From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Message-ID: <486D6DDB.4010205@infradead.org> Date: Fri, 04 Jul 2008 01:24:59 +0100 From: David Woodhouse MIME-Version: 1.0 Subject: Re: [bug?] tg3: Failed to load firmware "tigon/tg3_tso.bin" References: <1215093175.10393.567.camel@pmac.infradead.org> <20080703173040.GB30506@mit.edu> <1215111362.10393.651.camel@pmac.infradead.org> <20080703.162120.206258339.davem@davemloft.net> In-Reply-To: <20080703.162120.206258339.davem@davemloft.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-linux-mm@kvack.org Return-Path: To: David Miller Cc: tytso@mit.edu, jeff@garzik.org, hugh@veritas.com, akpm@linux-foundation.org, kosaki.motohiro@jp.fujitsu.com, mchan@broadcom.com, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, linux-mm@kvack.org, netdev@vger.kernel.org List-ID: David Miller wrote: > From: David Woodhouse > Date: Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:56:02 +0100 > >> It's wrong to change the CONFIG_FIRMWARE_IN_KERNEL default to 'Y', >> because the _normal_ setting for that option _really_ should be 'N'. > > On what basis? From a "obviously works" basis, the default should be > 'y'. I already changed it to 'y'. >> What we're doing now is just cleaning up the older drivers which don't >> use request_firmware(), to conform to what is now common practice. > > You say "conform" I say "break". You mean... "What we're doing now is just cleaning up the older drivers which don't use request_firmware(), to break to what is now common practice." ? Doesn't really scan, does it? Common practice in modern Linux drivers is to use request_firmware(). I'm just going through and fixing up the older ones to do that too. (After making it possible to build that firmware _into_ the kernel so that we aren't forcing people to use an initrd where they didn't before, of course.) The word for that is definitely 'conform'. I know you don't _like_ the modern accepted practice, but that's _your_ windmill to tilt at. I have my own :) >> In the meantime, it would be useful if Jeff would quit throwing his toys >> out of the pram on that issue and actually review the _code_ changes. In >> particular, are the reports correct that the device operates just fine >> without the TSO firmware loaded? Should we change the request_firmware() >> error path to just disable TSO and continue with the initialisation? > > No! > > The 5701 A0 firmware is necessary to load in order to work around > hardware and existing firmware bugs on those cards. It's an issue of > basic functionality, not just optimizations. > > 5701 A0 tg3 chips cannot operate at all without the firmware being > present in the driver. > > Therefore, if you can't load the firmware, the card is not going to > work. Neat avoidance of question there... it was fairly clear that the 5701_A0 firmware was going to be mandatory; I was asking about the TSO firmware. Does anyone _else_ actually want to give a straight answer to a simple question? Someone who wouldn't have to follow it with an apology because of all their shouting about 'breakage' when the firmware in question is actually optional anyway, perhaps? > If it was purely technical, you wouldn't be choosing defaults that > break things for users by default. Actually, the beauty of Linux is that we _can_ change things where a minor short-term inconvenience leads to a better situation in the long term. > Jeff and I warned you about this from day one, you did not listen, and > now we have at least 10 reports just today of people with broken > networking. Out of interest... of those, what proportion would be 'fixed' if they'd just paid attention when running 'make oldconfig', which is now addressed because I've changed the FIRMWARE_IN_KERNEL default to 'y'? And how many would be 'fixed' if someone had given me a straight answer when I asked about the TSO firmware, and that failure path no longer aborted the driver initialisation but instead just fell back to non-TSO? I'll look at making the requirement for 'make firmware_install' more obvious, or even making it happen automatically as part of 'modules_install'. -- dwmw2 -- To unsubscribe, send a message with 'unsubscribe linux-mm' in the body to majordomo@kvack.org. For more info on Linux MM, see: http://www.linux-mm.org/ . Don't email: email@kvack.org