Re: [PATCH] sysctl: Allow /proc/sys without sys_sysctl

H. Peter Anvin
2006-07-14T20:10:54Z

Theodore Tso wrote:
> On Wed, Jul 12, 2006 at 09:58:29PM +0200, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
>> On Wed, 2006-07-12 at 11:24 -0700, Stephen Hemminger wrote:
>>> What is the motivation behind killing the sys_sysctl call anyway?
>>> Sure its more ugly esthetically but it works.
>> it "works" but the thing is that the number space is NOT stable, and as
>> such it's a really bad ABI
>
> To be fair, the older, "base" numbers are actually stable, such as
> what glibc is depending on, have in practice been quite stable. It's
> only the newer fields that tend to be unstable.
>
> But that means we can afford to do an orderly migration away from it;
> it's not something that has to be urgently done within a few weeks or
> even a few months.
>

Another alternative would be to publish a limited set of sysctl numbers
that will be maintained forever.

-hpa