Messages in this thread | | | Date | Wed, 7 Mar 2001 14:41:17 -0300 (BRST) | From | Rik van Riel <> | Subject | 64-bit capable block device layer |
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Hi Linus,
how would you feel about having the block device layer 64-bit capable, so Linux can have block devices of more than 2GB in size ?
I know that 64-bit arithmetic is expensive on 32-bit platforms, but I have the idea there is a way around that for people who don't want 64-bit capable block devices.
1. use blkoff_t for all block number arithmetic
2. in some header file, have
#ifdef CONFIG_BLKDEV_64BIT typedef long long blkoff_t #else typedef long blkoff_t #endif
This way, people running smaller&slower machines can chose to do the cheaper 32-bit arithmetic and only the people using huge block devices will have to do the 64-bit arithmetic.
(yes, basically the same trick as we're using for PAE)
regards,
Rik -- Linux MM bugzilla: http://linux-mm.org/bugzilla.shtml
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