On Thu, Jan 22, 2026 at 02:13:06PM +0100, Morten Brørup wrote: > > From: Bruce Richardson [mailto:[email protected]] > > Sent: Thursday, 22 January 2026 13.24 > > > > Having the net_null driver always available can be convenient and > > allows > > use by unit tests, so add this trivial driver to the always-enable > > list. > > > > Signed-off-by: Bruce Richardson <[email protected]> > > > > --- > > I'm not sure if we want this to be always enabled or not, so sending > > this as an RFC. I can see definite advantages to doing so, but I also > > dislike having too many components on the always-enable list. > > > > Since I'm ambivilent myself, including this patch so the community can > > decide. > > I don't think real applications use this. > If they do, they can include it manually. > > My main objection is: > We are setting the wrong precedence if we make stuff like this mandatory for > convenience. > > But I agree with the reason you are suggesting it. > > Is there some other way it can be enabled for unit tests? > Maybe the null driver can depend on the unit tests being built? > > I don't mind that the driver is being built. > I just don't want it included by default when statically linking a monolithic > application. > > I'm flexible on this RFC, so it's a very soft NAK from me. > If it can be disabled at build time, I'm OK with it. (But still concerned > about setting the wrong precedence.) > Yes, I agree.
Why I'm proposing this is because, in order to give me faster rebuilds and because of the hardware I have available to me, I generally set up my builds with "-Denable_drivers=net/intel/*", since that really speeds up my dev-build-test cycle. In doing so, though, I do miss out on having some unit tests available when I run the fast-test suite, which is why I suggested this addition in case there are others who limit the builds to just the hardware they are using. /Bruce
