[opensolaris-summit] Summit Hardware

Thu Oct 4 11:07:48 PDT 2007

Its looking like it may be worthwhile... maybe on Sunday?  It seems like 
there are a few folks interested in having a couple of technical 
conversations.

I'd propose the following topics, which I can help lead.  This is based 
on where there are schedule gaps in the rooms in the current schedule:

Saturday 17:00-17:30   - Getting started with kernel development 
(intro/teaching)... I won't go much into specific APIs because there 
isn't time, but I can give tips and tricks to getting your feet wet, 
perhaps including fixing a known bug.

Saturday 17:30-18:30   - Porting network drivers to GLDv3... again this 
would be mostly a one-way.  I'd present an actual conversion.  (Since I 
can perform such a conversion in about 4 hours typically, I think 
*presenting* it in an hour would be pretty easy.)

Sunday 15:00-16:00   - Power management (mostly focused on tasks for 
driver developers, but also covering other challenges.  Randy and I 
could probably co-host it.)

I'd *request* someone to present a topic on Fault Management for Driver 
Developers.  I'm not qualified to present this.   But it's a topic I'm 
interested in, and which hasn't been well covered in an easily 
consumable format, IMO.

I'd recommend a round-table discussion to cover I/O virtualization.  
Specifically, what are we going to do about PCI SR-IOV, VMDq, Intel's VT 
I/O stuff, and such?  This is a topic of interest for Xen, hypervisor, 
and I/O engineers. (Also networking/crossbow.)  I think part of the 
problem is that we need to sit down and talk about what the problems 
coming down are, and what as a group we need to do to solve them.

I'd be interested in attending any presentation of, or discussion 
surrounding, Bluetooth, but I think the appropriate folks from China 
won't be here.

    -- Garrett

John Sonnenschein wrote:
> FWIW,
>
> when I initially became interested in the summit, I had assumed it
> would mostly be technical discussion ( it's the "developer summit" not
> the "packaging stuff together" summit ).
>
> I know that I at least would love for you to present something (either
> formally or otherwise) on kernel driver development
>
> On 10/4/07, Garrett D'Amore <gdamore at sun.com> wrote:
>   
>> Al Hopper wrote:
>>     
>>> On Thu, 4 Oct 2007, Shawn Walker wrote:
>>>
>>>       
>>>> On 04/10/2007, Garrett D'Amore <gdamore at sun.com> wrote:
>>>>         
>>>>> John Sonnenschein wrote:
>>>>>           
>>>>>> Apple actually published a fantastic set of docs on the filesystem,
>>>>>> but more to the point OSX/darwin contains a CDDL compatible licensed
>>>>>> implementation, but I'm not as attached to the particular idea as I am
>>>>>> with the idea of having technical (rather than political or design )
>>>>>> breakouts
>>>>>>
>>>>>>             
>>>>> As we are quickly running out of time, and I'm still not clear what
>>>>> exactly is going to be discussed here.  I can't tell whether the summit
>>>>> is going to be folks presenting their ideas for future directions on
>>>>> topics like packaging and installation (both of which bore me, but I
>>>>> actually happen to *like* the SYSV packaging that we have today), or
>>>>> whether this going to be any multiway exchange of ideas going on.
>>>>>
>>>>> The "drivers and laptop support" topic is potentially very germane to
>>>>> me, as that is my current focus (specifically drivers for SDcard, and
>>>>> laptop power management including suspend/resume), but I'm still not
>>>>> sure what is going to be discussed there... I don't recognize David
>>>>> Stewart from the laptop or device drivers communities, nor from the
>>>>> internal group at Sun that is focused on mobile platforms.  *So*, what
>>>>> will that topic be about, really?
>>>>>
>>>>> I'm still afraid that the very non-technical focus of the topics means
>>>>> that a lot of potential participants like me might be turned off by the
>>>>> Summit.  This looks a lot more like a meeting of the Program Managers
>>>>> than of the Engineers.  (And maybe that is indeed necessary and is also
>>>>> the need the Summit is intended to fill, but if that is the case then
>>>>> there is approximately zero purpose in my attendance.)
>>>>>           
>>>> I wouldn't call installation, packaging, upgrading, virtualisation,
>>>> laptop drivers, open sound, etc. "non-technical" -- but that all
>>>> depends on what you mean but "non-technical."
>>>>         
>> Yes, it does.  But if you look, virtualization for example, is still
>> focussed on install.
>>
>> I'm not sure that laptop drivers, OSS, etc. are really going to be
>> covered in technical detail, other than a presentation of slideware.  I
>> expect Intel will offer some information about what they are
>> contributing (which is indeed valuable!), but at the end of the day,
>> this is more likely, IMO, to be PM level stuff than
>> hands-gritty-in-the-code stuff.
>>
>>     
>>>> I'd be happy to see you there, as I know there are at least a few of
>>>> us that would like to pick your brains about driver development during
>>>> a breakout session. However, that's up to you.
>>>>         
>>> A big +1
>>>
>>> You can only influence the agenda by being present.  And we'll have
>>> some systems where you could provide a real hands-on demo of your
>>> expertize - rather than presenting slide-ware.
>>>       
>> I'd offered to present a technical breakout on one or more topics
>> related to drivers, networking, GLDv3, etc.  The "general" consensus I
>> got was (or that I thought I got was), there wasn't enough interest in
>> such topics at this particular venue.  And I've not seen anyone else
>> offer to present anything close to the technical level that I was hoping
>> for, outside of installation/packaging/patching.
>>
>> And, fwiw, the problems I had hoped to see go beyond my personal
>> interests, but could include other areas like OpenGL, compiz, looking
>> glass, etc.  But again, maybe those communities are taking care of
>> things in their own way.  (Gnome and X11 have their own
>> non-OpenSolaris-hosted communities at least.)
>>
>> Anyway, is this a forum where folks are going to get together and try to
>> solve problems, or is it more each presenter giving his thoughts and
>> slideware?
>>
>> One way presentations have their uses, and (as indicated above), I'm
>> willing to present if there is demand.  (Topics I am equipped for
>> include power management, dynamic reconfiguration, GLDv2/v3/DLPI, and
>> general kernel/device driver development.)
>>
>> But I'm also very, very interested in having conversations that are not
>> one-way.  There are some significant feature gaps, and technical
>> challenges that the community could use more help with.  A dedicated
>> forum to tackle group design problems, and even individual hacking (got
>> a pet bug you want fixed?)  would probably be very useful.  So far, this
>> doesn't look like (at least this time) this is evolving into that forum.
>>
>> Anyway, I need to make up my mind today, because I still have to figure
>> out travel and hotel plans.  And if I were to plan to present anything,
>> I'd need to gather materials.  Don't get me wrong: I *want* to
>> participate.  But I want the participation to be worth the time that it
>> distracts me from actually *doing*.
>>
>>     -- Garrett
>>     
>>> Water always finds its own level...
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>>
>>> Al Hopper  Logical Approach Inc, Plano, TX.  al at logical-approach.com
>>>            Voice: 972.379.2133 Fax: 972.379.2134  Timezone: US CDT
>>> OpenSolaris Governing Board (OGB) Member - Apr 2005 to Mar 2007
>>> http://www.opensolaris.org/os/community/ogb/ogb_2005-2007/
>>>       
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>>     
>
>
>   