Re: [RFC/RFT patch 0/7] timekeeping: Unify clock MONOTONIC and clock BOOTTIME

[Thomas Gleixner]

On Thu, 1 Mar 2018, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> On Thu, Mar 1, 2018 at 8:33 AM, Thomas Gleixner <tglx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> >
> > This really needs lot of testing, documentation updates and more input from
> > userspace folks to make a final decision.
> 
> Honestly, I don't think we'd get the testing this kind of change needs
> except by just trying it.
> 
> I'm willing to merge this in the 4.17 merge window, with the
> understanding that if people end up reporting issues, we may just have
> to revert it all, and chalk it up to a learning experience - and add
> the appropriate commentary in the kernel code about exactly what it
> was that depended on that MONO/BOOT difference.

Fair enough. So we maybe just merge the first two patches and merge the
cleanups and consolidation patches when we feel good enough.

I surely can queue the whole lot in next, but from PTI the experience I
know how good the test coverage is. 4.14.stable would be the ideal testing
ground. /me runs fast and hides

> One non-technical thing I would ask: use some other word than
> "conflate". Maybe just "combine". Or better yet, "unify".
> 
> "Conflate" technically and historically means the same thing as
> combine, but has very much gathered a side meaning of "confuse".
> 
> So yes, "conflate" is indeed about mixing or combining, but it's
> typically used in the sense of a *bad* combination or mixing. So
> "trying to conflate two issues" means "trying to mix two issues that
> are not the same into one".
> 
> So "unify" and "conflate" mean both the same thing and almost exactly
> the opposite at the same time.
> 
> And yes, you will find dictionaries (and linguists) that hold purely
> to the old meaning. As always, there are fogeys that can't get over
> the fact that meanings meander and change.

I'm old enough to have learned that conflate means unify or combine, but
I'm still not old enough to be stubborn about it :)

Thanks,

	tglx