linux-kernel - RE: Linux 2.6.29

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Date:	Fri, 27 Mar 2009 11:36:07 -0700
From:	"Hua Zhong" <hzhong@...il.com>
To:	"'Alan Cox'" <alan@...rguk.ukuu.org.uk>,
	"'Matthew Garrett'" <mjg59@...f.ucam.org>
Cc:	"'Theodore Tso'" <tytso@....edu>,
	"'Linus Torvalds'" <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>,
	"'Andrew Morton'" <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>,
	"'David Rees'" <drees76@...il.com>,
	"'Jesper Krogh'" <jesper@...gh.cc>,
	"'Linux Kernel Mailing List'" <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>
Subject: RE: Linux 2.6.29

Why are we even arguing about standards?

POSIX, as all other standards, is a common _denominator_ and absolutely the
_minimal_ requirement for a compliant operating system. It does not tell you
how to design the best systems in the real world. For God's sake, can't we
aim for something higher than a piece of literature written some 20 years
ago? And stop making excuses please?

The fact is, most software is crap, and most software developers are lazy
and stupid. Same as most customers are stupid too. A technically correct
operating system isn't necessarily the most successful and accepted
operating system. Have a sense of pragmatism if you are developing something
that is not just a fancy research project.

And it's especially true for ext4. I bet nobody would care about what it did
if it called itself bloody-fast-next-gen-fs, and of course probably nobody
would use it either. But since it's putting the "ext" and "next default
Linux filesystem in all distros" hat on, it'd better take both the glory and
the crap with it. So, no matter whether ext3 made some mistakes, you can't
just throw it all away while keeping its name to give people the false sense
of comfort.

I am really glad that Theodore changed ext4 to handle the common practice of
truncate/rename sequences. It's absolutely necessary. It's not a "favor for
stupid user space", but a mandatory requirement if you even remotely want it
to be a general-purpose file system. In the end, it doesn't matter how
standard compliant you are - people will only choose the filesystem that is
the most reliable, fastest, and works with the most number of applications.

Hua

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