Re: [RFC] Splitting kernel headers and deprecating __KERNEL__

[Ralf Baechle <ralf@linux-mips.org>]

On Mon, Nov 29, 2004 at 09:42:16AM +0000, David Woodhouse wrote:

> I've lost track of the number of times things have broken because of
> incorrect use of kernel headers from userspace. That's what we're trying
> to fix -- by putting only the bits which are _supposed_ to be visible
> into files which userspace sees, where we know they define part of the
> userspace API and hence we can be extremely careful when editing them. 
> 
> I don't think it makes sense at this point for us to bury our collective
> heads in the sand and pretend there isn't a problem here that's worth
> fixing.
> 
> I agree that it should be obviously correct though -- and that's why
> we're trying to end up with a structure that in the first pass would
> give us in userspace essentially what we already have in the various
> glibc-kernheaders packages, but without the constant and unnecessary
> need for some poor sod to keep those up to date by hand.

The concept of copying kernel headers into applications is even worse
when arch portability is affected.  I stopped counting how often I had
to fix that kind of crap - and the state of kernel headers and userspace
kernel header packages is really provoking that kind of mess.

  Ralf