On Mon, May 29, 2017 at 3:17 AM, Jakub Kicinski <kubak...@wp.pl> wrote: > On Sun, 28 May 2017 10:26:49 +0300, Yotam Gigi wrote:
>> This problem is even more relevant in the Mellanox HCA driver team, which >> would >> like to use that code in order to burn the HCA firmware, but not intend to >> trigger it on boot time, which means that must have a way for the user to >> trigger it. > What would the requirements for the HCA team be? Is it about loading > different code or loading HW settings? For the NIC, as of the (happily growing) large open-systems by nature install base, we can't effort for the driver not to load when the currently burned fw isn't the latest or the system doesn't have the latest libfirmware clone. We do have to keep the hassle of compatibility with older FWs, etc. As part of the driver/FW API design we use cap bits for that matter, and never ask/branch on specific FW or HW versions. We do want to let user work with the kernel w.o the need to have them install MLNX or anyone's tool suit and hence the large value we find in the ethtool flashing of FW image (the patches are ready...) Or.
