[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
* [EMAIL PROTECTED] [2006-04-05 11:25:46]
Ideally I'd expect the IPMP code to be a model of how to do this.
IPMP is, in reality, a strange beast. Why you'd expect it to set any
kind of precedent for how to write NIC drivers is something of a
mystery to me, as IPMP operates almost entirely at layer 3. Hiding
some of the implementation details of IPMP, as the Clearview project
will do, seems like a good thing and isn't really related to the
stability level of NIC driver interfaces.
My view of IPMP is that it is functionality that is layered on top
of NICs - it is a virtual NIC that has the backing of real ones
behind it. It isn't doing any real I/O itself, it is passing off
packets to real NICs for sending and similarly, packets received via
an IPMP interface come via a real NIC first.
IPMP was never implemented as a "virtual NIC", which perhaps is where
some of the confusion arises.
Sure, it wasn't in the past, but with Clearview it certainly looks
like one in the design doc.
Darren
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