Re: [PATCH] 2.5 PROPOSAL: Replacement for current /proc of shit.

Jakob Østergaard
2001-11-04T02:08:59Z

On Sun, Nov 04, 2001 at 02:40:51AM +0100, Daniel Phillips wrote:
> On November 2, 2001 03:20 am, Rusty Russell wrote:
> > I agree with the "one file, one value" idea.
>
> So cat /proc/partitions goes from being a nice, easy to read and use human
> interface to something other than that. Lets not go overboard.

/proc is usually a very nice interface that's both human- and machine-readable.
Some changes have gone in though (such as /proc/mdstat) that makes the proc
files implement something more like a pretty-printing user interface with
text-mode progress bars and what not. That's a PITA to parse.

Now, if established files in proc could just be stable, so that they would not
change unless non-backwards-compatible information absolutely must be
presented, that would be a major step in the right direction. Further, if we
could find some acceptable compromise between human- and machine- readability,
as has happened in the past...

Then, someone might just implement the equivalent of kstat (from Solaris) or
pstat (from HP-UX). Under a license so that commercial players could actually
link to the library as well (unlike the gproc library).

So call me a dreamer ;)

(For the record, it's not unlikely that I would be able to dedicate some
time to that effort in a not too distant future - say, 2.5 ?)

--
................................................................
: jakob@unthought.net : And I see the elder races, :
:.........................: putrid forms of man :
: Jakob Østergaard : See him rise and claim the earth, :
: OZ9ABN : his downfall is at hand. :
:.........................:............{Konkhra}...............: