> > Could some of the changes in the new linux device drivers have
> > introduced this same race condition?
>
> What device driver changes are you talking about? Unless you
> are using OSKit-Mach instead of GNUmach, nothing about the device
> drivers has changed
What I meant was the change from Linux 2.0 series ext2 code to the
Linux 2.2 series code.
> Moreover, the fundamental design and implementation of things like
> synchronization issues in filesystems are vastly different in
> the Hurd than in the Linux kernel. It is certainly the case that there
> might be a bug of a broadly similar character in the Hurd, but for
> a thing like this a Linux implementation detail is wholly unrelated
> to how the Hurd does things.
>
[...]
> But to draw a direct parallel between some particular bug fix in
> the Linux buffer cache infrastructure and what is going on in the
> Hurd, is straight out of left field.
>
I realize this. However, since I was under the impression that your
implementation of the newer ext2 file system coding was based in large
part on the Linux implementation, I thought that perhaps a similar
synchronization bug might be present in the Hurd code. It doesn't seem
too unbelievable that the corresponding fix to the Linux problem might
suggest a similar area to be checked in the Hurd code. Consequently, I
suggested that pokel might be a likely candidate.
> I may never comprehend why people find it necessary to use uuencode or
> base64-encoded attachments to send a few hundred lines of text. The
> uuencoding is nearly twice the size of the actual patch, and I have
> to go out of my way to read it. I did go out of my way and read
> it, just to make sure it was the sort of thing I thought it was. This
> is a whole layer of implementation abstraction where Linux and the Hurd
> share just about nothing at all.
>
I certainly appreciate you taking the time. Unfortunately, I am imprisoned
within a Microsoft network that insists on UUencoding attachments. The other
alternative would be MIME encoding, which pisses even more people off.
In the future I will be careful to cut and paste such attachments into the
text of the message so as not to waste readers' time. Please note that a
decent mail program, such as mutt, will allow you to view such attachments
with two keypresses.
Best regards,
-Brent