a15f2c08c7
The Hyper-V host API for PCI provides a unique "serial number" which can be used as basis for sysfs PCI slot table. This can be useful for cases where userspace wants to find the PCI device based on serial number. When an SR-IOV NIC is added, the host sends an attach message with serial number. The kernel doesn't use the serial number, but it is useful when doing the same thing in a userspace driver such as the DPDK. By having /sys/bus/pci/slots/N it provides a direct way to find the matching PCI device. There maybe some cases where serial number is not unique such as when using GPU's. But the PCI slot infrastructure will handle that. This has a side effect which may also be useful. The common udev network device naming policy uses the slot information (rather than PCI address). Signed-off-by: Stephen Hemminger <sthemmin@microsoft.com> Signed-off-by: David S. Miller <davem@davemloft.net>
Linux kernel
============
There are several guides for kernel developers and users. These guides can
be rendered in a number of formats, like HTML and PDF. Please read
Documentation/admin-guide/README.rst first.
In order to build the documentation, use ``make htmldocs`` or
``make pdfdocs``. The formatted documentation can also be read online at:
https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/
There are various text files in the Documentation/ subdirectory,
several of them using the Restructured Text markup notation.
See Documentation/00-INDEX for a list of what is contained in each file.
Please read the Documentation/process/changes.rst file, as it contains the
requirements for building and running the kernel, and information about
the problems which may result by upgrading your kernel.