Re: [RFC v2 1/2] kernel/sysctl: support setting sysctl parameters from kernel command line

[Michal Hocko]

On Thu 26-03-20 14:30:41, Christian Brauner wrote:
> On Thu, Mar 26, 2020 at 07:58:29AM +0100, Michal Hocko wrote:
> > On Wed 25-03-20 17:20:40, Eric W. Biederman wrote:
> > > Vlastimil Babka <vbabka@xxxxxxx> writes:
> > [...]
> > > > +	if (strncmp(param, "sysctl.", sizeof("sysctl.") - 1))
> > > > +		return 0;
> > > 
> > > Is there any way we can use a slash separated path.  I know
> > > in practice there are not any sysctl names that don't have
> > > a '.' in them but why should we artifically limit ourselves?
> > 
> > Because this is the normal userspace interface? Why should it be any
> > different from calling sysctl?
> > [...]
> 
> Imho, we should use ".". Kernel developers aren't the ones setting
> these options, admins are and if I think back to the times doing that as
> a job at uni I'd be very confused if I learned that I get to set sysctl
> options through the kernel command but need to use yet another format
> than what I usually do to set those from the shell. Consistency is most
> of the times to be preferred imho.

Absolutely agreed! Even if sysctl can consume / instead of ., which was a
news to me btw, the majority of the usage is with `.'
-- 
Michal Hocko
SUSE Labs