[ofw] evolution of the WinOF software

[Sean Hefty]

>group meeting. There main goal should be to provide the best solution
>for Windows environment and not the simplified porting between Linux and
>Windows. There are ULPs specific for Windows that does not exist in
>Linux and vice versa(WSD, SDP). Lets discuss in the next working group
>meeting.

To be clear, the goal of WinVerbs is to provide the best solution for Windows.
I will be adding rdma_cm support, and I believe that that interface should match
with the changes needed to support NDI -- not IBAL.  (I.e. use overlapped I/O,
not callbacks.)  Beyond supporting verb semantics, enabling portable
applications is not a goal of WinVerbs. 

The OFED compatibility interface is somewhat orthogonal to what the underlying
interfaces look like.  (Obviously such an interface can't easily reside above
something like NDI.)  Users have requested 'OFED verbs' and some of the Linux
utilities on Windows.  The OFED I/F alone is insufficient for creating a
portable app, but I would bet that creating that interface would be the fastest
and most maintainable way of porting the slew of IB management utilities to
Windows.

The existence of an OFED I/F on Windows is limited to userspace and does not
prevent apps from being Linux only, Windows only, or optimized for both
environments.  It provides the same purpose as DAPL, except for exposing
low-level interfaces that are of interest to diagnostic and other utilities. 

- Sean