Kernel Event Notification Subsystem (was: fanotify - overall design before I start sending patches)

Al Boldi
2009-08-06T13:56:46Z

Peter Zijlstra wrote:
> Like said, having the filesystem block actions based on external
> processes seems just asking for trouble.

I can't see anything wrong with that. In fact, moving policy into userland
seems like the correct approach anyway. IOW, the fact that the kernel is
dealing with policy all over the place is completely flawed.

What we really need, is to take the hard-coded policy burden out of the
kernel, and pipe all requests into dynamically configurable userland.

Which implies a "Kernel Event Notification Subsystem" that would by default
allow requests for root, and deny them for others, unless there is a userland
daemon that would respond differently within a timeout period.

Thanks!

--
Al