Re: Linux, UDI and SCO.

david parsons (o.r.c@p.e.l.l.p.o.r.t.l.a.n.d.o.r.u.s)
21 Sep 1998 14:24:53 -0700


In article <linux.kernel.6u4s4v$j57$1@palladium.transmeta.com>,
H. Peter Anvin <hpa@transmeta.com> wrote:
>Followup to: <6u4amt$ifv@pell.pell.portland.or.us>
>By author: o.r.c@p.e.l.l.p.o.r.t.l.a.n.d.o.r.u.s (david parsons)
>In newsgroup: linux.dev.kernel
>>
>> Which is good, because the UDI interface is likely to remain frozen
>> and thus a driver that's written against a 2.0.x UDI interface will
>> continue to work when the kernel is revved to 4.0. This is an
>> unqualified Good Thing, because it means that device driver writers
>> don't have to either (a) maintain their drivers forever to keep up
>> with kernel interface drift or (b) hope that if they lose interest
>> someone else will have enough interest to maintain the driver
>> forever to keep up with kernel interface drift.
>>
>
>It's not an *unqualified* good thing: the extra layer *will* come at a
>(performance) cost.

Possibly; it depends on (a) the skill of the people who do the
reference implementation and (b) the skill of the people who do
the performance implementation <assuming that the reference
implementation is slow.> But even if there was a performance
penalty(tm), it's better to have a device supported slowly than
to have a device not supported at all.

____
david parsons \bi/ Thus `unqualified good thing'.
\/

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