Connectx-3 SR-IOV PF does not forward unicast packet when put into a bridge with mlx4_en 4.0.0 driver

Connectx-3 SR-IOV PF does not forward unicast packet when put into a bridge with mlx4_en 4.0.0 driver

[G.R.]

Hi Tariq,

I run into a potential mlx4 driver issue and find your name in the
maintainer list.
I summarized my setup and problem in a forum post [1] but found a
workaround later.
The workaround is simply switching to the ofed driver version 4.9-4.1.7.
The problem for me is that the ofed support for Connectx-3 is stuck at
v4.9 which in turn got stuck at Debian 10.0 with kernel version 4.19
while I'm already on Debian 11.2 with 5.10.
I'm writing to ask if this should be considered as a feature
separation between the ofed version and the kernel shipped version?
Or simply a bug that can be fixed -- seems that the SR-IOV feature is
otherwise working fine with the kernel shipped version?

I really wish I can use the kernel shipped version since it's
guaranteed to be available.
I really don't want to be locked on the ofed version which appears to
be gradually dropping support to old NIC models and is lagging behind
with distro support ...

Thanks,
Timothy

[1] https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/question-is-sr-iov-enabled-nic-supposed-to-forward-packet-in-linux-bridge-connectx-3-nic-problem.36751/
PS: have no idea if the netdev list only accept email from
subscribers. Hope this works...