From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1030278AbWA0DnD (ORCPT ); Thu, 26 Jan 2006 22:43:03 -0500 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S1030282AbWA0DnD (ORCPT ); Thu, 26 Jan 2006 22:43:03 -0500 Received: from soundwarez.org ([217.160.171.123]:55739 "EHLO soundwarez.org") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1030278AbWA0DnB (ORCPT ); Thu, 26 Jan 2006 22:43:01 -0500 Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 04:42:48 +0100 From: Kay Sievers To: Pavel Machek , Dave Jones , Andrew Morton , rjw@sisk.pl, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: [PATCH -mm] swsusp: userland interface (rev 2) Message-ID: <20060127034248.GA27861@vrfy.org> References: <200601240929.37676.rjw@sisk.pl> <20060124131312.0545262d.akpm@osdl.org> <20060124213010.GA1602@elf.ucw.cz> <20060124135843.739481e7.akpm@osdl.org> <20060124221426.GB1602@elf.ucw.cz> <20060124222044.GG2449@redhat.com> <20060124223328.GC1602@elf.ucw.cz> <20060124223834.GH2449@redhat.com> <20060124224437.GA2007@elf.ucw.cz> <20060126020926.GR5501@mail> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Disposition: inline Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit In-Reply-To: <20060126020926.GR5501@mail> User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.9i Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org On Wed, Jan 25, 2006 at 09:09:27PM -0500, Jim Crilly wrote: > On 01/24/06 11:44:37PM +0100, Pavel Machek wrote: > > On Út 24-01-06 17:38:34, Dave Jones wrote: > > > > We'll of course try to get the interface right at the first > > > > try. OTOH... if wrong interface is in kernel for a month, I do not > > > > think it is reasonable to keep supporting that wrong interface for a > > > > year before it can be removed. One month of warning should be fair in > > > > such case... > > > > > > Users want to be able to boot between different kernels. > > > Tying functionality to specific versions of userspace completely > > > screws them over. > > > > Well, by the time we have any _users_ interface should be > > stable. Actually I believe interface will be stable from day 0, but... > > > I'm sure gregkh thought the same thing with about sysfs and udev and we've > seen how well that's worked out... Well, that was just an unfortunate "bug". Declaring interfaces "stable" makes as much sense as all the other tries to define crazy enterprise "standards" nobody follows in real world. In a developing environment, interfaces _become_ stable and don't get _declared_ by anybody as such. We are not talking about syscall interfaces or things that are simple enough to be kept stable, if you cross a certain level of complexity, you just can't apply these rules anymore. Interfaces mature over the time they get used. Only the _use_ of it collects the needed information to form the model behind it. They get improved up to the point that changing the interface causes more pain than it's worth this change. Then an interface has _become_ "stable" cause it makes sense at that point. "by the time we have any _users_ interface should be stable", that's such a nonsense. If you don't have any user, you don't know if this interface works at all and only if it gets used you get the needed feedback to improve it. Kay