From owner-freebsd-hackers  Sat Nov  1 00:04:56 1997
Return-Path: <owner-freebsd-hackers>
Received: (from root@localhost)
          by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) id AAA06839
          for hackers-outgoing; Sat, 1 Nov 1997 00:04:56 -0800 (PST)
          (envelope-from owner-freebsd-hackers)
Received: from word.smith.net.au (word.smith.net.au [202.0.75.3])
          by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) with ESMTP id AAA06833
          for <hackers@FreeBSD.ORG>; Sat, 1 Nov 1997 00:04:51 -0800 (PST)
          (envelope-from mike@word.smith.net.au)
Received: from word.smith.net.au (localhost.smith.net.au [127.0.0.1])
	by word.smith.net.au (8.8.7/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA00611;
	Sat, 1 Nov 1997 18:29:52 +1030 (CST)
Message-Id: <199711010759.SAA00611@word.smith.net.au>
X-Mailer: exmh version 2.0zeta 7/24/97
To: Jun-ichiro itojun Itoh <itojun@itojun.org>
cc: Mike Smith <mike@smith.net.au>, Terry Lambert <tlambert@primenet.com>,
        jamil@trojanhorse.ml.org (Jamil J. Weatherbee), hackers@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: BIOS information preservation (was Re: >64MB) 
In-reply-to: Your message of "Sat, 01 Nov 1997 14:21:44 +0900."
             <807.878361704@coconut.itojun.org> 
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Date: Sat, 01 Nov 1997 18:29:51 +1030
From: Mike Smith <mike@smith.net.au>
Sender: owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG
X-Loop: FreeBSD.org
Precedence: bulk

> 
> >Anyone likely to complain if I add a new datastructure to i386/bios.c and 
> >start populating it with stuff that various parts of the system glean 
> >about the BIOS environment?  Or should I be using a procedural lookup 
> >interface for this?
> >eg. either:
> >	foo = i386biosinfo->bios_memsize;
> >or
> >	error = i386biosinfo("memsize", &foo)
> >??
...
> 	I like the prior one better since the spelling mistake can be
> 	found by the compiler.  In the latter case spelling mistake like
> 	i386biosinfo("memsizee", &foo) can be detected only in runtime.

Ok, so it takes the developer a few more minutes.  OTOH, it means that 
things can be dynamically added without having to change the data 
structure.

It's a little academic just at the moment, as the task I wanted it to 
solve doesn't appear to do what I wanted.  I'll keep it on the back 
burner for next time though.

mike