From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S937220AbXG0OxI (ORCPT ); Fri, 27 Jul 2007 10:53:08 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S933350AbXG0Ow4 (ORCPT ); Fri, 27 Jul 2007 10:52:56 -0400 Received: from mailhub.sw.ru ([195.214.233.200]:1386 "EHLO relay.sw.ru" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S933595AbXG0Owz (ORCPT ); Fri, 27 Jul 2007 10:52:55 -0400 Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2007 18:52:35 +0400 From: Alexey Dobriyan To: "Eric W. Biederman" Cc: akpm@osdl.org, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, devel@openvz.org Subject: Re: [PATCH] Remove CTL_UNNUMBERED Message-ID: <20070727145235.GC6924@localhost.sw.ru> References: <20070726164518.GB16937@localhost.sw.ru> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.11 Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org On Thu, Jul 26, 2007 at 11:24:12AM -0600, Eric W. Biederman wrote: > Alexey Dobriyan writes: > > > CTL_UNNUMBERED is unneeded, because it expands to > > > > .ctl_name = 0 > > > > The same effect can be achieved by skipping .ctl_name initialization, > > saving one line per sysctl. > > > > Update docs and headers telling people to not add CTL_ numbers and > > giving example. > > > > This is probably all we can do to stop the flow of new CTL_ numbers, > > because most of sysctls are copy-pasted. CTL_UNNUMBERED doesn't solve > > this problem at all. > > > > Signed-off-by: Alexey Dobriyan > > Nack. Not unless you update the documentation and explanations > properly. They are left in place: Assigning binary sysctl numbers is an endless source of conflicts in sysctl.h, breaking of the user space ABI (because of those conflicts), and maintenance problems. A complete pass through all of the sysctl users revealed multiple instances where the sysctl binary interface was broken and had gone undetected for years. > The important part is that we stop assigning binary numbers. You > are removing part of the description of why we can not assign bianry > numbers and how that is important. You want me to rewrite that paragraph actually mentioning CTL_UNNUMBERED? > CTL_UNNUMBERED may be an irritant to you but as for actually using the > code I have look and it is about 6 of 1 half dozen of the other. Sorry, -EPARSE.