Messages in this thread | | | Date | Wed, 3 Aug 2016 01:42:26 +0100 | From | Al Viro <> | Subject | Re: Please don't replace numeric parameter like 0444 with macro |
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On Tue, Aug 02, 2016 at 04:58:29PM -0400, Linus Torvalds wrote: > [ So I answered similarly to another patch, but I'll just re-iterate > and change the subject line so that it stands out a bit from the > millions of actual patches ] > > On Tue, Aug 2, 2016 at 1:42 PM, Pavel Machek <pavel@ucw.cz> wrote: > > > > Everyone knows what 0644 is, but noone can read S_IRUSR | S_IWUSR | > > S_IRCRP | S_IROTH (*). Please don't do this. > > Absolutely. It's *much* easier to parse and understand the octal > numbers, while the symbolic macro names are just random line noise and > hard as hell to understand. You really have to think about it. > > So we should rather go the other way: convert existing bad symbolic > permission bit macro use to just use the octal numbers. > > The symbolic names are good for the *other* bits (ie sticky bit, and > the inode mode _type_ numbers etc), but for the permission bits, the > symbolic names are just insane crap. Nobody sane should ever use them. > Not in the kernel, not in user space.
Except that you are inviting the mixes like S_IFDIR | 17 /* oops, should've been 017, or do we spell it 0017? */ that way. I certainly agree that this patch series had been a huge pile of manure, but "let's convert it in other direction" is inviting pretty much the same thing, with lovely potential for typos, etc.
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