Re: [PATCH v12 2/2] arm: dts: aspeed: ventura: add Meta Ventura BMC
From: Andrew Lunn
Date: Wed Apr 08 2026 - 08:49:44 EST
> > > > If there are no devices on the bus, why enable it?
> > >
> > > We intentionally enable it so user-space tools can access the switch
> > > registers. I have added a comment in v13 to clarify this.
> >
> > Why would user space want to access the switch registers for an
> > unmanaged switch? It sounds like you are using Marvells SDK in
> > userspace to manage the switch, rather than using DSA.
> >
>
> We do have a custom user-space daemon that configures the switch
> registers for our specific use case. Should I remove the &mdio0 node
> if it is only enabled and has no other configuration in the upstream
> device tree?
Please just be truthful that you have a user space driver, so need the
bus enabled.
I also guess you have some other kernel code that allows you to
actually use the bus from user space? The typical ethernet IOCTL
handler does not work for you, since you don't have an ethernet device
using this bus. Such code is unlikely to be accepted into mainline. We
don't like user space drivers when there is a perfectly good kernel
driver for this switch.
Andrew