From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Linus Torvalds Subject: Re: linux-next: add utrace tree Date: Thu, 21 Jan 2010 17:28:42 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: References: <20100119211646.GF16096@redhat.com> <20100120111220.e7fb4e2c.sfr@canb.auug.org.au> <20100120054950.GB27108@elte.hu> <20100120061551.GB6588@in.ibm.com> <20100120062834.GB12165@elte.hu> <20100120072925.GA11395@elte.hu> <20100121013822.28781960.sfr@canb.auug.org.au> <20100122111747.3c224dfd.sfr@canb.auug.org.au> <20100121163004.8779bd69.akpm@linux-foundation.org> <20100121163145.7e958c3f.akpm@linux-foundation.org> <20100122005147.GD22003@redhat.com> <20100121170541.7425ff10.akpm@linux-foundation.org> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Return-path: Received: from smtp1.linux-foundation.org ([140.211.169.13]:60553 "EHLO smtp1.linux-foundation.org" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1754113Ab0AVBaI (ORCPT ); Thu, 21 Jan 2010 20:30:08 -0500 In-Reply-To: <20100121170541.7425ff10.akpm@linux-foundation.org> Sender: linux-next-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: To: Andrew Morton Cc: "Frank Ch. Eigler" , Stephen Rothwell , Ingo Molnar , Ananth N Mavinakayanahalli , Peter Zijlstra , Peter Zijlstra , Fr??d??ric Weisbecker , LKML , Steven Rostedt , Arnaldo Carvalho de Melo , linux-next@vger.kernel.org, "H. Peter Anvin" , utrace-devel@redhat.com, Thomas Gleixner On Thu, 21 Jan 2010, Andrew Morton wrote: > > ptrace is a nasty, complex part of the kernel which has a long history > of problems, but it's all been pretty quiet in there for the the past few > years. More importantly, we're not ever going to get rid of it. Quite frankly, judging my all past history we have ever seen in kernel interfaces, new an non-portable interfaces simply are never used. The whole question whether they are nicer or not is entirely immaterial. I'm personally very dubious that there are any merits to utrace that outweigh the very clear disadvantages: just another layer that adds a new level of abstraction to the only interface that people actually _use_, namely ptrace. But I haven't followed utrace. I doubt _anybody_ has, except for the utrace people themselves. Linus