Via the this-doesnt-really-matter-but-it-should-be-noted department:
According to the latest on t10.org, MMC retroactively permitted SCSI
version to be zero, for MMC-compliant USB and ATAPI devices.
The above tweak is entirely software->software communication... as the
comment you quoted notes, it's just a signal to the SCSI midlayer.
At the moment, the SCSI midlayer assumes any device that reports scsi
version as less than 2 is forced to SCSI version 2. Ultimately that's
incorrect behavior for all ATAPI devices (and later MMC revisions).
At the time, libata simply worked around this SCSI buglet in its own
code, since that was easier than auditing all SCSI code paths to ensure
new ATAPI/USB MMC logic does not break ancient devices.
But if someone is motivated enough to revisit this...
Jeff
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