[ofw] HCA Description field format differences between Windows & Linux?

[Fab Tillier]

Smith, Stan wrote on Thu, 3 Jun 2010 at 09:10:25

> 
> Hello,
>   The Linux ibnetdiscover lists HCAs in the format 'hostname portnum
> HCA-description'.
> Windows ibnetdiscover lists HCAs as 'HCA-description'.
> 
> I would like to enhance the Windows HCA driver, NodeDescription I
> believe, to include the 'hostname port' in order to provide format
> consistency for management tools which expect this format.
> 
> I was thinking along the lines of adding 'hostname portnum' to the
> NodeDescription string when the port goes Active.
> Is this a good/correct choice?

How do the Linux drivers set this?  Isn't there a local MAD you issue to the HCA to set the node description?

Is the NodeDescription different for each port of an HCA?

> Suggestions?

I would mimic whatever the Linux code does for consistency, in how it pushes the node description into the HCA.  Look at __read_machine_name in bus_driver.c for how the hostname was read from the registry.  Heck, you can even just reference node_desc (it's declared as an extern char in al_smi.c)

Perhaps push it into the HCA when the SMI client gets initialized?

-Fab