On Wed, 10 Apr 2024 09:42:14 +0200 Jiri Pirko wrote: > > - not get upset when we delete those drivers if they stop participating > > Sorry for being pain, but I would still like to see some sumarization of > what is actually the gain for the community to merge this unused driver. > So far, I don't recall to read anything solid. >From the discussion I think some folks made the point that it's educational to see what big companies do, and seeing the work may lead to reuse and other people adopting features / ideas. > btw: > Kconfig description should contain: > Say N here, you can't ever see this device in real world. We do use standard distro kernels in some corners of the DC, AFAIU. > >If you think that the drivers should be merged *without* setting these > >expectations, please speak up. > > > >Nobody picked me up on the suggestion to use the CI as a proactive > >check whether the maintainer / owner is still paying attention, > >but okay :( > > > > > >What is less clear to me is what do we do about uAPI / core changes. > >Of those who touched on the subject - few people seem to be curious / > >welcoming to any reasonable features coming out for private devices > >(John, Olek, Florian)? Others are more cautious focusing on blast > >radius and referring to the "two driver rule" (Daniel, Paolo)? > >Whether that means outright ban on touching common code or uAPI > >in ways which aren't exercised by commercial NICs, is unclear. > > For these kind of unused drivers, I think it would be legit to > disallow any internal/external api changes. Just do that for some > normal driver, then benefit from the changes in the unused driver. Unused is a bit strong, and we didn't put netdevsim in a special directory. Let's see if more such drivers appear and if there are practical uses for the separation for scripts etc?
