Re: [PATCH v5 14/17] NTB: Add support for EPF PCI-Express Non-Transparent Bridge

On 9/20/20 9:52 PM, Kishon Vijay Abraham I wrote:

Hi Randy,

On 18/09/20 9:45 pm, Randy Dunlap wrote:

quoted

On 9/17/20 11:42 PM, Kishon Vijay Abraham I wrote:

quoted

diff --git a/drivers/ntb/hw/epf/Kconfig b/drivers/ntb/hw/epf/Kconfig
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..6197d1aab344
--- /dev/null
+++ b/drivers/ntb/hw/epf/Kconfig

@@ -0,0 +1,6 @@
+config NTB_EPF
+	tristate "Generic EPF Non-Transparent Bridge support"
+	depends on m
+	help
+	  This driver supports EPF NTB on configurable endpoint.
+	  If unsure, say N.

Hi,
Why is this driver restricted to 'm' (loadable module)?
I.e., it cannot be builtin.

I'm trying to keep all the host side PCI drivers corresponding to the
devices configured using endpoint function drivers as modules and also
not populate MODULE_DEVICE_TABLE() to prevent auto-loading.

The different endpoint function drivers (right now only pci-epf-test.c
and pci-epf-ntb.c) can use the same device ID and vendorID for
configuring the endpoint devices. So on the host side, it's possible an
un-intended PCI driver can be bound to the device. So in-order to give
users the flexibility of deciding the driver to be bound, I'm trying to
keep it as modules. (Some driver like NTB also uses class code
PCI_CLASS_MEMORY_RAM for binding a driver in addition to deviceID and
vendorID but it need not be the case for all the drivers.)

Thanks for the explanation.

-- 
~Randy