Date: Tue, 6 Sep 2011 12:54:05 +0200 From: "K. Macy" <kmacy@freebsd.org> To: Arnaud Lacombe <lacombar@gmail.com> Cc: freebsd-net@freebsd.org Subject: Re: No IPFW binary compat across versions ? Message-ID: <CAHM0Q_MEmPiFtCRFW%2B-NNZLUHfr5txPzi1TDpWGuba0ncX9Ung@mail.gmail.com> In-Reply-To: <CACqU3MVvgftNMrGnoPaXB-MwyDqMc4jLd3qPWj9YEYdN3fJyyA@mail.gmail.com> References: <CACqU3MXVLjJvF6RGqpC-hvnbTgb-uNC7V0AP0ofXDRs4n7Nmtg@mail.gmail.com> <CAHM0Q_N0UZu0tvqL6TiCOmJfHAt4sBtWM1abE%2BuJPS9ubARrfg@mail.gmail.com> <CACqU3MUjjYXabmYZtivDQKJ2v6HcWyo1_3AuTyyjN1o5%2BV6hhg@mail.gmail.com> <CACqU3MVvgftNMrGnoPaXB-MwyDqMc4jLd3qPWj9YEYdN3fJyyA@mail.gmail.com>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
On Mon, Sep 5, 2011 at 11:44 PM, Arnaud Lacombe <lacombar@gmail.com> wrote: > Hi, > > On Mon, Sep 5, 2011 at 4:18 PM, Arnaud Lacombe <lacombar@gmail.com> wrote: >> Hi, >> >> On Mon, Sep 5, 2011 at 3:14 PM, K. Macy <kmacy@freebsd.org> wrote: >>> -STABLE only implies that the ABI does not change during that release >>> line. It makes no guarantees when moving from one branch to the next. >>> >> IIUC, FreeBSD does not provide binary backward compatibility between >> version at all, is that it ? >> > I guess the answer is "NO", on the same system: > Netstat depends on specific structures in kernel memory, ipfw depends on specific ioctls whose arguments may vary. Netstat in particular breaks on head on a quasi daily basis because of changes to networking structures. STABLE implies STABLE for things that depend on libc and are not dependent on obscure kernel interfaces. There is some work going on (off and on) to decouple netstat from kvm which would fix that. N-1 compatibility for ipfw is probably possible, anything more than that is probably infeasible from an interface tracking standpoint.
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?CAHM0Q_MEmPiFtCRFW%2B-NNZLUHfr5txPzi1TDpWGuba0ncX9Ung>