Re: [Ocf-linux-users] OCF inbuilt and 2.6.27

[David M. <Dav...@se...>]

Jivin inf...@he... lays it down ...
> Hello
> 
> I am sorry that just joining the mailing list and immediately sending a
> question is probably a great faux pas, and I want to apologize for that.

No need.

> My problem is related to the moving of OCF into the kernel with the 2.6.27 release.
> Before I was running 2.6.24-4 from the Slackware repository with the OCF
> 20080917 framework, but I was really excited about the OCF framework moving
> into the kernel with the 2.6.27 release.

OCF is not moving into the kernel,  not ever.  The licensing was one of
the major stumbing blocks.

My guess is that you are looking at the new cryptoAPI stuff in the
kernel which has hifn/talitos and other drivers.

> My problem is strange, but is the following... (please bare with me here,
> it might take a few lines to explain this)
> 
> After upgrading my development server to 2.6.27 with the inbuilt support for
> the HiFn 7956HXL luks have stopped working.
> To clarify what I mean by this. I can unlock my luks volumes just fine, but
> when the time comes to mount them, the mount command just hangs there
> forever, and I am forced to kill it.
> 
> I have tried the 2.6.27-7 from the Slackware repository, as well as the
> 2.6.28-7 from kernel.org, and the same behavior can be experienced. However,
> if I disable the HiFn card completely from the kernel I can mount my luks
> partitions just fine again.
> 
> Checking /proc/crypto I see that the HiFn modules are marked with a
> priority of 300 and the kernel inbuilt modules are marked with a priority
> of 100, and according to my broken logic (based on Cisco here) this should
> mean the kernel inbuilt modules should be used in preference for AES rather
> than my HiFn card.
> 
> I mainly bought this card because I am doing some development where I need
> literally shitloads of random entropy, and until the built in drivers I had
> no problems getting this, and the built in framework seems to give me even
> better RNG throughput, and I am really thankful for that! Don't get me wrong!
> 
> But is there any way of making both my HiFn card's RNG work as well as
> luks with a 2.6.27 kernel? Is anyone else but me experiencing the same
> issues with AES, HiFn, 2.6.27 and luks?

My guess is that previously you were using OCF for RNG entropy and not much
else,  while your luks was using software.

You get back to what you had by patching your kernel for OCF just as you
did in the past (although you need some patched posted to this list for
2.6.27), and disabling the kernel hifn driver.

Not sure if the RNG support is currently done by the in-kernel hifn
driver or not,  you would need to check the source.  OCF will still
support it as it always has, provising the kernel is appropriately
patched for OCF ;-)

Cheers,
Davidm

-- 
David McCullough,  dav...@se...,  Ph:+61 734352815
McAfee - SnapGear  http://www.snapgear.com                http://www.uCdot.org