Re: [PATCH 1/3] Replace kernel/timeconst.pl with kernel/timeconst.sh

["H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@zytor.com>]

On 12/11/2009 07:31 AM, Michal Marek wrote:
> 
> OK, that's valid point, indeed. Peter, would you ack Rob's patch with
> the oneline fix added (http://lkml.org/lkml/2009/12/8/94 plus
> http://lkml.org/lkml/2009/12/9/435)?
> 

I strongly dislike his patch, as he open-codes specific multiprecision
arithmetic.  This makes it hard for other people to maintain, and makes
it prone to errors -- as evidenced by the fact that it didn't even
replicate the known-good results.

I have made my position clear on this and other patches several times
before: I consider it a fool's errand, and a result of a completely
pointless crusade to make a particular science fair-type project a wee
bit easier.  We have already seen real damage caused by it, since people
have used awk instead, and have gotten bitten by incompatibilities
between awk implementations.

As such, no, I will not ack this patch, and will consider myself
released of any obligation to maintain the code if this goes in anyway.
 I would consider acking a C program which does proper multiprecision
arithmetic, but I'm also not going to spend my time on it.

	-hpa

-- 
H. Peter Anvin, Intel Open Source Technology Center
I work for Intel.  I don't speak on their behalf.