On 07/20/2012 11:42 AM, Ben Hutchings wrote:
The ethtool API is typically used for net device operations that can be largely devolved to individual drivers, and which the network stack can mostly ignore (though offload features are an historical exception to this). It started with Ethernet link settings, but many operations are applicable (and implemented by) other types of network device.
That (potentially) accounts for all network devices, but it leaves all the other devices that could export virtual functions.
Why should I need to use a different API to enable virtual functions on my network device and my storage controller? (And why should "ethtool" or "ip" care that it's a virtual function?)
What Don and I are suggesting is that the concept of virtual functions is a PCI thing, so it should be dealt with at the PCI layer. Regardless of the type of device the export of virtual functions is conceptually the same thing, so it should use the same API.
Once the device exists, then domain-specific APIs would be used to configure it the same way that they would configure a physical device.
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