Am 14.06.20 um 23:08 schrieb Jan Engelhardt:
On Sunday 2020-06-14 22:19, David Howells wrote:
Alexander A. Klimov <grandmaster@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
*Is it a good idea to rename files in include/uapi/ ?*
Very likely not. If programs out there are going to be built on a
case-sensitive filesystem (which happens all the time), they're going to break
if you rename the headers. We're kind of stuck with them.
Netfilter has precedent for removing old headers, e.g.
7200135bc1e61f1437dc326ae2ef2f310c50b4eb's ipt_ULOG.h.
Even if kernels would not remove such headers, the iptables userspace
code wants to be buildable with all kinds of kernels, including past
releases, which do not have modern headers like xt_l2tp.h.
The mantra for userspace programs is therefore "copy the headers" —
because you never know what /usr/include/linux you get. iptables and
iproute2 are two example codebases that employ this. And when headers
do get copied, header removals from the kernel side are no longer a
Absolutely correct, "*when* headers do get copied ..."
big deal either.
A header file rename is no problem. We even have dummy headers
Hmm.. if I understand all of you correctly, David, Stefano, Pablo and Al
say like no, not a good idea, but only you, Jan, say like should be no
problem.
Jan, do you have anything like commit messages in mainline or public
emails from maintainers confirming your opinion?
What exactly makes you sure that Torvalds, the #1 protector of the
userspace, would tolerate a such patch from me?
Yes, it would break the A*P*I, and not the A*B*I, but who knows..
already because of this... or related changes. Just look at
xt_MARK.h, all it does is include xt_mark.h. Cf.
28b949885f80efb87d7cebdcf879c99db12c37bd .
The boilerplate for xt_*h is quite high thanks to the miniscule
splitting of headers. Does not feel right in this day and age.
