linux-kernel - Re: [RFC] Pushing device/driver binding decisions to userspace

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Date:	Tue, 14 Nov 2006 08:32:00 +0100
From:	Arjan van de Ven <arjan@...radead.org>
To:	Jim Crilly <jim@....dont.jablowme.net>
Cc:	Lee Revell <rlrevell@...-job.com>,
	Ben Collins <ben.collins@...ntu.com>,
	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [RFC] Pushing device/driver binding decisions to userspace

On Mon, 2006-11-13 at 17:16 -0500, Jim Crilly wrote:
> On 11/13/06 09:18:59PM +0100, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> > On Mon, 2006-11-13 at 13:51 -0500, Lee Revell wrote:
> > > On Mon, 2006-11-13 at 08:58 +0100, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> > > > Now; there is a second issue. If the choice for one or the other is
> > > > consistent, we should consider fixing the kernel drivers to just not
> > > > advertise the b0rked one.. (this assumes that both drivers are in the
> > > > kernel and both are open source) 
> > > 
> > > Unfortunately it becomes political quickly.  For example the old OSS
> > > i810_audio driver is still in the kernel even though the ALSA driver
> > > supports more hardware and provides more functionality because some
> > > people consider the ALSA driver bloated.
> > 
> > I doubt distros ship both though.... I thought all distros were
> > alsa-only by now..
> > 
> 
> I know that Debian ships both because I have to switch back to the OSS
> driver whenever I want to play one of those closed source games that mmap
> /dev/dsp because the ALSA OSS emulation can't seem to handle having the
> device opened via ALSA and /dev/dsp at the same time and the aoss wrapper
> doesn't work for apps that use mmap on /dev/dsp.

and this is why shipping 2 drivers suck.
"A has a bug so I need to use B" is the wrong answer, at least long
term. The real answer is "fix A".
I know it sucks for you, but if shipping B means A doesn't get fixed, or
worse, bugs in A hardly get reported... it means the short term is
hurting the long term, and just prolongs the pain even for you...
(since switching drivers is a pain, and more and more stuff is depending
on alsa nowadays)

-- 
if you want to mail me at work (you don't), use arjan (at) linux.intel.com
Test the interaction between Linux and your BIOS via http://www.linuxfirmwarekit.org

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