linux-kernel - Re: [RFC] Should writes to /dev/urandom immediately affect reads?

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Message-ID: <CAHk-=wicaC9BhbgufM_Ym6bkjrRcB7ZXSK00fYEmiAcFmwN3Kg@mail.gmail.com>
Date:   Wed, 20 Sep 2023 12:42:54 -0700
From:   Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>
To:     Eric Biggers <ebiggers@...nel.org>
Cc:     "Jason A. Donenfeld" <Jason@...c4.com>,
        linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, linux-crypto@...r.kernel.org,
        "Theodore Ts'o" <tytso@....edu>,
        Dominik Brodowski <linux@...inikbrodowski.net>,
        Jann Horn <jannh@...gle.com>
Subject: Re: [RFC] Should writes to /dev/urandom immediately affect reads?

On Wed, 20 Sept 2023 at 12:32, Eric Biggers <ebiggers@...nel.org> wrote:
>
> >
> > Also, are there any relevant architectures where
> > "try_to_generate_entropy()" doesn't work? IOW, why do you even care?
> >
>
> There are, as shown by the fact that the full unification of /dev/urandom and
> /dev/random failed yet again.

No, no. That only showed that such architectures exist. It didn't show
that any *relevant* architectures exist.

The ones reported on were 32-bit arm, m68k, microblaze, sparc32,
xtensa.. Maybe others.

> But similarly, that's unrelated.

They are related in the sense fo "why do you actually *care*?"

Because I don't see why any of this actually matters.

               Linus