Re: e1000/ICH8LAN weirdness - no ethtool link until initially forced up

["Robin H. Johnson" <robbat2@gentoo.org>]

On Tue, Nov 07, 2006 at 02:32:32PM -0800, Auke Kok wrote:
> >Would a patch that adds a modparam (not enabled by default) running the
> >behavior I'm after, be acceptable, so the e1000 driver can act identical
> >to all of the other drivers?
> I bet that all drivers work fine if you `ifconfig up` them. What happens if 
> other NIC drivers implement similar powersaving methods and start working 
> the same?
In that, case the following (puesdo-code) would need to be added to
ethtool.

(before reading link status)
1. $oldstate = GET(current software state of UP/DOWN from ifconfig)
2. if($oldstate != UP) then SET(software state to UP)
3. if($oldstate != UP) then (some delay might be needed)
4. read PHY status
5. if($oldstate != UP) then SET(software state to $oldstate)

Thus ethtool should always report the correct PHY state.

-- 
Robin Hugh Johnson
E-Mail     : robbat2@gentoo.org
GnuPG FP   : 11AC BA4F 4778 E3F6 E4ED  F38E B27B 944E 3488 4E85

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