Re: [PATCH] Add boot command line parsing for the e100 driver

[Jeff Garzik]

On Mon, May 19, 2003 at 05:33:23PM +0100, Christoph Hellwig wrote:
> On Mon, May 19, 2003 at 12:30:52PM -0400, Jeff Garzik wrote:
> > > 
> > > Don't do this. 2.5 has the module_parame stuff that works for both
> > > static and modular drivers.  Just convert e100 to it.
> > 
> > ...which totally screws people trying to keep 2.4 and 2.5
> > sources as close as possible.
> 
> So what?  It's not that we APIs don't change under Linux.

If you look carefully, source back-compatibility has been preserved
for network drivers.  Most API changes are accepted without comment
because they are easily made back-compatible.  The module_param API
breaks that.

Network driver-land is different from SCSI-land, where the amount of 2.5
differences is so high one more change doesn't make a difference.

> > If all modules do not require new module_param changes, then logically,
> > e100 does not either.  And e100 has a better argument than most against
> > such changes.
> 
> Again, we don't convert old drivers just for the sake of it.  But

Well...

> instead of adding such horrible cruft Corey did it should just use the
> proper API.

An API already exists, and it is source compatible between 2.4 and 2.5:
ethX=.... on the kernel command line.

The proper patch would pick up options from there.

	Jeff