Re: [PATCH v4 1/2] New driver: Xillybus generic interface for FPGA(programmable logic)

From: Eli Billauer
Date: Tue May 21 2013 - 07:02:27 EST


On 21/05/13 00:16, Hans J. Koch wrote:
On Fri, May 17, 2013 at 05:53:39PM +0300, Eli Billauer wrote:
It has turned out somewhat tricky to put Xillybus in one of the existing
categories of device drivers. I placed it under drivers/uio, mainly because it
shares the spirit of a generic driver allowing userspace programs to talk
directly with hardware. Unlike the classic UIO devices, Xillybus' char files
shouldn't be memory mapped, but rather used in the regular manner as streams
of data.
In that case it simply isn't a UIO device.

By moving Xillybus to drivers/uio, I suggested that the term UIO could mean any direct user-space I/O, not just by memory mapping. But hint was taken. I'll move it back to drivers/misc. Unless someone can suggest a better place.
This driver was previously posted under drivers/misc/. The misc device
framework turned out to be inadequate, as the driver may create more than 100
device files in some cases.
And that is a problem? If yes, try something else like sysfs. From your
description, this is a drivers/misc device for me.
Sysfs has been suggested in the past. My best understanding of sysfs is that it's there to convey small pieces of information. Xillybus' device files are intended for possibly heavy data traffic.

Thanks for your inputs.
Eli

--
To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/