From: Pablo Neira Ayuso <pablo@netfilter.org>
Date: Mon, 29 Jul 2013 12:30:04 +0200

Currently, it is not possible to use neither NLM_F_EXCL nor
NLM_F_REPLACE from genetlink. This is due to this checking in
genl_family_rcv_msg:

	if (nlh->nlmsg_flags & NLM_F_DUMP)

NLM_F_DUMP is NLM_F_MATCH|NLM_F_ROOT. Thus, if NLM_F_EXCL or
NLM_F_REPLACE flag is set, genetlink believes that you're
requesting a dump and it calls the .dumpit callback.

The solution that I propose is to refine this checking to
make it stricter:

	if ((nlh->nlmsg_flags & NLM_F_DUMP) == NLM_F_DUMP)

And given the combination NLM_F_REPLACE and NLM_F_EXCL does
not make sense to me, it removes the ambiguity.

There was a patch that tried to fix this some time ago (0ab03c2
netlink: test for all flags of the NLM_F_DUMP composite) but it
tried to resolve this ambiguity in *all* existing netlink subsystems,
not only genetlink. That patch was reverted since it broke iproute2,
which is using NLM_F_ROOT to request the dump of the routing cache.

Signed-off-by: Pablo Neira Ayuso <pablo@netfilter.org>

Yes, I remember that old attempt to fix this.

Ok, let's see what happens when we limit the scope of this change
to just genetlink users.

I honestly can't believe that NLM_F_EXCL and NLM_F_REPLACE are
completely unusable in normal rtnetlink interfaces.