From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.1 (2015-04-28) on archive.lwn.net X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-6.0 required=5.0 tests=HEADER_FROM_DIFFERENT_DOMAINS, MAILING_LIST_MULTI,RCVD_IN_DNSWL_HI autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.1 Received: from vger.kernel.org (vger.kernel.org [209.132.180.67]) by archive.lwn.net (Postfix) with ESMTP id 696AE7D089 for ; Tue, 20 Nov 2018 16:50:03 +0000 (UTC) Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1727698AbeKUDT4 (ORCPT ); Tue, 20 Nov 2018 22:19:56 -0500 Received: from ms.lwn.net ([45.79.88.28]:55940 "EHLO ms.lwn.net" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1725925AbeKUDT4 (ORCPT ); Tue, 20 Nov 2018 22:19:56 -0500 Received: from lwn.net (localhost [127.0.0.1]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384 (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by ms.lwn.net (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id 6971535A; Tue, 20 Nov 2018 16:49:51 +0000 (UTC) Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2018 09:49:50 -0700 From: Jonathan Corbet To: Vlastimil Babka Cc: Pavel Machek , Daniel Colascione , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, rppt@linux.ibm.com, timmurray@google.com, joelaf@google.com, surenb@google.com, Andrew Morton , Roman Gushchin , Mike Rapoport , "Kirill A. Shutemov" , "Dennis Zhou (Facebook)" , Prashant Dhamdhere , "open list:DOCUMENTATION" Subject: Re: [PATCH v2] Document /proc/pid PID reuse behavior Message-ID: <20181120094950.11978b68@lwn.net> In-Reply-To: <1c5caa66-3c61-cb57-754a-f099200c73b2@suse.cz> References: <20181031150625.147369-1-dancol@google.com> <20181105132205.138695-1-dancol@google.com> <20181119105426.GD28607@amd> <1c5caa66-3c61-cb57-754a-f099200c73b2@suse.cz> Organization: LWN.net MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Sender: linux-doc-owner@vger.kernel.org Precedence: bulk List-ID: X-Mailing-List: linux-doc@vger.kernel.org On Tue, 20 Nov 2018 10:05:21 +0100 Vlastimil Babka wrote: > Why can't the documentation describe the current implementation, and > change in the future if the implementation changes? I doubt somebody > would ever rely on the pid being reused while having the descriptor > open. How would that make sense? In the hopes of ending this discussion, I'm going to go ahead and apply this. Documenting current behavior is good, especially in situations where that behavior can surprise people; if the implementation changes, the docs can change with it. Thanks, jon