[PATCH] doc: clarify deprecation status for flow actions PF and VF

[PATCH] doc: clarify deprecation status for flow actions PF and VF

[Ivan Malov]

These actions have been deprecated since DPDK 21.11 as
ambiguous and hard-to-use, but their removal might not
be popular because net drivers i40e, ixgbe and txgbe
employ these actions in complicated "PF/VF + QUEUE"
tunnel rule support. Maintainers of these drivers
should voice their attitude to the said problem.

For now, document the status in deprecation notes.

Signed-off-by: Ivan Malov <ivan.malov@oktetlabs.ru>
Reviewed-by: Andrew Rybchenko <andrew.rybchenko@oktetlabs.ru>
---
 doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst | 9 +++++++--
 1 file changed, 7 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst b/doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst
index c31b92a41f..12867dc3cf 100644
--- a/doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst
+++ b/doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst
@@ -83,8 +83,13 @@ Deprecation Notices
   will be limited to maximum 256 queues.
   Also compile time flag ``RTE_ETHDEV_QUEUE_STAT_CNTRS`` will be removed.
 
-* ethdev: Items and actions ``PF``, ``VF``, ``PHY_PORT``, ``PORT_ID`` are
-  deprecated as hard-to-use / ambiguous and will be removed in DPDK 22.11.
+* ethdev: Flow actions ``PF`` and ``VF`` have been deprecated since DPDK 21.11
+  and are yet to be removed. That still has not happened because there are net
+  drivers which support combined use of either action ``PF`` or action ``VF``
+  with action ``QUEUE``, namely, i40e, ixgbe and txgbe (L2 tunnel rule).
+  It is unclear whether it is acceptable to just drop support for
+  such a complex use case, so maintainers of the said drivers
+  should take a closer look at this and provide assistance.
 
 * ethdev: Actions ``OF_DEC_NW_TTL``, ``SET_IPV4_SRC``, ``SET_IPV4_DST``,
   ``SET_IPV6_SRC``, ``SET_IPV6_DST``, ``SET_TP_SRC``, ``SET_TP_DST``,
-- 
2.30.2

Re: [PATCH] doc: clarify deprecation status for flow actions PF and VF

[Thomas Monjalon]

05/10/2022 13:32, Ivan Malov:
> These actions have been deprecated since DPDK 21.11 as
> ambiguous and hard-to-use, but their removal might not
> be popular because net drivers i40e, ixgbe and txgbe
> employ these actions in complicated "PF/VF + QUEUE"
> tunnel rule support. Maintainers of these drivers
> should voice their attitude to the said problem.
> 
> For now, document the status in deprecation notes.
> 
> Signed-off-by: Ivan Malov <ivan.malov@oktetlabs.ru>
> Reviewed-by: Andrew Rybchenko <andrew.rybchenko@oktetlabs.ru>

Applied, thanks for the clarification.
Hope we can resolve it during 22.11-rc2.