Messages in this thread | | | Subject | Re: [RFC PATCH 8/9] surface_aggregator: Add DebugFS interface | From | Maximilian Luz <> | Date | Thu, 24 Sep 2020 20:40:34 +0200 |
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On 9/24/20 8:46 AM, Greg Kroah-Hartman wrote: > On Thu, Sep 24, 2020 at 12:06:54AM +0200, Maximilian Luz wrote: >> On 9/23/20 8:29 PM, Greg Kroah-Hartman wrote: >>> On Wed, Sep 23, 2020 at 08:03:38PM +0200, Maximilian Luz wrote: >>>> On 9/23/20 6:14 PM, Greg Kroah-Hartman wrote: >> >> [...] >> >>>> So the -EFAULT returned by put_user should have precedence? I was aiming >>>> for "in case it fails, return with the first error". >>> >>> -EFAULT trumps everything :) >> >> Perfect, thanks! >> >>>>> Listen, I'm all for doing whatever you want in debugfs, but why are you >>>>> doing random ioctls here? Why not just read/write a file to do what you >>>>> need/want to do here instead? >>>> >>>> Two reasons, mostly: First, the IOCTL allows me to execute requests in >>>> parallel with just one open file descriptor and not having to maintain >>>> some sort of back-buffer to wait around until the reader gets to reading >>>> the thing. I've used that for stress-testing the EC communication in the >>>> past, which had some issues (dropping bytes, invalid CRCs, ...) under >>>> heavy(-ish) load. Second, I'm considering adding support for events to >>>> this device in the future by having user-space receive events by reading >>>> from the device. Events would also be enabled or disabled via an IOCTL. >>>> That could be implemented in a second device though. Events were also my >>>> main reason for adding a version to this interface: Discerning between >>>> one that has event support and one that has not. >>> >>> A misc device can also do this, much simpler, right? Why not use that? >> >> Sorry to ask so many questions, just want to make sure I understand you >> correctly: >> >> - So you suggest I go with a misc device instead of putting this into >> debugfs? > > Yes. > >> - And I keep the IOCTL? > > If you need it, although the interface Arnd says might be much simpler > (read/write) > >> - Can I still tell people to not use it and that it's not my fault if a >> change in the interface breaks their tools if it's not in debugfs? > > Yes :) > >> - Also load it via a separate module (module_misc_device, I assume)? > > That works. > >> One reason why the platform_device approach is practical in this >> scenario is that I can leverage the driver core to defer probing and >> thus defer creating the device if the controller isn't there yet. > > That's fine, and is a nice abuse of the platform driver interface. I > say "abuse" because we really don't have a simpler way to do this at the > moment, but this really isn't a platform device...
Yeah, it is a bit of a hack...
>> Similarly, the driver is automatically unbound if the controller goes >> away and the device should be destroyed. All of this should currently be >> handled via the device link created by ssam_client_bind() (unless I >> really misunderstood those). > > That all is fine, just create the misc device when your driver binds to > the device, just like you create the debugfs file entries today. > There's no difference except you get a "real" char device node instead > of a debugfs file. > >> I should be able to handle that by having the device refuse to open the >> file if the controller isn't there. Holding the state-lock during the >> request execution should ensure that the controller doesn't get shut >> down. > > Nah, no need for that, again, keep the platform driver/device and then > create the misc device (and remove it) where you are creating/removing > the debugfs files.
Okay, I'll do that. Thank you!
>>> A simple misc device would make it very simple and easy to do instead, >>> why not do that? >> >> Again, I considered the probe deferring of the platform driver fairly >> handy (in addition to having the implicit debugfs warning of "don't rely >> on this"), but if you prefer me implementing this as misc device, I'll >> do that. > > The "joy" of creating a user api is that no matter how much you tell > people "do not depend on this", they will, so no matter the file being > in debugfs, or a misc device, you might be stuck with it for forever, > sorry.
Hmm, true. I'm fairly confident that the request-IOCTL, as is right now, should be sound (regarding to 5th and later gen. requests). It also can be extended in a non-breaking way to handle events by reading from the device in the future. So might as well commit to that.
Thanks, Max
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