Re: AltQ

[Thierry Deval <TDeval@PrimeOBJ.COM>]

On 01-Feb-00 Chris Cappuccio wrote:
> On Tue, 1 Feb 2000, Thierry Deval wrote:
> 
>  | Couldn't we use the same majors across platforms ? Do they diverge that
> much ?
>  | 
> 
> if you look at, say, /usr/src/sys/arch/sparc/sparc/conf.c, major numbers
> up to 123 are allocated.  Under /usr/src/sys/arch/i386/i386/conf.c, it is up
> to 63.
> 
> Major numbers not portable (which is why there's a separate /dev/MAKEDEV for
> each architecture) simply because they are for devices and some devices may
> exist on some platforms and not others.

OK, This explains that :(

>  | > Also, if the architecture has a special high resolution
>  | > timer (like the pentium's TSC timer) then support should be added in
>  | > altq/altq_subr.c.
>  | 
>  | Wow, low-level coding... What archs do have such features (do we consider
>  | variants like 68360 <-> m68k; of course they are not supported) ?
>  | Let's go to the datasheets ...
>  | 
> 
> Well, it will use microtime if you don't do this.  Unless there is code to
> support the alternative timer feature (such as, the i386 arch has code to
> support TSC) then it needs to be done (could be taken from netbsd if they
> have it and we dont for instance)
> 
> The RTMX real-time code includes a high resolution kernel timer (according to
> www.rtmx.com).. When the RTMX real-time code is merged into current, this may
> be an alternative.
> 
> The point of all this is for the developers to accept the commit of ALTQ into
> the tree.  This will not happen until ALTQ is modified to support all
> architectures, and either a vast majority of network drivers are modified to
> work with ALTQ or ALTQ is redesigned to work in a different manner (Which I
> don't think will happen at all ;)
> 
> So, the real question is, does anyone want to modify network drivers?? The
> modifications became more complex between altq-2.0 and altq-2.1 and are not
> documented in the altq how-to-modify-drivers.txt.  (I don't want to do this 
> if someone else does ;)

Of course, I want. And I will, given some time...
And I really appreciate your support and advises :-)

> Of course if people using other architectures are interested in ALTQ then
> please get it together!!

I, for now, am working on x86, but have a multia (alpha) for test purposes.
In a near future, we'll get a powermac (we'll see how it fits, as a newly
supported platform)

I bet sparc would be of great value (as they are the best networking platforms
under Solaris).

Don't know about the others...


        Thierry