On Fri, Jul 18, 2025 at 05:05:45PM +0100, Kevin Traynor wrote: > On 18/07/2025 16:19, Bruce Richardson wrote: > > On Fri, Jul 18, 2025 at 04:03:17PM +0100, Kevin Traynor wrote: > >> On 03/07/2025 15:31, Ciara Loftus wrote: > >>> The SSE rx and tx paths will be removed from the i40e, iavf and ice > >>> drivers in the 25.11 release. Each of these drivers have faster > >>> vector paths (AVX2 and AVX-512) which have feature parity with the > >>> soon to be removed SSE paths. In environments where AVX2 or AVX-512 > >>> are not supported, the scalar path will still be used, which also has > >>> feature parity. > >>> > >>> Signed-off-by: Ciara Loftus <ciara.lof...@intel.com> --- > >>> doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst | 7 +++++++ 1 file changed, 7 > >>> insertions(+) > >>> > >>> diff --git a/doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst > >>> b/doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst index e2d4125308..0d020c9c1f > >>> 100644 --- a/doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst +++ > >>> b/doc/guides/rel_notes/deprecation.rst @@ -80,6 +80,13 @@ Deprecation > >>> Notices and the header struct ``rte_vxlan_gpe_hdr`` with the macro > >>> ``RTE_ETHER_VXLAN_GPE_HLEN`` will be removed in DPDK 25.11. > >>> > >>> +* net/intel: drivers that have an SSE vector path alongside other > >>> vector paths, + namely i40e, iavf and ice, will have their SSE > >>> vector paths removed in DPDK 25.11. + Modern x86 systems all > >>> support AVX2, if not AVX-512, so the SSE path is no longer + widely > >>> used. This change will not result in any feature loss, as the > >>> fallback + scalar paths which have feature parity with SSE will be > >>> used in the cases where + the SSE paths would have been used. + * > >>> ethdev: The flow API matching pattern structures, ``struct > >>> rte_flow_item_*``, should start with relevant protocol header > >>> structure from lib/net/. The individual protocol header fields and > >>> the protocol header struct > >> > >> I'm not aware of anyone using hardware that old and relying on SSE, > >> but it seems a bit short notice for a patch to remove hardware > >> support. > >> > >> Would it hurt much to give it a longer deprecation so anyone who needs > >> to prepare by upgrade, or taking 25.11 with support etc. can do that ? > >> > > Do we think that will make a difference? After all, dropping the SSE > > path won't break DPDK on older hardware, it will only run a bit slower > > using the scalar path. Beyond that, it would only affect deployments > > with new/latest DPDK on old hardware - obviously old hardware running > > older DPDK would be unaffected. > > > > Don't disagree, and it does seem a bit of mismatch using old hw and new > DPDK, but I needed to spend a bit of time to try and check if this would > impact wrt systems used, compile options, product upgrade paths etc. so > others might be in same boat. > > Alternatively, could put the deprecation now and revisit if anyone > complains before 25.11. > Sure. Let's deprecate now and if there are any objections or we decide to postpone the removal in 25.11 that is fine.
/Bruce
