At 11:36 AM 10/17/2002, Jeff Garzik wrote: >* There are hardware limits which are not present in software. One common >scenario that stumps offload-all-TCP vendors is slow connections: many >Web sites are saddled with _thousands_ of users simultaneously connected >via slow links (modem users). This scenario and similar Real World(tm) >scenarios like it hit socket or RAM limits on offload-all-TCP cards very >quickly. >* At 1Gb/10Gb speeds, you must overcome problems like PCI bus >throughput. This problem exists completely independent of where the TCP >stack is. Actually, you have it backwards here, because having the stack on the card (and allowing port to port routing without a bus transfer), seems to be precisely what the card addresses. It seems likely that the card is more suited for building switches and things than general network device usage, however the usefulness of running something like that on a linux platform is a bit suspect, particularly when all of the value-added things you might want to do with a custom switch would be out of reach. However, Jeff is correct in that targeting the linux community of do-it-yourselfers is probably a bad idea. You'll be dealing with people who think that everything is broken and that only they, as a collective mind, can repair it. They'll want you to GPL your firmware, and then once it becomes popular some taiwanese company will clone your card and you'll be out of business. Sound like a good business model? :-) Dennis - : send the line "unsubscribe linux-net" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
