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Date:      Sat, 4 May 2002 14:42:43 -0400 (EDT)
From:      Robert Watson <rwatson@freebsd.org>
To:        Poul-Henning Kamp <phk@critter.freebsd.dk>
Cc:        arch@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: syscall changes to deal with 32->64 changes. 
Message-ID:  <Pine.NEB.3.96L.1020504143946.21461r-100000@fledge.watson.org>
In-Reply-To: <33534.1020505495@critter.freebsd.dk>

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On Sat, 4 May 2002, Poul-Henning Kamp wrote:

> In message <Pine.NEB.3.96L.1020504032841.21461e-100000@fledge.watson.org>, Rob
> ert Watson writes:
> 
> >Here's my opinion: if it's a change
> >that can be made by one person in one week without boatloads of lasting
> >compatibility and ABI concerns, and you're volunteering to do it, then I
> >think it's a great idea.
> 
> That's not even remotely close to realistic.

Let me clarify what I meant there, it was
way-the-heck-early-in-the-morning.  What I'd like to bound is the flag
procedure: that we try to avoid more than a week of disruption.  Nothing
says the internal kernel interfaces, etc, can't be upgraded gradually as
you suggest, etc, just that we attempt to avoid extended breakage during
the change in default ABI.

> I think a realistic plan might look something like this:
> 
> 1.  Change the in-kernel types to 64 bits
>     for each entity to change size:
> 	   a) rewrite syscall entries to translate sizes.
> 	   b) change size in kernel, but retain old size in userland
> 
> 2.  Add new syscall API
>     a) write syscalls implementations.
> 
> 3.  Change userland over.
>     a) Add #ifdef NEWAPI all over the includes so people can select
>        which API to use.
>     b) Create new major-revv libc which uses new API
>     c) Leave people time to find bugs in ports etc.
>     d) Throw the switch for good.
> 
> Earliest realistic dates would be 3c on juli 1st and 3d a month later.
> 
> Is that too late for 5.0-R ?

That's probably something to discuss with re@, etc.  My personal opinion
is that the ABI change would be alright through the end of August.  I'd
like to see it more on the timeframe you suggest.  If we do this, then we
do definitely need to have a DP3 using the new ABI, probably around Sept 1
or mid-August, to allow broader testing with the new ABI.

Robert N M Watson             FreeBSD Core Team, TrustedBSD Project
robert@fledge.watson.org      NAI Labs, Safeport Network Services



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