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SubjectRe: Kernel interface changes (was Re: cdrecord problems on


On 6 Feb 1999, H. Peter Anvin wrote:

> Followup to: <Pine.LNX.3.95.990205152900.606K-100000@penguin.transmeta.com>
> By author: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@transmeta.com>
> In newsgroup: linux.dev.kernel
> >
> > On Fri, 5 Feb 1999, Brandon S. Allbery KF8NH wrote:
> > >
> > > I REPEAT: AFS IS NON-NEGOTIABLE HERE.
> >
> > I repeat: _I_ don't care.
> >
>
> Let me do a translation of what I think everyone is saying here:
[snip]
> * Linux will not do such layering for everything. However, there is
> no reason why one can't build a layered ABI adapter (effectively an
> ABI to API converter) on top of Linux. This implies some
> performance cost, but will allow binary modules to work more or less
> indefinitely, barring huge changes to the kernel internals.

Erm... Or not-so-huge ones. Scenario: semaphore that should be grabbed in
VFS being grabbed by each fs driver. Race is found. Thing moves to VFS
(where it belongs) and now we should remove it from each fs in existance
(deadlocks). I'm afraid that no ABI will save in such situation. Yup, it's
not a pleasant thing to fix and nobody sane would do it just for fun -
there is a lot of filesystems in official tree, to start with.

Another thing: policy wrt exporting stuff. *Any* exported symbol is a
potential boat anchor.


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