Re: [PATCH v5 5/5] gpu: nova-core: add ChannelIdPool

On Thu Aug 13, 2026 at 8:32 PM CEST, Yury Norov wrote:
>   pub(crate) fn alloc_area(
>       &self,
>       count: usize,
>       align: usize,
>   ) -> Result<ChannelIdArea<'_>> {
>       let count = NonZero::new(count).ok_or(EINVAL)?;
>       let align = Alignment::new_checked(align).ok_or(EINVAL)?;
>
>       let mut ids = self.inner.lock();
>       let area = ids.find_unused_area(0, count, align).ok_or(ENOSPC)?;
>
>       // If the pool is small, the backing bitmap may be rounded up to a larger size.
>       if area.range().end > self.num_chids {
>           return Err(ENOSPC);
>       }
>
>       Ok(ChannelIdArea {
>           pool: self,
>           range: area.acquire(),
>       })
>   }
>   
>   let area = pool.alloc_area(8, 4)?;
>
> See the difference? You still check the parameters, but don't make it
> the part of interface.

Miguel already replied to this, so just briefly adding to this.

We usually want the arguments to already carry the invariants we require. If we
make the arguments unconstrained, we may end up in situations where we already
have types that provide certain guarantees about value constraints and yet we
have to give up on them because the API takes unconstrained arguments and
revalidates.

The code from Eliot does actually already takes advantage of this. In

	pool.alloc_area(nz::<8>(), Alignment::new::<8>())?;

both arguments are already validated at compile time, whereas with unconstrained
arguments we're left with a runtime check.

Yes, nz() does not actually validate it statically, but it easily could (and
probably should).