Re: [PATCH 1/2] serial: samsung: Move uart_register_driver call todevice probe

[Russell King - ARM Linux]

On Mon, Jan 20, 2014 at 01:16:01PM -0800, Greg KH wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 20, 2014 at 10:05:30AM +0000, Russell King - ARM Linux wrote:
> > On Mon, Jan 20, 2014 at 02:32:34PM +0530, Tushar Behera wrote:
> > > uart_register_driver call binds the driver to a specific device
> > > node through tty_register_driver call. This should typically happen
> > > during device probe call.
> > > 
> > > In a multiplatform scenario, it is possible that multiple serial
> > > drivers are part of the kernel. Currently the driver registration fails
> > > if multiple serial drivers with same default major/minor numbers are
> > > included in the kernel.
> > > 
> > > A typical case is observed with amba-pl011 and samsung-uart drivers.
> > 
> > The samsung-uart driver is at fault here - the major/minor numbers were
> > officially registered to amba-pl011.  Samsung needs to be fixed properly.
> 
> I agree, the Samsung driver is "broken" here, but that's no reason why
> these two drivers can't register with the tty layer _after_ the hardware
> is detected, and not before.
> 
> That saves resources on systems that build the drivers in, yet do not
> have the hardware present, which is always a good thing.

Great, so what you're saying is that we need to wait until the first
device calls into the probe function.  What about removal... how does
a driver know when it's last device has been removed to de-register
that?

I guess it needs the driver model to provide some way to know when a
driver is completely unbound - but isn't that racy?

-- 
FTTC broadband for 0.8mile line: 5.8Mbps down 500kbps up.  Estimation
in database were 13.1 to 19Mbit for a good line, about 7.5+ for a bad.
Estimate before purchase was "up to 13.2Mbit".
--
To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
More majordomo info at  http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
Please read the FAQ at  http://www.tux.org/lkml/