Re: [RFC PATCH 00/11] Rust null block driver

From: Miguel Ojeda <miguel.ojeda.sandonis@gmail.com>
To: Jens Axboe <axboe@kernel.dk>
Cc: "Keith Busch" <kbusch@kernel.org>,
	"Bart Van Assche" <bvanassche@acm.org>,
	"Andreas Hindborg" <nmi@metaspace.dk>,
	"Christoph Hellwig" <hch@lst.de>,
	"Damien Le Moal" <Damien.LeMoal@wdc.com>,
	"Hannes Reinecke" <hare@suse.de>,
	lsf-pc@lists.linux-foundation.org,
	rust-for-linux@vger.kernel.org, linux-block@vger.kernel.org,
	"Matthew Wilcox" <willy@infradead.org>,
	"Miguel Ojeda" <ojeda@kernel.org>,
	"Alex Gaynor" <alex.gaynor@gmail.com>,
	"Wedson Almeida Filho" <wedsonaf@gmail.com>,
	"Boqun Feng" <boqun.feng@gmail.com>,
	"Gary Guo" <gary@garyguo.net>,
	"Björn Roy Baron" <bjorn3_gh@protonmail.com>,
	"Benno Lossin" <benno.lossin@proton.me>,
	"open list" <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>,
	gost.dev@samsung.com, "Daniel Vetter" <daniel@ffwll.ch>
Subject: Re: [RFC PATCH 00/11] Rust null block driver
Date: Thu, 4 May 2023 22:11:11 +0200	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <CANiq72nAMH1SfGmPTEjGHfevbb9tMLN4W7gJ3nBpJcvkCEsZ4g@mail.gmail.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <e7bc2155-613b-8904-9942-2e9615b0dc63@kernel.dk>

On Thu, May 4, 2023 at 9:02 PM Jens Axboe <axboe@kernel.dk> wrote:
>
> But back to the real question... This is obviously extra burden on
> maintainers, and that needs to be sorted out first. Block drivers in

Regarding maintenance, something we have suggested in similar cases to
other subsystems is that the author gets involved as a maintainer of,
at least, the Rust abstractions/driver (possibly with a different
`MAINTAINERS` entry).

Of course, that is still work for the existing maintainer(s), i.e.
you, since coordination takes time. However, it can also be a nice way
to learn Rust on the side, meanwhile things are getting upstreamed and
discussed (I think Daniel, in Cc, is taking that approach).

And it may also be a way for you to get an extra
maintainer/reviewer/... later on for the C parts, too, even if Rust
does not succeed.

> general are not super security sensitive, as it's mostly privileged code
> and there's not a whole lot of user visibile API. And the stuff we do
> have is reasonably basic. So what's the long term win of having rust
> bindings? This is a legitimate question. I can see a lot of other more
> user exposed subsystems being of higher interest here.

From the experience of other kernel maintainers/developers that are
making the move, the advantages seem to be well worth it, even
disregarding the security aspect, i.e. on the language side alone.

Cheers,
Miguel