Re: [RFC] Patch to Abstract Ethernet PHY support (using driver model)

[Stephen Hemminger <shemminger@xxxxxxxx>]

On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 08:45:53 -0600
Kumar Gala <kumar.gala@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Jeff,
> 
> We were hoping for more feedback from netdev people on this patch:
> 
> http://oss.sgi.com/projects/netdev/archive/2004-12/msg00643.html
> 
> thanks
> 
> - kumar
> 
> On Dec 23, 2004, at 3:00 PM, Andy Fleming wrote:
> 
> > It has been suggested that I split the patch into 2 parts: gianfar
> > specific stuff, and PHY specific stuff.
> >
> > Here is the result:
> > <gfar_12232004.patch><phy_12232004.patch><ATT229010.txt>
> 

It would be more valuable if there were cases where multiple different boards 
that
use the same type of PHY chip were supported. Even better if it could subsume 
the existing
MII code. Don't know enough about all the different flavors of hardware to know 
what
combinations exist but it looks like there are different boards that have the 
same
PHY chips. It looks like the FreeBSD tries to abstract this.

-- 
Stephen Hemminger       <shemminger@xxxxxxxx>