From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S263809AbTLJRvu (ORCPT ); Wed, 10 Dec 2003 12:51:50 -0500 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S263823AbTLJRvu (ORCPT ); Wed, 10 Dec 2003 12:51:50 -0500 Received: from mail.fh-wedel.de ([213.39.232.194]:39571 "EHLO mail.fh-wedel.de") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S263809AbTLJRvo (ORCPT ); Wed, 10 Dec 2003 12:51:44 -0500 Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2003 18:49:23 +0100 From: =?iso-8859-1?Q?J=F6rn?= Engel To: Hua Zhong Cc: "'Linus Torvalds'" , "'Andre Hedrick'" , "'Arjan van de Ven'" , Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu, "'Kendall Bennett'" , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: Linux GPL and binary module exception clause? Message-ID: <20031210174923.GA27073@wohnheim.fh-wedel.de> References: <00af01c3bf41$2db12770$d43147ab@amer.cisco.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Disposition: inline Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit In-Reply-To: <00af01c3bf41$2db12770$d43147ab@amer.cisco.com> User-Agent: Mutt/1.3.28i Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org On Wed, 10 December 2003 09:15:15 -0800, Hua Zhong wrote: > > Many userspace programs fall into this category too. For example they > depend on /proc to be there. They probably only work with a certain > version of the kernel because the next version changed some format in > /proc. > > Is /proc a stable API/ABI? Yes? No? Have you ever played roleplaying games? Almost every rule system has gray areas that could be exploited by the player. But if you really try to do it, the game master will simply notice that - as unlikely as it sounds - a meteor just landed on your head and you are dead. Try to use /proc/kcore to load kernel modules through a gray area and the game master (aka judge) will notice. Use it to check the kernel version and noone cares. So common sense applies again, no matter how tricky your questions are. Jörn -- If you're willing to restrict the flexibility of your approach, you can almost always do something better. -- John Carmack