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On Wed, Jan 4, 2012 at 6:35 AM, Pandu Poluan <pandu@××××××.info> wrote: |
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> |
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> On Jan 4, 2012 6:19 AM, "Dale" <rdalek1967@×××××.com> wrote: |
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>> |
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>> Neil Bothwick wrote: |
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>>> |
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>>> On Tue, 3 Jan 2012 15:31:20 +0100, Nicolas Sebrecht wrote: |
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>>> |
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>>>> I know. It's the "I want to get the rid of initramfs" thing that looks |
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>>>> crazy to me. |
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>>> |
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>>> No one is saying they want to get rid of the initramfs, because they are |
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>>> not using one. What people object to is being forced to start using one. |
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>>> |
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>>> |
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>> |
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>> You got that right. I have not used one since I started using Gentoo. |
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>> Now, I may very well have to start. I hope mdev gets to a point where it |
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>> works really well on desktop systems. |
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>> |
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> |
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> You were there in the thread linked by Walt, udev is just one of several |
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> packages maintained by RH people that *demands* /usr to be mounted during |
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> boot. |
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> |
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> And the RH devels insistence to deprecate /bin, /sbin, /usr/sbin... |
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> |
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> I'm getting depressed. One battle might be won (mdev vs udev), but there's |
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> still a war against the RH braindeadness... |
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|
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I'm sorry to tell you this, but (as admirable as it could be), the |
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mdev hack to use it instead of udev is not a "victory". We are not at |
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war, in the first place; and in the second place, the mdev hack would |
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be used by a handful of guys bent on refusing a change that, like it |
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or not, would in the end come. Like Gentoo on FreeBSD, it would be a |
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nice hack, maybe even worthy of applause, but in the end irrelevant: a |
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toy. A cute, entertaining (and, in a few cases, useful) toy. But a toy |
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nonetheless. |
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|
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The heavy development will continue to happen in udev, and the devices |
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that will dominate in the future (touchscreens, bluetooth input and |
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audio devices, hardware that has a highly dynamic change rate) will |
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only be supported by udev. The mdev hack will be useful maybe to only |
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some guys, and even then udev would be able to do the same (and more). |
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|
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The use of an initramfs (or, alternatively, having /usr in the same |
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partition as /), and maybe the move of /bin to /usr/bin and /lib to |
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/usr/lib will be made, and in the future most of the interesting |
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software will simply assume that this is how a system works. Maybe we |
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will even stop to use the ridiculous short directory names from the |
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stone age, and we will start using sensible names: |
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|
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/usr -> /System |
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/etc -> /Config |
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/var -> /Variable |
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|
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I feel a deep respect for the people working on making mdev a |
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"replacement" of udev; it is not an easy task (even if it only works |
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for a really small subset of the use cases udev covers), and something |
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that I certainly would never do. But their hack (as beautiful as it |
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may be) will never be used by the majority of Linux users, and |
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probably not even by the majority of Gentoo users (if my |
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interpretation of the discussion on gentoo-dev is correct). And with |
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the pass of time it will be harder and harder to keep the hack working |
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with new hardware, new software, and new use cases. |
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|
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But, hey, this is FOSS; you guys go nuts hacking in whatever feature |
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(or anti-feature) you like. As in the case of this mdev hack, it may |
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even be included in the Gentoo ebuilds. Just don't expect it to be |
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supported forever, don't expect it to support general-purpose setups, |
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and certainly don't call it "a victory". It's just the same history as |
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always: the people writing the code are the ones calling the shots. |
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|
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Regards. |
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-- |
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Canek Peláez Valdés |
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Posgrado en Ciencia e Ingeniería de la Computación |
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Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México |