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The 2.3.x "Things To Fix" List 162

Johan Jonasson writes "Alan Cox has posted the first draft of the 2.3.x "Things to fix" list. Also known as "the stuff that has to be taken care of before 2.4 can come out". "
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The 2.3.x "Things To Fix" List

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  • (because we're lazy, the list is short, and because I want to eschew the 1stposters)

    Multiwrite IDE breaks on a disk error
    Poll on > 16000 file handles fails
    Restore O_SYNC functionality
    Merge the network fixes - there is a ton of backed up stuff to do asap
    ISA DMA is no longer allocating correctly aligned data
    vmalloc(GFP_DMA) is needed for DMA drivers
    VM needs rebalancing
    NFSD fixes for path walking to regenerate dentries
    Fix eth= command line
    Check O_APPEND atomicity bug fixing is complete
    Protection on isize (sct)
    Merge 2.2.13/14 changes
    Get RAID 0.90 in
    PAE36 failures
    USB HID merge
    Mikulas claims we need to fix the getblk/mark_buffer_uptodate thing gor
    2.3.x as well
    PIII/Athlon/MMX/etc acceleration merge from 2.2.x-ac
    Merge arcnet update (DONE)
    Fix SPX socket code
    AHA152x isnt smp safe (FIXED)
    NCR5380 isnt smp safe
    isofs break on 4Gig disk (FIXED ?)
    Finish 64bit vfs merges (stat64 etc) (DONE ??)
    Make syncppp use new ppp code
    Fbcon races
    Fix all remaining PCI code to use new resources and enable_Device
    Stackable fs ?? (Erez)
    Get the Emu10K merged
    Test PMC code on Athlon
    Fix module remove race bug (-- not in open so why did I see crashes ??? --)
    Per Process rtsigio
    Maybe merge the ibcs emulation code
    VFS?VM - mmap/write deadlock
    initrd is bust
    rw sempahores on page faults (mmap_sem)
    kiobuf seperate lock functions/bounce/page_address fixes
    per super block write_super needs an async flag
    addres_space needs a VM pressure/flush callback
    per file_op rw_kiovec
    enhanced disk statistics
    Fix routing by fwmark
    put_user appears to be broken for i386 machines
  • How about fixing NFS on SMP too. That's been broken ever since 2.2.13. It seems like Alan was working on it in September and then he just lost interest in it.
  • Sure, like the standard "1st poster" even understands the word eschew. right now they are trying to figure out if you sneezed on them or something.
  • by slpalmer ( 6337 ) <slpalmer@gmaiCHICAGOl.com minus city> on Tuesday January 04, 2000 @09:49AM (#1405519)
    It would be a great benefit (to me at least) to see this list of bugs by architecture. If I want to know what's going on with the Alpha Port I have to research almost every bug to find which ports it affects, before I can consider spending time trying to fix something.
  • by tweek ( 18111 )
    It's times like these I wish I spoke more than php and perl =/.
    Anyone got any good suggestions for getting started on linux programming or hell any good suggestions for starting? I actually thought about taking some courses at night.
  • by rodentia ( 102779 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2000 @10:02AM (#1405522)
    I know the feeling. I found Wrox's (whose stuff I generally dislike) Beginning Linux Programming to be generally excellent. Read it with a good C reference handy and you will go far, grasshopper. There are several docs in the LDP dealing with kernel dev and device drivers, as well.
  • This looks like an interesting opportunity for Quality Assurance work for Linux kernel stuff. Hmm, of course I wouldn't know where to start, what/how to test it, or even how to do a full-fledged system test. BUT, hey, it's a door waiting to be opened
  • by blakestah ( 91866 ) <blakestah@gmail.com> on Tuesday January 04, 2000 @10:10AM (#1405525) Homepage
    How about fixing NFS on SMP too. That's been broken ever since 2.2.13. It seems like Alan was working on it in September and then he just lost interest in it.

    2.2.13 must be what - at least a month old ?

    NFS on SMP is working JUST FINE on my SMP box, running 2.2.12 with the knfsd-1.4.7 patches. And it has been for about 2.5 months. Most of the knfsd patch functionality has been merged into the 2.2.14-pre tree, so 2.2.14 ought to be a fairly stable NFS branch, even for SMP users. At least for NFS version two, which is a fairly old standard.

    If you are really interested, there is a separate mailing list for nfs users that has been posted to the kernel mailing list, and the user space utilities have been evolving from knfsd-1.4.7 to nfs-utils-0.15 or so. Linux nfs now has locking and everything. Still, you'd have to consider nfs on linux a real weakness compared to other Unices. NFS version 3 is still a pipe-dream for clients or servers, and version two is just now stabilizing in the 2.2 tree.
  • I was really hoping that some work on getting APM working under SMP would go in before 2.4.0, but alas, it seems not to have made the "to be added" list. I really miss the "power off on shutdown" option - that made my life a little easier before I got a UPS. Oh well, I guess I could wait a little longer, as it's not a necessary feature. Now if I could only get drivers for that dang blasted Efficient Networks Speedstream 3060 ADSL NIC. :) Stoopid BellSouth...
  • If you are interested in kernel hacking, pickup "Writing Linux Device Drivers" published by O'Reilley, "Linux Kernel Internal" (forget who publishes it), and most importantly, use the source.


    --
    Deepak Saxena

  • The highpoint 366 udma/66 controller has a kernel patch and stuff available from highpoint-tech.com.. why not include thoes.. hehe :-)
  • If you are talking about just plain "Linux programming" (i.e. not the kernel) I suggest you do the following:

    1) Buy "Beginning Linux Programming". The first edition was great, the second looks even better.

    2) If you subscribe to Linux Journal, ask the editors to start a "Newbie Programmer" column. I recently sent them an offer to write such a column and having demand roll in would help a lot. 8^)
    ---
    • The S/390 patches, from 2.2.x
    • Reiserfs
    • Ext3
    • Procfs
    • Softnet
    • EITHER Posix ACL, OR Trustees
    • Itanium support (I -know- it exists, somewhere)
    • Transmeta support (C'mon, Linus, don't keep us in suspense! It's bad for the arteries. :)

    Some things I'd -like- to see, for 2.5.x:

    • Fixed QNS, NTFS and HPFS filing system support
    • Better Configuration Documentation (missing from too many options)
    • Any extensible network addressing protocol
    • Better support for SMP
    • Multi-protocol tunneling
    • Better co-operation with the various microkernel efforts (eg: L4Linux)
    • All kernel bugs fixed
    • All buffer overflows removed
    • Peace on Earth and Goodwill to Men
  • Start by trying all the features you can marked (FIXED) or (FIXED ?). They require the simplest effort but are the most useful to someone who may or may not have the hardware on hand. Make an ISO partition greater than 4Gb and use it. Attempt some of the stuff he says 'isn't SMP freindly' on a SMP. Take copious mental notes of the results, and a bug report (or an 'It Works!) sent his way would be nice.

    Welcome to the Linux Quality Assurance Team!
  • Does anybody know if 2.3.x (2.4) will support the Adaptec Raid adapters, specifically the AAA-13x series? I really want a linux driver badly for this card. I got it before I even found out Linux existed. Adaptec's driver support really sucks, so don't imagine I'll ever be seeing them release the driver. Hell, they don't even have a win2000 driver for it. Thanks for you help in advance!

  • by Anonymous Coward
    This book isn't great, but it is quite good, and aproaches from a beginner lever, with only more of the basic assuumptions. I highly recommend it. Its called _Linux_Application_Development_ by Michael K. Johnson and Erik W. Troan, published by Addison Wesley, ISBN 0-201-30821-5, and I think I got it off of Fatbrain for around $38.
  • Hey, I want to eventually USE 2.4, let's don't go crazy....

    Each of your 2.3 wishlist items would probably push 2.4 out an additional 1-2 months. That's No Good.
    ---
  • Have you checked out SGI's patches for
    NFSV3 against the 2.2.10 kernel?

    Works fine for me as an NFS3 client.

    oss.sgi.com/projects

    Also included as part of SGI's modified version
    of Redhat, sgilinux 1.1.
  • by Anonymous Coward
    The Efficient Networks card takes ATMF-25 straight to the NIC, then converts it internally to Ethernet & then passes things off to the rest of the system as usual.

    There aren't any (that I know of) public *nix drivers for this card.

    Which is a gigantic pain in the ass, since many low-cost DSL providers use this card rather than DSL routers. An Ameritech tech told me this was probably because the DSL provider knows that if they use a DSL router, you can hang a NAT box off the router and connect multiple machines (since DSL routers take ATMF-25 in one port, and spit Ethernet out the other port).

    By using this NIC, they reduce the "unauthorized" use of their bandwidth. By not providing *nix drivers, they know that they've reduced that "risk" even further.

    I hate this card -- the DSL providers in my area mostly use Alcatel hardware, and apparently Alcatel recommends using this card. As a result, I cannot get DSL+Linux at residential rates. I have to pay for "expanded service" -- meaning an additional $50 per month, with another $600 in Customer Premises Equipment.

    Aaaaiiiieeee!

  • That sounds like a good start, but my linux knowledge is next to nil.


    Hmm, that just gave me an idea

    1. Learn linux front to back

    2. Start doing hobbyist QA work for linux software/distros

    3. As soon as I get recognition, start company that does QA work for linux & its apps

    4. Go IPO crazy!@#!@#



    Yeah, easy money baby. heh.
  • by G27 Radio ( 78394 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2000 @10:44AM (#1405544)
    Anyone got any good suggestions for getting started on linux programming or hell any good suggestions for starting? I actually thought about taking some courses at night.

    It seems almost redundant (no KT intended) to mention O'Reilly books as an excellent resource...anyway, if you're looking for some insight into the Linux kernel, O'Reilly's Linux Device Drivers book is very educational. At least for me it was. I've never worked on the kernel or device drivers for it and probably never will, but I found the book to be very informative nevertheless. BTW, I also am a Perl/PHP geek...not very fluent in C.

    numb
  • by jormurgandr ( 128408 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2000 @10:45AM (#1405545)
    I know it wouldnt be all that difficult to include generic softmodem support in the kernel, and that would REALLY make a lot of people happy (myself included). I wrote a mod for mine, but I'm not all that great at Kernel programming, and it has a habit of not working or crashing altogether. If it supported more devices (maybe better USB support as well), more people might consider linux over windows.
    =======
    There was never a genius without a tincture of madness.
  • Thanks for the input, Bill.
  • It seems a little out of date. The kernel I'm running on my latest test f/w disk is 2.3.35, and initrd is working fine on that. Admittedly they had a slight problem with earlier versions but its fixed as of days.
  • The whole point of Open Source is that YOU don't need to be all that great. Take what you've done and go to l-k with a request for testers, coders, etc. They'll find/fix your errors and viola! we have a softmodem driver.
    ---
  • viola! we have a softmodem driver

    Just add a 'cello, and 2 violins.

  • That sucks. But what's stopping people from doing NAT with Windows NT, if they have driver support for this card? (Besides the obvious slashdot commentary about WinNT.)

    --
  • I hate to sound like a newbie, but I havent been coding on linux all that long. what is 1-k?
    =======
    There was never a genius without a tincture of madness.
  • by Poe ( 12710 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2000 @10:58AM (#1405554) Homepage
    It seems a shame that none of the journaling filesystems that are in the works are going to be ready in time for 2.4 (i.e. ext3, ReiserFS, or XFS) (unless I lost one of them somewhere in the alphabet soup)

    There was some talk of these on Kernel Traffic [linuxcare.com], but apparently to no avail.

    This is still one area that NT kinda shows linux up. (though there are plenty of bones to pick with NTFS, don't get me wrong) Not only that, but it's a neat, useful idea that adds much and takes nothing away. (I'm sure you'll be able to use ext2 'till the earth falls into the sun.)
  • Well thanks for the most uninformative news post I have ever seen. What on earth are you talking about? Version 2.3.x of what? I can't recognize a project by someone's name that I can't recognize. Grrr...
  • "l-k" is shorthand for "linux-kernel", meaning "the linux-kernel" mailing list.
    ---
  • "l-k" == "linux-kernel mailing list"
  • Why did this get market as a troll? Just because he gave his opinion (and then followed it with an exception, I might add)?

    Wrox has some decent stuff out there. Frank Boumphrey's (sp?) book on stylesheets is excellent, for example. They ain't O'Reilly, but you could do a lot worse.

    The only thing that sort of rubs me the wrong way about Wrox is their Windows bias. The vast majority of their books are about MS-proprietary technologies, and their web-development books concentrate on developing for MSIE almost exclusively.
    ---
  • by Christopher B. Brown ( 1267 ) <cbbrowne@gmail.com> on Tuesday January 04, 2000 @11:10AM (#1405561) Homepage
    This is not all that interesting work, in some ways, but certainly useful stuff.

    The necessary methodology involves automating execution of QA tests. You don't want to have to run 'em all by hand...

    Approach:

    • For each test, X, cd /usr/src/qa/tests/X
    • make clean; make test

      This compiles a C program that exercises some facility of the system.

      The program drops output into a local file in the directory, as well as to a central results DB in /usr/src/qa/results , where entries are keyed by test, by date, and by kernel version.

      The notable result is a Pass or Fail value.

    • A script runs through all the directories, running each test.

      It would be good if a "success" result caused the test program to create the file success, so that one could run through, after a patch, and "merely" use make success to rerun failed tests.

    • Every time you locate a bug, you create a test.
    • Every time you find behaviour that ought to be, you create a test.
    This is more-or-less how one does regression testing with things like compilers. Tests that run with the kernel would be equally valuable.

    If you build a reasonably intelligent infrastructure, and are accepting of regression tests, you'll come to know more about how the kernel works than you ever wanted to know...

  • You obviously haven't been reading /. for very long. The unofficial motto of /. is "Linux news for Linux nerds, stuff that matters for Linux users." About every third story is tied in one way or another to Linux.
  • My mistake.

    I have to treat slashdot more like the mail. If no country is mentioned on a stamp, it means UK. If no topic is mentioned on a post, it means Linux.
  • I haven't really looked at it, but saw it in a bookstore, and it seems interesting... annotated Linux kernel code (2.2.something...)

    Take a look at it here [fatbrain.com]...
    ----

  • I have the suspicion that "official" S/390 support may be more than a little ways off. Possibly privileged information, so I'll leave it at that...

    I agree that it would be nice to have the various new FSes; I don't think Reiserfs will be quite ready, and it looks likewise for ext3, more be the pity. As for Procfs, if it's not there already, I have a hard time believing it'll get there soon. And you forgot NFS3, no?

    As for ACLs, I don't think the rest of the world is ready for them. They're practically useless without fairly sweeping changes to things like:

    • LIBC
    • GNU Fileutils
    • RPM, dpkg
    • Anything else that might need to be aware of them.

    I somewhat favor a rather different ACL model based on TOPS-10 FILDAE; [hex.net] 'tis unclear that we've got a clear model of how to configure security with ACLs, and it doesn't make sense to push it into the kernel until there are some clear ideas on how to implement the user-space ACL management.

  • That's what I plan on doing... I do have some tech docs on the 3000 series, but I don't have the mojo for writing device drivers. NetBSD has some stuff, as does FreeBSD, but I much prefer a Linux box, as I already understand ipchains.

    XenoWolf
  • by Anonymous Coward
    The scsi symbios and adaptec support for alpha is still unstable in 2.2.x kernel. Please, this needs to be fixed.
    • Procfs
    You meant DevFS [csiro.au] right? From the brief discussions I've read on Linux Kernel, it doesn't seem too likely this will get in. Everytime it is brought up, it is usually shot right down with, "its not the right way (tm) to do it". EOD. (End Of Discussion)

    Can someone enlighten me a little bit more on the issues. I'd sure like to get rid of all the crap hanging out in /dev on my system, and i'd rather not have to patch my kernel twice everytime I upgrade.

  • by Anonymous Coward
    Damn, Windows 2000 is coming out already?
    Well, I suppose sooner or later an infinite number of monkeys...

    Windows 2000 is terribly late, over budget, still too demanding to run on
    a lot of the hardware in corporate America, and there remain serious
    compatability problems which mean MS will continue to produce consumer
    Windows versions based on the rotting DOS core.

    In 1998, NT5 faced an unprepared market, Bill hoped to make a killing,
    but unfortunately he didn't have a product to put in the box. Two whole
    years later NT5 has a new name, a reduced feature set and claims to be
    "finished", but you still won't find it in any shops. Meanwhile the
    competition have cleaned up.

    Remember, if you choose W2K you have to live with that feature set for
    the next three or four years, perhaps more. There's no reason to think
    that the improvements from RH4.x to RH6.x can't be repeated in future
    versions, which will leave W2K SP4 looking pretty sad next to a shiny
    RH7.2 system, while Microsoft promises better things "Soon".
  • Eeep! Sorry, not Procfs, Devfs. Erp! Has someone seen my brain?
  • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 04, 2000 @11:37AM (#1405574)
    Top item on my wish list is that things like this should be in Jitterbug [samba.org] or GNATS" [apache.org]. I would be nice if VA Linux Systems [valinux.com] or Linux Care [linuxcare.com] could provide and support bug tracking for offical OSS developers.

    I also wish there had been more push for make Linux x86 a better database server platform. Limitations that get in the way are:

    • 15 partition limit should be raised to a 31 partition limit
    • Support in the offical kernel for accessing raw partitions such as rawfs or char partition devices
    • Support in the offical x86 kernel for file over 2 gigs

    Another item is the ability to have multiple default routes and routing to the default route based on source ip address. Multi-homing on multiple Internet feeds just isn't any fun when all your outbound traffic goes through the same pipe regardless of where the request comes from.

    Anyways, I look forward to the 2.5 developments. The 2.3 kernel series has been fun. :)

  • Ok, i think the initial post was good... but this Anon Coward seems like its too good to be true.. i mean, just that he seems to prove your point, but you can't prove its not you b/c he's anonymous.... not that it always would... But either way 'fist prost'... that doesn't seem like that would happen... i mean... yeah...

    maybe i'm just ignorant and everyone else realizes this whole anon post?
  • Thanks, gwalla.

    Boumphrey's book is the only other Wrox title I haven't returned disatisfied.

    XML for Applications was one of the lightest 600 page tech book I've ever run afoul of. Its true you could do worse: SAMS.
  • No, not siberia. I come to slashdot for nerd news, not linux news. Believe it or not, I dont use linux. Articles without a topic are confusing even if they are talking about a product that I use often. Would you understand if a post claimed that Version 7 would be coming out next month? Version 7 of what? Who knows?
  • Well, Highpoint 366 support is included in the Andre Hedrick's IDE-patch for 2.2.x (available at ftp.*.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/hedrick). I'm using it with my BP6, and it works well.

    I'm not sure, but I suppose the IDE-patch is is already included in 2.3.x.
  • Actually, I wasn't noting that; I made exactly the same mistake. Happily, that left us on the same page...

    Devfs has been available as a patch to the kernel for a long time now; if it's not in yet, I'm not sure why it would be expected to go in now...

  • by Zurk ( 37028 )
    or read online at http://khg.redhat.com
  • It's these kinds of things that The Optical Valley Project [opticalvalley.com] hope to do for the community.

    We'll be providing a mirror of that list on OVP sometime today (when one of the web monkeys finishes his recess), and hopefully, this could be the start of a worthy project to follow up on.

    A previous poster mentioned that when he attempted to do any work on an Alpha port, he had to search high and low for each bug before starting. I think that would also help in this case, to specify for which platform each of the bug(s) affect.

    Anyone interested in getting free hosting with OVP, and is willing to do work for the community, please contact us [mailto].

    Thanks for your time.

    Chris Simmons
    The Optical Valley Project
    http://www.opticalvalley.com [opticalvalley.com]

  • by Anonymous Coward
    > I was really hoping that some work on getting APM working under SMP would go in before 2.4.0

    APM is basically a broken standard as far as SMP is concerned-- the official specifications for APM break down on a SMP machine. Now, it may be possible to put in a hack workaround, but whether or not that will work depends upon your BIOS.

    Heck, many BIOSes don't support APM in Linux on a uniprocessor machine; they expect to be called from DOS and crash when Linux asks them to power down.


    Nevertheless, it's possible that a workaround may come at some point. Also, you may be able to do what you want with the ACPI driver in 2.4-- that should work okay with SMP.
  • it wont work cos :
    [a] How do you test different SCSI drivers -- add 200 scsi cards to your system ?
    [b] How do you test filesystem drivers ? create n filesystems ?
    etc..etc..
    regression testing is ok for standalone programs but since we have no generic emulator for all the hardware we cant do it on the kernel.
  • by harmonica ( 29841 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2000 @11:51AM (#1405587)
    In a press release made yesterday, Suse announces that ReiserFS 3.5.12 (that's not the latest version) can now be downloaded from their site at ftp://ftp.suse.com:/pub/suse/i386/update/6.3/reise rfs/. It's not a final version and you won't get support for it (if you have bought Suse 6.3).

    See the Heise newsticker posting at http://www.heise.de/newsticker/data/ps-04.01.00-00 0/ or Suse's announcement at http://www.suse.de/de/news/news/kurzmeldungen/reis erfs.html (both in German, Babelfish may help).
  • Yep, DevFS. Sorry!

    The issues, as I understand them, can be summarised as:

    • A need for a potentially very large number of devices, without using up all the inodes on the system, flooding the /dev directory any worse, or making a royal hash of device number allocation.
    • Some method of supporting the 'orrible chaos that USB and Firewire could inflict on the current system.
    • A belief (by some) that /dev is overcrowded and mostly filled with superfluous files.
    • A question as to whether you need physical files which really only just point to virtual drivers anyway.
    • A question as to what -would- be the Right Way (tm) to solve this Nightmare on /Dev Street.
  • We need a logical volume manager! Heinz Mauelshagen [mailto] has written one (read about it here [msede.com], and it appears to be stable. This has got to be part of the Linux core before using it in a large environment is reasonable. Those of us coming from other Unix backgrounds have been gritting our teeth at the lack of both a mature JFS AND an LVM.

  • That's fair comment; it will be difficult to run all the tests in "the lab" if some of them are only for the Atari TT port, and the lab doesn't have an Atari TT.

    That goes to suggest that the testing scheme needs to be highly distributed, so that it checks to see what hardware is there is on a particular box, and tests that hardware. And submits the results back to a central site that would collect the results of tests together.

  • Did you see/hear the Crosseyed & Painless at NYE2000? or is your alias coincidence...

    (searching for Linux usin' Phishies)
  • somebody moderate that post up, Linux Device Drivers was invaluable in walking me thru my first, for real, production device driver with no more knowledge than C and an idea of how memory mapping works.... the book kicks some serious booty.

    Then again, so does that bucking bronco on the front... not to mention the operating system it's written about. It's pretty fscking cool when you can write your first driver on your everyday werk box, making liberal use of insmod and rmmod, and only really freak it out three or four times over the course of six weeks' work.

    Good luck on the device driver....

    (lucky bastard... wish I had time to hack some more of those...)
  • At the daring risk of sounding even more moronic, where would I find this mailing list?
    =======
    There was never a genius without a tincture of madness.
  • In the coming releases.. Instead of adding support for a whole lot of neat and new things. Perhaps making what we have better? Code audits fix ups. Just in my spare time of learning a little about the LInux Kernel ive seen a few little things here and there. It would be sort of nice to audit the code like the OpenBSD folks did. But that put the operating system a bit behind and made it not so much for the "bleeding edge" types which thrive on linux.
  • by Anonymous Coward
    Totally necessary if, like me, you're trying to build a network with 100K users ...
  • What's this about "have to patch my kernel twice"?

    DevFS was doomed to failure from day one. How do you expect the kernel to know what devices will _ever_ be available? It certainly easy enough for loaded and/or active drivers, but what about modules? For a module to be automatically loaded, the device node will have to already exist. Maybe _I_ want weird names for my devices?
  • This is still one area that NT kinda shows linux up.

    Not by much, and not for long. NTFS sucks as an example of a journaling file system. ext3, ReiserFS and XFS will soon give Linux users lots of choices and some pretty strong advantages over NTFS.

  • Sweet! Time to download the 3.3.x
  • It would be good if a "success" result caused the test program to create the file success, so that one could run through, after a patch, and "merely" use make success to rerun failed tests.

    One problem with this, is any change could break something that previously worked. After patching I believe that all tests would need to be re-tested

    Hal Duston

  • The fix list link was a direct copy of the email Alan Cox sent to the linux-kernel mailing list. At the bottom you will read:

    - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.rutgers.edu Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/
    I trust you can figure out the rest.
  • If you were paying attention you would notice that the topic on this article is "Linux" and if you use a graphical browser, is right next to a picture of Tux, the Linux penguin. I don't see how that's unclear.
  • perhaps it is, but sun, HP, SGI, and i believe IBM put it in their unix kernels so to compete performance-wise, linux has to as well. the nice thing with linux is that you don't _have_ to. just compile a kernel without it and use the user-space nfs implementation, if you prefer.

    however, once you see the performance diff, you'll likely want to stick with knfs. in my testing at home with a 10 MB network and at work at 100 MB i find that knfs is just about limited by wire/disk speed while user-nfs is several times slower. knfs is even faster than ftp by quite a bit, especially for reads. writes are generally 20-30% or so slower than reads due to using nfsv2.

    tim
  • by orcrist ( 16312 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2000 @02:02PM (#1405613)
    I come to slashdot for nerd news, not linux news.

    Well, for one, it could be argued that if you go to a health-food store looking for 'food, not health food' you'll be sorely dissapointed. Slashdot is what it is...

    For another, the articles are in categories; this one is in the category "Linux", denoted by the cute little penguin on graphical browsers, or the 'Linux' alt tag on text browsers. Given the context, a version number number alone doesn't leave much room for doubt.

    Would you understand if a post claimed that Version 7 would be coming out next month? Version 7 of what? Who knows?

    Well, if it were say, next to the Beos logo, I would assume it was version 7 of Beos. (just to choose an example at random, I don't know what version Beos is at). I guess if it were next to the Monty Python foot I might be confused...

    Finally, you have a login. Take a look at your preferences [slashdot.org] and adjust accordingly.
  • I can't even remember when I sent the DVD stuff to Linus - sometime prior to 2.3.15 (the oldest patch I have on my discs). So don't worry, 2.4 will support the CSS ioctls.
  • As of SuSE 6.3, LVM is part of the distribution. I just thought it was part of 2.2.13.

    Chris
  • Is this this a good place to start for decently experienced C programmers? I'm interested in OS programming, and examining and possibly contributing to linux seems like a good place to start. I've done quite a bit in C/C++, but I've never really worked on a large size project before, and I'm just not sure where to start digging in. Might this book help?
  • No, this is a good thing... We will be getting a significant change in the stable kernel tree quicker.

    Yes, not having a tts[1] fs /now/ sucks, but waiting now+1mo*cool_feature_to_include for the next major release is a Bad Thing.

    [1] (I wonder if he's a novell type?)

  • No that is not clear. As you can see by clicking on the linux penguin (or alt message), a wide range of topics are posted with Tux as the icon.
  • (I admit it, Im a Novell guy, and think NDS is the coolest thing since...(long pause) Um, the coolest thing ever.)

    One thing that linux is good at is replacing the file and print sharing provided by a NT( However linux as a workgroup server currently cant compeat with Netware/NDS (and proably now with *gasp* win2k/ads). Novels marketing division is compleatly brain dead, but when ADS comes online, watch out.

    Of course, why anyone would wory about filesystem privilages is beyond me, thats what ZENworks (application launching) and Groupwise (file sharing) is for :)

  • No that is not clear. As you can see by clicking on the linux penguin (or alt message), a wide range of topics are posted with Tux as the icon. Feel free to notice that everything from Opera to new Window Managers get posted with Tux as the logo.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • by DragonHawk ( 21256 ) on Tuesday January 04, 2000 @04:02PM (#1405623) Homepage Journal
    I haven't heard much of a good argument against devfs.

    devfs impacts every device driver in the kernel, true, but one assumes that if it is worthwhile, we can deal with that. Kernel-wide changes have been done before and will be again. And most of the changes have been done as patches by the devfs maintainer already. So that isn't the real issue.

    devfs would add complexity to the kernel, but so does everything else that adds code. So that isn't the real reason.

    You would lose persistance of the /dev/ directory structure, true, but a method to write out changes and read them back in at boot would be very simple to implement. You lose anything in the buffer-cache if you power-off without sync'ing, but nobody complains about that. So that isn't the issue.

    In the end, it always comes down to "What we have now works fine, and we've done it this way forever, so why change?" The idea of replacing the /dev/ directory is too big a change to swallow for some people. Some of those people are kernel hackers with demigod or higher status, so the change isn't going in.

    Too bad, really. I think devfs has a lot of merit to it.
  • The scsi symbios and adaptec support for alpha is still unstable in 2.2.x kernel. Please, this needs to be fixed.

    Errr... works fine for me, with an AlphaPC 164LX (EV5) and a Symbios SCSI adapter. Be more specific on your system, and maybe send it someplace where it's more likely to get noticed than a random AC post on Slashdot.

    "Software is like sex- the best is for free"
    -Linus Torvalds
  • This is still one area that NT kinda shows linux up

    I know NTFS is a journaling fs, but I thought one of the main advantages of journaling was so that in the event of a drive not getting unmounted properly the journal could be checked to see what is lost, etc and do what it needs to get it back up to where it left off without running fsck/chkdsk, but NT chkdsk runs over the whole drive as if there was no journaling, am I missing something?

    --

  • Remember, if you choose W2K you have to live with that feature set for
    the next three or four years, perhaps more


    How did you figure that one out?
    Windows is a modular OS and NT is a modular kernel.

    The feature set is already richer than Linux/Unix is many areas - anything that's missing - write it yourself.
    Write kernel extensions, drivers, software. I don't really see how what you say is relevant.
    You're like one of those people who go and compare Linux + every single piece of unix software created to Windows NT out of the box.
    NT4 didn't have a telnet server - but you didn't have to wait to W2K to get one, write one yourself, port it from Unix using cygwin, or buy one. You complain when windows includes too many features - then you complain when windows lacks some features.
  • Man pages. I want plain old, updated, current, man pages!

    *sigh*

    Oh well. Back to reality.
  • how about 64-bit kernel time - so we can start implementing those future file systems with an end-of-time that's way way out there - I know we have untill 2038 .... but then 40 odd years ago in 1960 people were putting 2 digit dates in their cobol and look where it got us .....
  • As you can see by clicking on the linux penguin (or alt message), a wide range of topics are posted with Tux as the icon.

    Okay, I'll play along...

    Hmmmm...

    0 Playboy And...Linux? by Hemos on Tuesday January 04, @09:43PM EST 24

    1 Linux Kernel 2.2.14 by CmdrTaco on Tuesday January 04, @04:16PM EST 246

    2 The 2.3.x "Things To Fix" List by CmdrTaco on Tuesday January 04, @02:43PM EST 128
    -- The current article

    3 The ROX Desktop by emmett on Monday January 03, @05:43PM EST 215
    -- Okay this one is Linux/Unix

    4 Interview: a New Linux Year with Jon 'maddog' Hall by Roblimo on Saturday January 01, @02:02PM EST 88

    5 Universal Linux-based Internet Appliance by CmdrTaco on Saturday January 01, @09:32AM EST 52

    6 Linux Last in Deja Network OS Poll by Roblimo on Saturday January 01, @07:10AM EST 156

    7 Forrester Report: Linux Hysteria Will Fade In 2000 by Hemos on Thursday December 30, @03:29PM EST 241

    8 The Linux Newbie Replies: WFM? by Hemos on Thursday December 30, @12:14PM EST 367

    9 Yet Another Linux Driver Petition by CmdrTaco on Thursday December 30, @07:44AM EST 140

    10 US Army Needs Linux Workstation Advice by Cliff on Tuesday December 28, @01:09PM EST 396

    11 Second "Bonus" Interview: Jon "maddog" Hall by Roblimo on Monday December 27, @12:00PM EST 102
    -- Linux, trust me!

    12 Linus One of Fortune's "People to Watch in 2000" by Hemos on Monday December 27, @10:31AM EST 87
    -- Linus is the creator of Linux

    13 Crack.LinuxPPC.org Cracked by CmdrTaco on Monday December 27, @08:12AM EST 132

    14 Linux Handwriting Recognition by CmdrTaco on Saturday December 25, @08:25AM EST 79

    15 "What is Linux Missing?" by CmdrTaco on Friday December 24, @07:34AM EST 732

    16 Opera Beta Released by Roblimo on Friday December 24, @06:35AM EST 255
    -- This was Opera for Linux

    17 UK Gov't Experts Say Linux is Secure, Windows Not by Roblimo on Thursday December 23, @10:14PM EST 277

    18 The MassLinux Disappearance Explained by Hemos on Thursday December 23, @11:30AM EST 137

    19 386 Based Linux Powered Telephone by CmdrTaco on Wednesday December 22, @08:49PM EST 132

    20 Realtime Linux Workshop in Vienna by CmdrTaco on Wednesday December 22, @11:02AM EST 66

    21 LWN Does Year in Review for Linux by Hemos on Tuesday December 21, @06:22PM EST 60

    22 HP Still Porting Linux to 64 bit PA RISC by Hemos on Tuesday December 21, @08:45AM EST 54

    23 Tivo Source Code Released by CmdrTaco on Tuesday December 21, @07:40AM EST 220
    -- Tivo runs on Linux

    24 Is SCSI Sub-Par Under Linux? by Cliff on Friday December 17, @06:37AM EST 263

    25 Corel and Red Hat Rumors Continue by CmdrTaco on Thursday December 16, @11:20AM EST 180
    -- Linux companies

    26 Adobe Announces Initial Support for Linux by HeUnique on Thursday December 16, @05:15AM EST 256

    27 Linus Announces Move into Pre-2.4 Stage by Hemos on Wednesday December 15, @12:38PM EST 209
    -- See above re Linus/Linux

    28 Matra to open source their CAD component library by sengan on Tuesday December 14, @08:40PM EST 139
    -- Okay, open source

    29 Wearable PCs Under Linux by CmdrTaco on Tuesday December 14, @12:16PM EST 133


    So that's 27 pure Linux, and 2 borderline.
    I'll agree there's a wide variety, but: unclear?

    Chris
  • >> The Efficient Networks card takes ATMF-25 straight to the NIC, then converts it internally to Ethernet & then passes things off to the rest of the system as usual. >> There aren't any (that I know of) public *nix drivers for this card.

    Hold on a sec... I just got ADSL installed at one of our offices yesterday. BellSouth couldn't give me the Alcatel 1000 ADSL that I normally request (they've been out of them for awhile, but have ordered more). Since it's a three person office, I had them hook the ADSL to the receptionist's computer, and planned on using ISC (ICS?) in Win98 SE to share (BellSouth couldn't get Windows dial-up working after four or five hours... it took me two hours, not counting the four hours or so of trying to find the damn Product Key).

    Now, I know it's a PPP Efficient Networks card, and in a directory on the computer, they left a directory that they said contained the Linux drivers. The directory exists, but I have't gone into it yet. The guy who did the install was a hardcore geek (after four hours of sitting watching Window 98 reboot, you chat about stuff), and even showed me some undocumented features of the Windows driver (when you have the PPP monitor up, hit "Alt-Shift-A" to bring up "Administrator Mode"). If anyone needs it, email me... but it should be up somewhere. (evan@onepaper.com)

    And today, I finally got it all working by backing up and formatting, and reinstalling Windows 98. Turns out, the copy the office had, that they SWORE was SE, was a "first edition" Win98 disk. I have their network up, but no proxy (my fault for assuming they were right).

    I never did anything to make ADSL work on my home Mandrake box... it booted up, and just saw the net. It took about half an hour to get IP Masquerade working for my home network, mostly because I took my time reading the HOWTO. When I tried Corel, the same thing - no configuration, just net.

    And which is the harder system to setup and use? (30 minutes versus 10 hours and counting...)

    --
    Evan

  • I agree that you want, at some point, to rerun the whole suite.

    But if all you did was to patch the kernel a bit to fix a particular problem, it may be desirable to just run the tests that you figure are related to that change.

    Rerunning the full suite overnight or on some other reasonable periodic basis to find problems that may have been introduced would be an obvious thing to do.

    The real point is that if the test suite grows to 15MB of source code, and runs for 25 hours, you don't run the whole thing every time you make a little change. You run the parts that could conceivably be relevant. And run the whole thang once in a while.

    Or perhaps have a daemon that grabs the latest kernel every time one is released, and runs it through regression.

    That's not a concern until there's so many tests that they'll run for many hours...

  • moderators - how is this redundant when it's the first post?
  • To a certain degree I agree with you, probably we could get away with only re-testing the subsystem that was changed. I like P. J. Plauger's comments about testing in Chapter 0 of The Standard C Library. He basically says that the test code and the code being tested end up testing each other, and frequently need to be changed in unison. The testing code is closely tied to the tested code, and usually as complex. Each piece debugs the other. He is talking about the C library, which is rather modular in places and rather interdependent in others, so I guess that same applies to the kernel.

    Hal Duston

  • I actually made this work on the "old" (old? it's not even a year old!) dual PII-450 server at work. iirc, it's a matter of adding the 'apm=smp-power-off' option - use a line like:

    append = "apm=smp-power-off"

    in your lilo.conf to enable it.
  • Have you checked out SGI's patches for NFSV3 against the 2.2.10 kernel?

    We use a LOT of nfs at work. I already have Trond's NFS V3 patches applied to my kernels, and they work OK, sort of. I can also run an NFS V3 server with the knfsd patches (or Neil Brown's new patches). But the linux nfs V3 server, while working with Digital and SGI NFS V3 clients, cannot be seen by linux nfs v3 clients, OR linux nfs v2 clients.

    I feel safe in saying linux nfs v2 server and client are working well. V3 would sure help a lot, but I just don't see it happening in any sort of stable well-maintained way - yet. Of course, the speed differences are not great until you get to 100 BT lines anyway...

    This has HUGE raminifications for the usability of linux as a file server in a distributed Unix environment. NFS servers from linux are behind virtually EVERY other flavor of Unix. I suspect they will come around. But nfs is not exactly improving fast.
  • 1. Read the manuals. The point being made lately about inadequacy is somewhat encouraging. I won't fault anyone for commenting on stuff that needs to be improved, but the fact is if you want to hack ( as in to build something) you have to take some responsibility for gathering information. 2. Forget about learning the whole source. Only a moron would do that. This relates to #1. The manuals were put together for two reasons, to avoid the monstrous stupidity of needing one hacker to accompany every user at all times and to avoid the monstrous stupidity of making people record unnecessary information. You want to be a hacker not a paranoid fascist effiency expert wannabe incapable of accomplishing anything to which you aspire, aka a wanker. 3. Learn how to read source. Applies to #2. This is even more important than fully learning a language. Know how to separate sections so that you can reconstruct them similarly rather than ridiculously attempting to regurgitate them from memory. It's more imprtant to know what a function looks like, what a comment looks like, and how to trace one result from one funtion to the use of that result in another function. 4. Applies to #3. Learn where to put infromation that you find. This is the 3rd most important part. Any project that looks like a black box is intimidating if you don't have an idea what you're trying to solve. For any project, state the obvious, lay it out on paper. Then begin to develop. 5. Applies to #4. (2nd Most important part). Learn to generalize. Remember software is virtual machinery. Virtual physics (somebody needs to write a book on that) is different from real physics. When you move a paperweight everything happens on its own, you don't have to tell the universe to move the image you see of the paperweight along with the paperweight itself. In a 3-D program you have to do that. One of the ways you become aware of this is by understanding the complete meaning of the idea that your screen is just a bunch of colored dots. A hacker gains a lot of freedom from knowing that. The complexity and collapses into simple models, the confusion disappears. An example is the crazy amount of redundancy virtual physics imposes on 3-D programs. Calculating visible areas from every cubic unit of space, takes a lot of time, to prevent that you have to waste a lot of space.. In real life light either reaches your eye or it doesn't. No big deal. 6. Applies to everything, so this is the most important tip. Nothing is simple; virtual physics prevents this. You have to identify extremes in the concept of your project where things either run slowly or take an enormous amount of space. An example is the cellular directory assistance place I work at: Sure type in the query values and presto you get your phone number. simple right? No. If your customer is looking for A & P super food stores, they might as well go out for coffee, cuz a lot of words begin with A + P. Lots of businesses like initials which makes it worse. Then there's things like the fact that Southern States have towns that have 3 or 4 different names plus you have customers that ask for the Police Department in Northern Virginia. Good luck. In CPU design you have CPU caches, It's a matter of balance because when you improve performance by increasing associativity, you screw perfomance because that automatically increases the miss rate. 7. As a result of #6 you need to learn balance. Speed vs space, Cache Hit Wait vs Miss Rate, Power and detail in your project versus deadline. So you can see it has nothing at all to do with code. It's about your organizational skills. The rest just writes itself.
  • 1. Read the manuals. The point being made lately about inadequacy is somewhat encouraging. I won't fault anyone for commenting on stuff that needs to be improved, but the fact is if you want to hack ( as in to build something) you have to take some responsibility for gathering information.

    2. Forget about learning the whole source. Only a moron would do that. This relates to #1. The manuals were put together for two reasons, to avoid the monstrous stupidity of needing one hacker to accompany every user at all times and to avoid the monstrous stupidity of making people record unnecessary information. You want to be a hacker not a paranoid fascist effiency expert wannabe incapable of accomplishing anything to which you aspire, aka a wanker.

    3. Learn how to read source. Applies to #2. This is even more important than fully learning a language. Know how to separate sections so that you can reconstruct them similarly rather than ridiculously attempting to regurgitate them from memory. It's more imprtant to know what a function looks like, what a comment looks like, and how to trace one result from one funtion to the use of that result in another function.

    4. Applies to #3. Learn where to put infromation that you find. This is the 3rd most important part. Any project that looks like a black box is intimidating if you don't have an idea what you're trying to solve. For any project, state the obvious, lay it out on paper. Then begin to develop.

    5. Applies to #4. (2nd Most important part). Learn to generalize. Remember software is virtual machinery. Virtual physics (somebody needs to write a book on that) is different from real physics. When you move a paperweight everything happens on its own, you don't have to tell the universe to move the image you see of the paperweight along with the paperweight itself. In a 3-D program you have to do that. One of the ways you become aware of this is by understanding the complete meaning of the idea that your screen is just a bunch of colored dots. A hacker gains a lot of freedom from knowing that. The complexity and collapses into simple models, the confusion disappears. An example is the crazy amount of redundancy virtual physics imposes on 3-D programs. Calculating visible areas from every cubic unit of space, takes a lot of time, to prevent that you have to waste a lot of space.. In real life light either reaches your eye or it doesn't. No big deal.

    6. Applies to everything, so this is the most important tip. Nothing is simple; virtual physics prevents this. You have to identify extremes in the concept of your project where things either run slowly or take an enormous amount of space. An example is the cellular directory assistance place I work at: Sure type in the query values and presto you get your phone number. simple right? No. If your customer is looking for A & P super food stores, they might as well go out for coffee, cuz a lot of words begin with A + P. Lots of businesses like initials which makes it worse. Then there's things like the fact that Southern States have towns that have 3 or 4 different names plus you have customers that ask for the Police Department in Northern Virginia. Good luck. In CPU design you have CPU caches, It's a matter of balance because when you improve performance by increasing associativity, you screw perfomance because that automatically increases the miss rate.

    7. As a result of #6 you need to learn balance. Speed vs space, Cache Hit Wait vs Miss Rate, Power and detail in your project versus deadline.

    So you can see it has nothing at all to do with code. It's about your organizational skills. The rest just writes itself.
  • futile and unlikely.

    All of 2000 now refers to \Device\Harddisk0\Partition1. All of 2000 will name your hard drives according to what port and channel they're instralled on. Now why didn't we think of that? We did 30 years ago. Letter names will disappear soon. 2000 already has the mount syscall.

    2000 Server comes with a (gasp) Mount point manager.

    I'm sorry but I have no reason to switch back to Windows.

    Is Linux missing some things? Sure. Are the betas of those portions kicking ass already? Most certainly.

  • Sorry bub but the only thing getting steamrolled is the public's ignorance about Microsoft's originality. Happy New Year.
  • Windows is a modular OS and NT is a modular kernel.

    Can you replace the shell? Can you replace the kernel? Does it run on 20+ Architectures? Would 911 run Windows (I do wonder why they run Linux, hmm..)?

    The feature set is already richer than Linux/Unix is many areas - anything that's missing - write it yourself

    Gee that's original.

    Write kernel extensions, drivers, software. I don't really see how what you say is relevant.

    Again, how is that better than Linux. Dude man show me a 2000 release that doen't need sound recorder or media player to play a sound file. Only the driver.

    cat(concatenate, or just send) sound.au(raw audio) > (to, like DUH!) /dev/dsp (digital signal processor aka sound card)

    (for the slow parenthese are not to be typed in.)

    I can play a file from a damned one line script.

    Second, Kernel extensions that need to be rewritten every few years compared to fully published stable APIs. Nope no thanks.

    Sorry but no dice. It's still spit and glue from what I've seen, though it is kind of starting to look like Unix.

    You're like one of those people who go and compare Linux + every single piece of unix software created to Windows NT out of the box.)

    Nope. Wrong. I compare only the distributions I use to what comes on the Windows CD. I only need to do that. Though Linux still beats Windows in bare bones setup.

    In a full install, I get full Internet readiness from using to developing, from small time applications to tools for setting up a major global organization in no time flat. Could Linux distros use some WYSIWYG editors on CD, maybe, but Windows so far doesn't offer me anything to match until I buy separate products. Windows gives me a click and drool universe and oh my god look at the pretty colors euphoria as the only reward. I'm not a kid anymore. It takes power and gunctionality to make me drool. I'm certainly not impressed.

    I'm soory but you're the one who sounds sore.
  • This is all part of a cunning plan. The internet companies trade profits for growth, right? The kernel trades stability for market share. Linus figures that once the whole world is running his code, everybody will have an incentive to fix the bugs that bite 'em.

    Linus is the master of lazy programmers.

  • Are either you or the poster above you paying the slightest attention to what I'm talking about?

    Aaaarrrrgghhhhh. Are you stupid?!?!?!?!

    Or are you not paying attention to what I said?

    Let me give you an example:

    "In a press release today, the White House said the President is not feeling well"

    Now, quick; Is that the president of IBM? Zimbabwe? The Nose-Picker's Club of Estonia?

    but a out of context version number

    It's not out of context!!! It is implied. Shall I give you a translation table for reference?

    A Version number sitting alone next to:

    Linux Logo ---> Linux kernel
    BeOS Logo ----> BeOS version
    Apache Logo --> Apache version
    etc.

    What's so hard about that to understand?

    Chris
  • > How good is Linux at (Remote Access) RAS,

    Telnet?

    > Componentization (COM+),

    GNOME and KDE both have good versions of this.

    > Telephony (TAPI),

    Dunno but I remmber seeing an app advertised on freshmeat thats been around since 96 to do this.

    > Speech (SAPI),

    There's something for it, can't remember what.

    > 3D (DirectX),

    DirectX sucks.
    OpenGL works fine.

    > DataAccess (ODBC),

    Ummmm,
    MySQL, Oracle
    .....

    > Accessibility (MSA)

    Fairly good

    > Transaction Servers (MTS),

    No idea.

    > Message Queuing (MSMQ),

    Haven't a clue

    > IIS,

    Now you're just being silly.
    I've forgotten what it's called...
    Oh yeah apache

    > ASP,

    php

    > ActiveX,

    Com+ in a fancy name.

    > PnP..etc

    2.3 supports my pnp cards without any hassle.
    In fact I've had more luck with pnp stuff
    under linux, than under windows.

    > ...the list goes on (note, everthing i list is >free with windows)...

    Free to obtain,
    how much does it cost to have more than 10people using it at once?

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