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We've run into problems with running out of dynamicly assign char device majors particullarly on automated test systems with all-yes-configs. Roughly 40 dynamic assignments can be made with such kernels at this time while space is reserved for only 20. Currently, the kernel only prints a warning when dynamic allocation overflows the reserved region. And when this happens drivers that have fixed assignments can randomly fail depending on the order of initialization of other drivers. Thus, adding a new char device can cause unexpected failures in completely unrelated parts of the kernel. This patch solves the problem by extending dynamic major number allocations down from 511 once the 234-254 region fills up. Fixed majors already exist above 255 so the infrastructure to support high number majors is already in place. The patch reserves an additional 128 major numbers which should hopefully last us a while. Kernels that don't require more than 20 dynamic majors assigned (which is pretty typical) should not be affected by this change. Signed-off-by: Logan Gunthorpe <logang@deltatee.com> Cc: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org> Cc: Alan Cox <alan@linux.intel.com> Cc: Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de> Cc: Linus Walleij <linus.walleij@linaro.org> Link: https://lkml.org/lkml/2017/6/4/107 Signed-off-by: Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@linuxfoundation.org>
Linux kernel ============ This file was moved to Documentation/admin-guide/README.rst Please notice that there are several guides for kernel developers and users. These guides can be rendered in a number of formats, like HTML and PDF. In order to build the documentation, use ``make htmldocs`` or ``make pdfdocs``. 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.