Re: [PATCH 2/2] mvneta: use inband status only when link type is "auto"

From: Stas Sergeev
Date: Thu Jul 09 2015 - 17:31:41 EST


10.07.2015 00:14, Florian Fainelli ÐÐÑÐÑ:
On 09/07/15 13:26, Stas Sergeev wrote:
09.07.2015 21:18, Florian Fainelli ÐÐÑÐÑ:
On 09/07/15 10:41, Stas Sergeev wrote:
The commit 898b2970e2c9 ("mvneta: implement SGMII-based in-band link
state
signaling") implemented the link parameters auto-negotiation
unconditionally.
Unfortunately it appears that some HW that implements SGMII protocol,
doesn't generate the inband status, so it is not possible to
auto-negotiate
anything with such HW.
What is the purpose of using the in-band status in the first place if
you end-up having to specify a 'fixed-link' property which contains most
of the link parameters: speed, duplex etc...?
You don't have to.
My config from today is as simple as:

fixed-link {
link = "auto";
};

and that's all.
Without my today's patch, only 'speed' is a mandatory - not too much.
That makes me think that 'fixed-link' is not exactly what you want then,
you would probably want something like "marvell,use-in-band-status" or
something like this. It could be a more generic property that is not
Marvell specific after all, that would be fine.
I think there is some confusion around fixed-link, because
of its name. This is what fixed-link is:
---
Some Ethernet MACs have a "fixed link", and are not connected to a
normal MDIO-managed PHY device.
---
A bit vague, but to me it means "non-MDIO", and that's all.
If we make it like "marvell,use-in-band-status", then it will
suddenly cancel everything in a fixed-link definition, which
is non obvious. Or, if we make it so that fixed-link def is
not needed in presence of "marvell,use-in-band-status", then
this "marvell,use-in-band-status" will have to silently enable
the fixed-phy driver the way fixed-link does.
If we just view fixed-link as non-MDIO link, then everything
fits, IMHO.
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