Messages in this thread |  | | From | Systemkennung Linux <> | Subject | Re: suggestion for change to proc filesystem | Date | Sun, 16 Jun 1996 16:39:37 +0200 (MET DST) |
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Hi all,
> I don't think I've seen this suggestion before... > > How about adding a version number as the first entry in every 'file' in the > /proc filesystem. Every time that the format of one of the files > is changed, the version will get incremented. > > This would certainly aid people in debugging programs that are based > on the /proc filesystem. Just imagine, no more "ps doesn't work anymore, > what's wrong??". The application could use the version number > and say "The /proc filesystem format has chaned for /proc/xxx. This > program may not function properly anymore. Please upgrade it!"
In fact adding version numbers and checking them would make the whole situation worse; programs would have to complain though they still receive appropriate information from /proc. Oh, we could fix that by adding a setver command ;-)
No version numbers are required for the proc filesystem when used properly; the entries in /proc are made up in a way that makes it easy to check for the presence of required information. ps broke because it had a poorly written parser for information from proc.
Ralf
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