On Thu, Jan 04, 2007 at 06:19:06PM +0530, Vivek Goyal wrote:
> On Thu, Jan 04, 2007 at 07:41:01AM -0500, Neil Horman wrote:
> > On Thu, Jan 04, 2007 at 11:24:20AM +0530, Vivek Goyal wrote:
> > > On Thu, Jan 04, 2007 at 10:56:28AM +0530, Ankita Garg wrote:
> > > > Hi,
> > > >
> > > > o Patch to pass reset_devices flag to the second kernel.
> > > >
> > >
> > > Some background why we need this command line parameter. Command line
> > > parameter reset_devices was introduced in kernel versions 2.6.19. The
> > > intention of this parameter is that driver needs to first do a software
> > > reset of the underlying device and then go ahead with rest of the
> > > initialization.
> > >
> > > This will help initializing the devices while second kernel is booting.
> > > That's why we need to pass this parameter to second kernel commandline.
> > >
> > > Though there does not seem to be any user of this parameter so far in
> > > the kernel, I am expecting that down the line we will have.
> > >
> > > Thanks
> > > Vivek
> > 
> > I'm confused still as to why we need to add this code at all?  We have the
> > ability to add kernel command line parameters via the initscripts?  Why not 
> > just
> > add this in there when needed?
> > 
> 
> Hi Neil,
> 
> That solution would be very specific to RedHat. If a user on non RHEL5
> distro tries to use kdump then how would he handle it?
> 
I understand that, but the point I'm trying to make is that this seems like it
would be better to do in an initscript in general.  We've seen the need to add
specific commandline parameters for specific systems several times now.  Instead
of updating the kexec code to detect and add appropriate parameters for every
system out there, wouldn't it be better if each distro provided  a way for a
user to configure any needed additional parameters that an initscript could then
just pass along to the kernel using the --command-line option?

> Another option can be that we specify this thing in kdump documentation so
> that a user can add this parameter additionally along with maxcpus=1 and
> irqpoll. Then respective distros can choose to automate this whole process
> and add append reset_devices through init scripts.
> 
I absolutely agree.  I think this is the way to go forward.  It keeps us from
having to update kexec binaries when someone wants/needs new command line
parameters (for which there may be countless combinations of out in the field).
Make the distros provide a method for leveraging the already existing
functionality of kexec instead (in this case --command-line).  Its less
confusing and more flexible IMO.

Thanks & Regards
Neil

> What do other think about it?
> 
> Thanks
> Vivek

-- 
/***************************************************
 *Neil Horman
 *Software Engineer
 *Red Hat, Inc.
 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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 *http://pgp.mit.edu
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