Subject: Re: Silicom bypass driver promote from staging

From: Stephen Hemminger <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 7 Aug 2014 09:55:45 -0700

On Thu, 7 Aug 2014 09:26:54 +0000
David Hendel <[email-masked]> wrote:

> Let me know how we can proceed with that. what should be the next step.
> -------------
> Theory of Operation:
> The Silicom Bypass Network Interface Cards (NICs) are network cards with paired ports (2 or 4).
> The pairs either act as a "wire" allowing the network packets to pass or insert the device in between the two ports.  When paired with the on-board hardware watchdog or other failsafe, they provide high availability for the network in the face of software outages or maintenance.
> 
> The software requirements are for a kernel level driver that interfaces with the bypass and watchdog, as well as for control software. User control can be either the provided standalone executable
> (/bin/bpctl) or the API exposed by the Silicom library. 

The current driver uses a device specific /proc interface.
That API programming model will not likely be acceptable in a standard network driver.
Please consider doing something generic with netlink.