Re: [PATCH 3/4] crypto: [sha] glue code for Intel SHA extensions optimized SHA1 & SHA256

[Tim Chen <tim.c.chen@linux.intel.com>]

On Fri, 2015-09-11 at 00:52 +0200, Stephan Mueller wrote:
> Am Donnerstag, 10. September 2015, 15:27:20 schrieb Tim Chen:
> 
> Hi Tim,
> 
> >This patch adds the glue code to detect and utilize the Intel SHA
> >extensions optimized SHA1 and SHA256 update transforms when available.
> >
> >This code has been tested on Broxton for functionality.
> 
> A general comment on this file: shouldn't this file be cleaned and use the 
> standard mechanisms of the kernel crypto API?
> 
> This glue implements its own selection of which SHA implementation to use. But 
> the kernel crypto API implements that logic already. The issue with the 
> current implementation in this file is that you have no clue which particular 
> implementation of SHA is in use in one particular case.
> 
> So, may I suggest a restructuring to define independent instances of SHA, such 
> as
> 
> - cra_name == "sha1", cra_driver_name="sha1_ssse3", cra_priority=300
> - cra_name == "sha1", cra_driver_name="sha1_avx", cra_priority=400
> - cra_name == "sha1", cra_driver_name="sha1_avx2", cra_priority=500
> - cra_name == "sha1", cra_driver_name="sha1_shavx", cra_priority=600
> 
> Similarly for the other SHAs?
> 
> In all the register functions for the ciphers, you can bail out if the 
> hardware does not support an implementation.

Stephen,

Is there a scenario you can think of 
when a lower performing sha1 transform needs to
be exposed as a separate driver?  

Otherwise the glue code logic will only expose the
best performing one for a cpu and hide the others, which was intentional
on our part to prevent a lower performing sha from getting used.

Tim