> > > > Do you want to burn an option letter on that? It seems like it > > > > might be better to search the string for 0x and base the selection > > > > of bitmap of list parsing based on its presence or absence. > > > > It was the initial proposal (in April): > > http://dpdk.org/ml/archives/dev/2014-April/002173.html > > And I liked keeping only 1 option; > > http://dpdk.org/ml/archives/dev/2014-May/002722.html > > But Anatoly raised the compatibility problem: > > http://dpdk.org/ml/archives/dev/2014-May/002723.html > > Then there was no other comment so Didier and I reworked a separate > option. > > > > > The existing coremask parsing always assumes a hex coremask, so just > > > looking for a 0x will not work. I prefer this scheme of using a new > > > flag for this method of specifying the cores to use. > > > > > > If you don't want to use up a single-letter option, two alternatives: > > > 1) use a long option instead. > > > 2) if the -c parameter includes a "-" or a ",", treat it as a > > > new-style option, otherwise treat as old. The only abiguity here > > > would be for specifying a single core value 1-9 e.g. is "-c 6" a mask with > two bits, or a single-core to run on. > > > [0 is obviously a named core as it's an invalid mask, and A-F are > > > obviously masks.] If we did want this scheme, I would suggest that > > > we allow trailing commas in the list specifier, so we can force > > > users to clear ambiguity by either writing "0x6" or "6," i.e. disallow > ambiguous values to avoid problems. > > > However, this is probably more work that it's worth to avoid using > > > up a letter option. > > > > > > I'd prefer any of these options to breaking backward compatibility in this > case. > > > > We need a consensus here. > > Who is supporting a "burn" of an one-letter option with clear usage? > > Who is supporting a "re-merge" of the 2 syntaxes with more complicated > > rules (list syntax is triggered by presence of "-" or ",")? > > > > Burn!
I would still prefer a long option (we already have a coremask parameter, so another one is kind-of non-essential and IMO shouldn't belong in a scarce resource of one-letter parameters), but if everyone else agrees, the "burn" option is much more preferable to me than complicating syntax of an already existing parameter. Thanks, Anatoly
