Re: [rfc] split_page function to split higher order pages?

[Nick Piggin]

On Mon, Jan 23, 2006 at 09:47:15AM +0100, Heiko Carstens wrote:
> > > > Just wondering what people think of the idea of using a helper
> > > > function to split higher order pages instead of doing it manually?
> > > 
> > > Maybe it's worth documenting that this is for kernel (or even
> > > architecture) internal use only and that drivers really shouldn't be
> > > doing this..
> > 
> > I guess it doesn't seem like something drivers would need to use
> > (and none appear to do anything like it).
> 
> And I thought this could/should be used together with vm_insert_page() that
> drivers are supposed to use nowadays instead of remap_pfn_range().
> Why shouldn't drivers use this?
> 

Actually fs/ramfs/file-nommu.c does use this (but it need not because
!CONFIG_MMU page allocator already does something similar).

But largely, no in-tree drivers use the facility so I think it would
be good for the mm folk to consider the first use case if and when it
comes up. So I've added a comment in split_page to that effect.

Thanks,
Nick

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