From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: ebiederm@xmission.com (Eric W. Biederman) Subject: Re: [RFC RTNETLINK 00/09]: Netlink link creation API Date: Wed, 06 Jun 2007 10:13:36 -0600 Message-ID: References: <20070605141250.15650.47178.sendpatchset@localhost.localdomain> <46669FA0.3030405@trash.net> <4666D426.2070606@trash.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Cc: netdev@vger.kernel.org, socketcan@hartkopp.net, hadi@cyberus.ca, xemul@sw.ru, tgraf@suug.ch To: Patrick McHardy Return-path: Received: from ebiederm.dsl.xmission.com ([166.70.28.69]:40711 "EHLO ebiederm.dsl.xmission.com" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1755552AbXFFQPs (ORCPT ); Wed, 6 Jun 2007 12:15:48 -0400 In-Reply-To: <4666D426.2070606@trash.net> (Patrick McHardy's message of "Wed, 06 Jun 2007 17:35:02 +0200") Sender: netdev-owner@vger.kernel.org List-Id: netdev.vger.kernel.org Patrick McHardy writes: >> I still think adding a IFLA_PARTNER or a custom attribute is cleaner >> in this case. Slight semantic mismatches are the worst design bugs >> to correct. > > > Indeed, IFLA_PARTNER sounds like a better idea. I just suggested to > Pavel to create only a single device per newlink operation and binding > them later, what do you think about that? I don't think it solves much because we still need a way to report the partner device. On the actual using side I think it makes the core of the driver much more difficult to get right. Basically if we can't count on having a partner device we have to add NULL pointer checks and locking to the packet dispatch which is otherwise unnecessary. Eric