linux-kernel - Re: [2.6 patch] drivers/scsi/nsp32.c: remove kernel 2.4 code

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Date:	Fri, 27 Apr 2007 10:55:54 -0400 (EDT)
From:	"Robert P. J. Day" <rpjday@...dspring.com>
To:	James Bottomley <James.Bottomley@...elEye.com>
cc:	Adrian Bunk <bunk@...sta.de>,
	Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>,
	linux-scsi@...r.kernel.org, linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org,
	Yokota Hiroshi <yokota@...lab.cs.tsukuba.ac.jp>,
	GOTO Masanori <gotom@...ori.org>
Subject: Re: [2.6 patch] drivers/scsi/nsp32.c: remove kernel 2.4 code

On Thu, 26 Apr 2007, James Bottomley wrote:

> Personally, I don't like to see 2.4 and 2.6 in a new driver, and
> will tend to try to force it to be 2.6 only.  For an existing
> driver, I tend to be much more tolerant: removing the huge gobs of
> code to achieve 2.6 only is usually a bit disruptive on both the
> driver and the maintainer
>
> > But if a driver is no longer actually maintained for both kernels
> > these checks become useless (and there quickly arised
> > unconditional 2.6-only code in such a driver) and can be removed.
>
> This driver is maintained by
>
> Yokota Hiroshi <yokota@...lab.cs.tsukuba.ac.jp>
> GOTO Masanori <gotom@...ori.org>
>
> As it says in the header.  It was last modified in May 2006, so it
> is maintained under the somewhat elastic standards of SCSI.  I've
> cc'd them to see what they think.

while we're on the subject, what's the policy on supporting kernel
version selection *within* the 2.5 series?  as in:

$ grep -r "KERNEL_VERSION(2,5" *
drivers/scsi/pcmcia/nsp_cs.h:#if (LINUX_VERSION_CODE >= KERNEL_VERSION(2,5,74))
drivers/scsi/pcmcia/nsp_cs.c:#if (LINUX_VERSION_CODE < KERNEL_VERSION(2,5,0))
drivers/scsi/pcmcia/nsp_cs.c:#if (LINUX_VERSION_CODE < KERNEL_VERSION(2,5,2))
drivers/scsi/pcmcia/nsp_cs.c:#if (LINUX_VERSION_CODE > KERNEL_VERSION(2,5,73))
... etc etc ...

granted, this doesn't happen in a lot of files (almost of them
SCSI-related), but is it official policy to support code based on its
release number in the 2.5 series of releases?  unless you have a good
reason, wouldn't it make more sense to compare against (2,6,0) rather
than, say, (2,5,73)?  just an observation.

rday

-- 
========================================================================
Robert P. J. Day
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry
Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA

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