Messages in this thread | | | Date | Wed, 23 Jun 1999 14:06:15 -0300 | From | Rogerio Brito <> | Subject | Re: Kernel modules compiling error on 2.3.8 ? |
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On Jun 23 1999, Michael Harnois wrote: > On Wed, 23 Jun 1999 12:08:13 +0200, Frank Hofmann <frho@grofa.com> said: > > > I had no problems with previous kernelversion 2.3.5. What is the > > problem ? > > Some exceptionally clever soul thought it would be a bright idea to > release a 2.3.7 in which 2/3 of the filesystems were broken. Glad to > know the same is true for 2.3.8.
I'm sorry, but it *IS* actually a clever thing to intentionally break the interface whenever you make substantial changes to the inner gears of whatever programs you maintain.
One could argue that changes to the API should be kept to a minimum (and I tend to agree with that), but if you do change the semantics of a software component, then you've got to break your own software to avoid having to chase unexpected bugs due to different semantics, whenever other components try to talk with the modified module.
It's plain and simple and the core Linux maintainers know this very well -- and this may be the reason (note that I'm not actually saying that these were *the* reason) why we've had a major breakage of file systems: the semantics or functionality of the FS seem to have changed. So, there are now only a few file systems working (NFS, ext2, AFAIK).
IMO, it is better to have software that does NOT work for a known reason (e.g., API change) than to have software that DOES work for an unknown reason.
[]s, Roger...
-- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Rogerio Brito - rbrito@iname.com - http://www.ime.usp.br/~rbrito/ (still an) Ugrad. Comp. Science student - "Windows? Linux and X!" Nectar homepage: http://www.linux.ime.usp.br/~rbrito/opeth/ =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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