Re: [dpdk-dev] [PATCH] doc: announce KNI ethtool removal

[Jay Rolette <rolette@infinite.io>]

On Thu, Jul 21, 2016 at 10:33 AM, Ferruh Yigit <ferruh.yigit@intel.com>
wrote:

> On 7/20/2016 5:07 PM, Thomas Monjalon wrote:
> > The out-of-tree kernel code must be avoided.
> > Moreover there is no good reason to keep this legacy feature
> > which is only partially supported.
> >
> > As described earlier in this plan:
> >       http://dpdk.org/ml/archives/dev/2016-July/043606.html
> > it will help to keep PCI ids in PMD code.
> >
> > Signed-off-by: Thomas Monjalon <thomas.monjalon@6wind.com>
> > ---
> >  doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst | 7 +++++++
> >  1 file changed, 7 insertions(+)
> >
> > diff --git a/doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst
> b/doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst
> > index f502f86..9cadf6a 100644
> > --- a/doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst
> > +++ b/doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst
> > @@ -41,3 +41,10 @@ Deprecation Notices
> >  * The mempool functions for single/multi producer/consumer are
> deprecated and
> >    will be removed in 16.11.
> >    It is replaced by rte_mempool_generic_get/put functions.
> > +
> > +* The ethtool support will be removed from KNI in 16.11.
> > +  It is implemented only for igb and ixgbe.
> > +  It is really hard to maintain because it requires some out-of-tree
> kernel
> > +  code to be duplicated in this kernel module.
> > +  Removing this partial support will help to restrict the PCI id
> definitions
> > +  to the PMD code.
> >
>
> KNI ethtool is functional and maintained, and it may have users!
>
> Why just removing it, specially without providing an alternative?
> Is is good time to discuss KCP again?
>

Yes, my product uses it. Seems like we are back to the same discussion we
had a few months ago about the KNI situation...

It shouldn't be removed unless there is a replacement, ideally one that
works with the normal Linux tools like every other network device. While
the code wasn't ready at the time, it was a definite improvement over what
we have with KNI today.

Jay