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To: "Andrew V. Stesin" <stesin@elvisti.kiev.ua>
cc: stable@freebsd.org
Subject: Re: What I'd like to see brought to -stable 
In-reply-to: Your message of "Thu, 01 Feb 1996 10:00:09 +0200."
             <199602010800.KAA29987@office.elvisti.kiev.ua> 
From: David Greenman <davidg@Root.COM>
Reply-To: davidg@Root.COM
Date: Thu, 01 Feb 1996 02:50:52 -0800
Sender: owner-stable@freebsd.org
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>1.  (kernel) A fix for "system binds" problem (IDE system with X11
>    "goes asleep" periodically for random periods of time).

   I think this is workable. The problem is apparantly in the object clean
code, and I think the changes can be retrofitted.

>2.  "phk malloc" by Paul Henning Kampf. It's one of the best performance
>    improvements I've seen, why recompile approx. entire world after
>    dropping it into an installed system? And, taken from -current,
>    it works without a glitch -- only _times_ faster :)

  No, sorry, this won't be in the release. The main problem is that phk's
malloc does a better job recycling memory and this exposes bugs in
applications. Since 2.1-stable is supposed to be "stable", I don't want to
rock the boat - the result would only be the appearance that 2.1-stable was
far less than stable even though the real problem is in the apps. Since "apps"
also includes our *own* /usr/src, this would look very bad. There's also a
question as to whether all of the bugs in phkmalloc have been worked out. A
fairly serious bug was found just a few weeks ago.

>3.  "STARTUP_SETLOCALE hack" removal and a couple of localization
>    changes done by Andrew Chernov throughout the userland
>    utilities.

   I don't have a problem with this as long as Andrey is dedicated to managing
the changes. I'm not going to touch this myself, however.

>4.  A new groff (1.10). It's way nice to have direct LaserJet printing!

   I think this would be okay if someone was dedicated to doing the upgrade.
Like #3, I won't be doing this myself.

>5.  Recent PPP improvements.

   Yes, definately.

   ...and lots of other fixes that haven't been mentioned. We'll be going
through all the changes soon to find other candidates.

-DG

David Greenman
Core Team/Principal Architect, The FreeBSD Project