[ofa-general] Re: [PATCH RFC] opensm/event_plugin: plugin API version 2

[Hal Rosenstock]

Hi Sasha,

On Wed, 2008-07-02 at 16:11 +0300, Sasha Khapyorsky wrote:
> Hi Hal,
> 
> On 14:28 Mon 30 Jun     , Hal Rosenstock wrote:
> > > 
> > > As we learned recently having structured API leads to such problems just
> > > well, in this case one can expect "stable API" even if it was never
> > > declared.
> > 
> > I hardly think that situation is comparable if you are referring to the
> > library APIs exposed inside of OpenSM for the vendors who wanted these
> > without OpenSM itself (for diags and ibutils).
> 
> Why not?

Because exposing all the data structures, etc. is way more granular (all
the socalled opaque objects are no longer opaque) than a library API.
It's a totally different magnitude IMO.

> We got complains about changes in libosmcomp just few weeks
> ago. 

But at least that's way more manageable the way it is and I would have
cast the libosmcomp issue in a slightly different light.

> I clearly don't want to make such limitations for OpenSM itself.

I don't see how those limitations can be made or OpenSM could not move
forward.

> > > I think I agree with Ira - OpenSM version exact match enforcement will
> > > make it clearer that plugin writer should be ready to rebuild and
> > > possibly update its code.
> > 
> > should being the operative word.
> > 
> > > > Might this be better handled as packaging with separate packages based
> > > > on licenses ?
> > > 
> > > What do you mean?
> > 
> > This is related to what I wrote below about the OpenFabrics licensing
> > requirements. The idea is if GPL licensing were to be allowed (perhaps
> > only in some limited context), then there could be two different
> > packages: dual and GPL. In that way plugins would be more assured of
> > being compatible with each other and OpenSM.
> 
> I would prefer to separate packages by its functionality and not due to
> licensing issues. 

Right, licensed based packages do put all related functionality in a
similar bucket (management) but is that the basis to make such a
decision ?

> Anyway GPL is not permitted in OFA and all this
> discussion is yet hypothetical.

Yes, but one needs to look at hypotheticals to set direction.

-- Hal

> Sasha
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