev@vger.kernel.org, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org To: "Brandeburg, Jesse" Return-path: Received: from srv5.dvmed.net ([207.36.208.214]:36902 "EHLO mail.dvmed.net" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1753916AbYEOWmL (ORCPT ); Thu, 15 May 2008 18:42:11 -0400 In-Reply-To: <36D9DB17C6DE9E40B059440DB8D95F52052D71BB@orsmsx418.amr.corp.intel.com> Sender: netdev-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: Brandeburg, Jesse wrote: > we've been hearing rumblings of big customers wanting (maybe requiring) > wired network drivers from Intel to advertise this flag. Jeff have you > heard of such? > > I think the argument is that a headless system (no keyboard/mouse, no > soundcard, probably no video) with a libata based driver and a network > driver without IRQF_SAMPLE_RANDOM has *no* sources of entropy. In this > case the argument is very strong for at least *some* source of entropy > from interrupts so that randomness can get some external input. Just > try rebuilding a kernel RPM over an ssh session and you'll see what I > mean. > > In short, I agree with Alan's IRQF_SAMPLE_DUBIOUS, and know of Linux > customers who also want the same. So I guess a good message for customers might be: Don't depend on an entropy source whose volume decreases as workload and network traffic increase. Jeff