Skip site navigation (1)Skip section navigation (2)
Date:      Mon, 21 Nov 2011 17:18:48 +1100
From:      Julien Ridoux <jrid@cubinlab.ee.unimelb.edu.au>
To:        Lawrence Stewart <lstewart@freebsd.org>
Cc:        svn-src-head@freebsd.org, svn-src-all@freebsd.org, src-committers@freebsd.org, Ben Kaduk <minimarmot@gmail.com>
Subject:   Re: svn commit: r227778 - head/sys/net
Message-ID:  <648D11A8-3636-49E5-BF20-83E4EA87242C@cubinlab.ee.unimelb.edu.au>
In-Reply-To: <4EC9E408.9000304@freebsd.org>
References:  <201111210417.pAL4HOdi023556@svn.freebsd.org> <CAK2BMK4DP=japDufnbMUgqMgmL7rRye4wMrwqzHePyreNwiu-Q@mail.gmail.com> <4EC9E408.9000304@freebsd.org>

next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help

On 21/11/2011, at 4:39 PM, Lawrence Stewart wrote:

> On 11/21/11 16:12, Ben Kaduk wrote:
>> On Sun, Nov 20, 2011 at 11:17 PM, Lawrence =
Stewart<lstewart@freebsd.org>  wrote:
>>> Author: lstewart
>>> Date: Mon Nov 21 04:17:24 2011
>>> New Revision: 227778
>>> URL: http://svn.freebsd.org/changeset/base/227778
>>>=20
>>> Log:
>>>  - When feed-forward clock support is compiled in, change the BPF =
header to
>>>    contain both a regular timestamp obtained from the system clock =
and the
>>>    current feed-forward ffcounter value. This enables new =
possibilities including
>>=20
>> Is it really necessary to make the ABI dependent on a kernel
>> configuration option?  This causes all sorts of headaches if loadable
>> modules ever want to use that ABI, something that we just ran into
>> with vm_page_t and friends and had a long thread on -current about.
>=20
> Fair question. Julien, if pcap and other consumers will happily ignore =
the new ffcount_stamp member in the bpf header, is there any reason to =
conditionally add the ffcounter into the header struct?

It is a valid question indeed. The feedback I have received so far was =
to not have the feed-forward clock support be a default kernel =
configuration option. What follows is based on this assumption.

The commit (r227747) introduces sysctl that are conditioned by the same =
"FFCLOCK" kernel configuration option. If a loadable module tests for =
the presence of this sysctl, it will know if the ffcount_stamp member is =
available. Is it too much of a hack?

Alternatively, if the ffcounter is added to the bpf header =
unconditionally, the ffcount_stamp member can be set to 0. Loadable =
modules will then see a consistent ABI but will retrieve a meaningless =
value.

I am not sure which option makes more sense, any preference?

Cheers,
Julien=



Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?648D11A8-3636-49E5-BF20-83E4EA87242C>