On Mon, Aug 12, 2019 at 1:31 AM Jiri Pirko [off-list ref] wrote:

Mon, Aug 12, 2019 at 03:37:26AM CEST, dsahern@gmail.com wrote:

quoted

On 8/11/19 7:34 PM, David Ahern wrote:

quoted

On 8/10/19 12:30 AM, Jiri Pirko wrote:

quoted

Could you please write me an example message of add/remove?

altnames are for existing netdevs, yes? existing netdevs have an id and
a name - 2 existing references for identifying the existing netdev for
which an altname will be added. Even using the altname as the main
'handle' for a setlink change, I see no reason why the GETLINK api can
not take an the IFLA_ALT_IFNAME and return the full details of the
device if the altname is unique.

So, what do the new RTM commands give you that you can not do with
RTM_*LINK?

To put this another way, the ALT_NAME is an attribute of an object - a
LINK. It is *not* a separate object which requires its own set of
commands for manipulating.

Okay, again, could you provide example of a message to add/remove
altname using existing setlink message? Thanks!

Will the below work ?... just throwing an example for discussion:

make the name list a nested list
IFLA_ALT_NAMES
        IFLA_ALT_NAME_OP /* ADD or DEL used with setlink */
        IFLA_ALT_NAME
        IFLA_ALT_NAME_LIST

With RTM_NEWLINK  you can specify a list to set and unset
With RTM_SETLINK  you can specify an individual name with a add or del op

notifications will always be RTM_NEWLINK with the full list.

The nested attribute can be structured differently.

Only thing is i am worried about increasing the size of link dump and
notification msgs.

What is the limit on the number of names again ?