[ofw] [PATCH] Bump up CI and AL interface version numbers

[Anatoly Greenblatt]

Sean,
 
You're right - all libraries must support all kernel interfaces. But we also need a way to differentiate between variants of same interface. There could be a situation where newer library works with older driver (or viese versa) and the order of elements in some struct definition has changed between versions. That is why interface version number should be increased to let application recognize the change..
 
Regards,
Anatoly.
 .

________________________________

From: ofw-bounces at lists.openfabrics.org on behalf of Hefty, Sean
Sent: Tue 8/26/2008 8:05 PM
To: Fab Tillier; Tzachi Dar; ofw at lists.openfabrics.org
Subject: RE: [ofw] [PATCH] Bump up CI and AL interface version numbers



>You're confusing release numbers with interface versions.  If you change an
>interface, you should change the number - it's not the same interface.  Whether
>the interface version is 1 or 1000 is irrelevant to the end user, but not to
>the developer.  It doesn't matter if the release number changes or not, the
>interface changed.  There's no reason to artificially keep the numbers low -
>it's much more valuable to allow upgrades of drivers without requiring
>rebuilding the system form the ground up.

You're letting an arbitrary separation of patches dictate what the interface version should be.  We *should* be providing libraries that support *all* kernel interface versions.  Applications can also be written to use different library interfaces.  You don't need to bump the interface version for every single change - only once for a set of collective changes.  This makes it easier to support multiple interfaces.

As for release numbers, the major release numbers (should) indicate a change to the interface that is not backwards compatible.

- Sean
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