Confusing stream of atkbd messages after failed boot

Confusing stream of atkbd messages after failed boot

[Alan J. Wylie]

On upgrading to 2.6.19, I didn't bother reading the release notes, did
a "make oldconfig", and rebooted. The boot failed (since the SATA
.config options had been moved) and I was presented with a continous
stream of error messages:

atkbd.c: Spurious ACK on isa0060/serio
  Some program might be trying to access hardware directly.

These seem to be as a result of the keyboard LEDs being flashed.

They cause the real error message:

Cannot open root device

and the preceding kernel messages which show a lack of detection of
the SATA hard drive to be rapidly scrolled off screen.

The atkbd message should at the very least be rate limited.

-- 
Alan J. Wylie                                          http://www.wylie.me.uk/
"Perfection [in design] is achieved not when there is nothing left to add,
but rather when there is nothing left to take away."
  -- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

[PATCH 2.6.19 1/1] atkb: supress repeated warning messages

[Alan J. Wylie]

On Sat, 2 Dec 2006 13:56:13 +0000, "Alan J. Wylie" <alan@wylie.me.uk> said:

> I was presented with a continous stream of error messages:

> atkbd.c: Spurious ACK on isa0060/serio Some program might be trying
> to access hardware directly.

> These seem to be as a result of the keyboard LEDs being flashed.

> They cause the real error message:

> Cannot open root device

> and the preceding kernel messages which show a lack of detection of
> the SATA hard drive to be rapidly scrolled off screen.

> The atkbd message should at the very least be rate limited.

Here is an ugly hack that limits the above error message.

--- linux/drivers/input/keyboard/atkbd.c.orig	2006-12-05 20:34:50.000000000 +0000
+++ linux/drivers/input/keyboard/atkbd.c	2006-12-03 13:43:13.000000000 +0000
@@ -412,9 +412,16 @@
 			goto out;
 		case ATKBD_RET_ACK:
 		case ATKBD_RET_NAK:
-			printk(KERN_WARNING "atkbd.c: Spurious %s on %s. "
-			       "Some program might be trying access hardware directly.\n",
-			       data == ATKBD_RET_ACK ? "ACK" : "NAK", serio->phys);
+			{
+				static int warned = 0;
+
+				if (!warned) {
+					printk(KERN_WARNING "atkbd.c: Spurious %s on %s. "
+					       "Some program might be trying access hardware directly.\n",
+					       data == ATKBD_RET_ACK ? "ACK" : "NAK", serio->phys);
+					warned = 1;
+				}
+			}
 			goto out;
 		case ATKBD_RET_HANGEUL:
 		case ATKBD_RET_HANJA:


Signed-off-by: Alan J. Wylie <alan@wylie.me.uk>

-- 
Alan J. Wylie                                          http://www.wylie.me.uk/
"Perfection [in design] is achieved not when there is nothing left to add,
but rather when there is nothing left to take away."
  -- Antoine de Saint-Exupery