Re: [RFC PATCH 0/3] vfio: ccw: basic channel path event handling

From: Pierre Morel
Date: Mon Jan 15 2018 - 05:22:50 EST


On 15/01/2018 09:57, Dong Jia Shi wrote:
* Cornelia Huck <cohuck@xxxxxxxxxx> [2018-01-11 11:54:22 +0100]:

On Thu, 11 Jan 2018 04:04:18 +0100
Dong Jia Shi <bjsdjshi@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Hi Folks,

Background
==========

Some days ago, we had a discussion on the topic of channel path virtualization.
Ref:
Subject: [PATCH 0/3] Channel Path realted CRW generation
Message-Id: <20170727015418.85407-1-bjsdjshi@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
URL: https://lists.nongnu.org/archive/html/qemu-devel/2017-07/msg08414.html

Indeed that thread is not short and discussed many aspects in a
non-concentrated manner. The parts those are most valuable to me are:
1. a re-modelling for channel path is surely the best offer, but is not
possible to have in the near future.
2. to enhance the path related functionalities, using PNO and PNOM might
be something we can do for now. This may be something that I could improve
without model related arguments.

So here I have this series targeting to add basic channel path event handling
for vfio-ccw -- no touch of the channel path modelling in both the kernel and
the QEMU side, but find a way to sync path status change to guest lazily using
SCSW_FLAGS_MASK_PNO and pmcw->pnom. In short, I want to enhance path related
stuff (to be more specific: sync up path status to the guest) on a best effort
basis, which means in a way that won't get us invloed to do channel path
re-modelling.
The guest should also get the updated PIM/PAM/POM, shouldn't it?

Yes. The following values will be updated for the guest:
PMCW:
- PIM/PAM/POM
- PNOM
- CHPIDs
SCSW
- PNOM bit

See vfio_ccw_update_schib in patch #4 of the QEMU series.

What benifit can we get from this? The administrator of a virtual machine can
get uptodate (in some extent) status of the current using channel paths, so
he/she can monitor paths status and get path problem noticed timely (see the
example below).

I think we can start a new round discussion based on this series. So reviewers
can give their comments based on some code, and then we can decide if this is
we want or not.

As flagged with RFC, the intention of this series is to show what I have for
now, and what could the code look like in general. Thus I can get some early
feedbacks. I would expect to see opinions on:
- is the target (mentioned above) of this series welcomed or not.
It certainly makes sense to have a way to get an updated schib.

:)

I think so too, if the guest's administrator wants to be able to do something.

But I would like to see something about path virtualization.
Having more accurate information on hardware without virtualization is a
big handicap for migration and hotplug.

Regards,

Pierre


--
Pierre Morel
Linux/KVM/QEMU in BÃblingen - Germany