Re: [PATCH] ppc64: kexec support for ppc64

[Andrew Morton <akpm@osdl.org>]

Gerrit Huizenga <gh@us.ibm.com> wrote:
>
> [ ... ]
>

But you didn't address the question of whether the kexec feature is
sufficiently useful in its own right to justify merging.

> 
>   If it takes a little list or test matrix of platforms tested over the
>   short term to help verify what machines work, we might be able to set
>   something like that up as well.

Yes, please do that.  But remember that Linux has a distributed test team
of thousands.  I have a separate proposal:

My big checkbox for kdump is "can I personally use kdump to diagnose and
solve testers' bug reports?".

If we can reach the stage where a random person downloads a -mm kernel,
hits a bug and, with a reasonable success rate, can send me a kernel core
file which I find useful then yeah, it's proven.

Problem is, I haven't gotten around to moving this idea an inch forward and
am unlikely to do so.

It would really help if some of the kdump developers could assist: make
sure the instructions are easy, that the tools are available, work with
people on the mailing list to get a core file from them, then, using the
core file, work with the relevant maintainer to identify and solve the bug.
We did this a few weeks ago with the -mm timer deadlock.  Off-list, I think.

Possible?