From owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Jan 13 20:45:34 2011 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-current@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 112A7106566C for ; Thu, 13 Jan 2011 20:45:34 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from dnebdal@gmail.com) Received: from mail-iy0-f182.google.com (mail-iy0-f182.google.com [209.85.210.182]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C849E8FC20 for ; Thu, 13 Jan 2011 20:45:33 +0000 (UTC) Received: by iyb26 with SMTP id 26so1976347iyb.13 for ; Thu, 13 Jan 2011 12:45:33 -0800 (PST) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=domainkey-signature:mime-version:in-reply-to:references:date :message-id:subject:from:to:cc:content-type; bh=3yHxb0u4cjXTCAaGasGE256o22Ogd06Qm6u1sKOX/zs=; b=ut5sM7KUc1ytPk2v1Xw9q+E3DJ4OZNiEbkkko5aSdx72MtkPOFdImaB3FIbbqxdGRu 4K+lwWf/Pl6AhfsuDMdx5L0Ta8pLuyT1VrwJnuOlJjlngvJcOy/VT4ryOBjFkd2bM2iD Y1ADcIf1ML+uqLgXXvyEpn6M5H/TPRrfCwQjc= DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; c=nofws; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=mime-version:in-reply-to:references:date:message-id:subject:from:to :cc:content-type; b=rnhq6bsiO1lFanNxL4R9k9ehCL0ZqgfDzauzXbua/SaFlMe8p8D8NmJkPvwv2tjJ+X qBO4eHTiTgg+gneZh4L8i02t6e1z50+yXQIzKgkgdHvtxd/YalTYBhbh/s88Kfxw1vyw nZVLDCUjj4RXqrO5VBZEZZRgIVSAR3GJdXXhs= MIME-Version: 1.0 Received: by 10.231.13.197 with SMTP id d5mr2901730iba.6.1294949810499; Thu, 13 Jan 2011 12:16:50 -0800 (PST) Received: by 10.231.59.134 with HTTP; Thu, 13 Jan 2011 12:16:50 -0800 (PST) In-Reply-To: References: Date: Thu, 13 Jan 2011 21:16:50 +0100 Message-ID: From: Daniel Nebdal To: freebsd-current@freebsd.org Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Cc: David DEMELIER , Nils Holland , "C. P. Ghost" Subject: Re: why panic(9) ? X-BeenThere: freebsd-current@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Discussions about the use of FreeBSD-current List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 13 Jan 2011 20:45:34 -0000 On Wed, Jan 12, 2011 at 1:43 PM, Nils Holland wrote: > C. P. Ghost wrote: > >> As far as I know, Windows NT is a microkernel arch, and >> faulty drivers, often provided by external vendors would not >> bring that system (as much as we hate or despise its >> Windows OS personality that runs on top of it) to a complete halt. > > I don't know ... when Windows crashes (I'm no fan of it either, but anyway) > and you ask Microsoft about it, then it's most of the time an external > driver that is responsible. Graphics card driver seem to be the cause most > often, but other stuff as well. (...) > Greetings, > Nils a) NT isn't really a microkernel; most drivers run in kernelspace and can happily mess things up if they fail. b) Graphics drivers are actually one of the things they've fixed (well, re-fixed; this was also the case in 3.51) - from Vista and onwards they mostly live in userspace. (I've had the graphics driver crash on me a few times - it's restarted automatically, and all that happens is that the screen goes black for some seconds. It's kind of impressive.) More on topic, I can only agree with the majority - failing fast is a feature, both to mess things up as little as possible, and to make diagnostics and later fixing easier. -- Daniel Nebdal