From owner-freebsd-hackers Thu Jun 4 14:02:56 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id OAA06561 for freebsd-hackers-outgoing; Thu, 4 Jun 1998 14:02:56 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from dyson.iquest.net (dyson.iquest.net [198.70.144.127]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id OAA06304; Thu, 4 Jun 1998 14:01:31 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from toor@dyson.iquest.net) Received: (from root@localhost) by dyson.iquest.net (8.8.8/8.8.8) id QAA00518; Thu, 4 Jun 1998 16:01:14 -0500 (EST) (envelope-from toor) Message-Id: <199806042101.QAA00518@dyson.iquest.net> Subject: Re: kernfs/procfs questions... In-Reply-To: <199806041927.NAA03558@mt.sri.com> from Nate Williams at "Jun 4, 98 01:27:47 pm" To: nate@mt.sri.com (Nate Williams) Date: Thu, 4 Jun 1998 16:01:13 -0500 (EST) Cc: dyson@FreeBSD.ORG, nate@mt.sri.com, hackers@FreeBSD.ORG From: "John S. Dyson" Reply-To: dyson@FreeBSD.ORG X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL38 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG Nate Williams said: > > > > I disagree for easily one simple reason: sysctl affords an internal > > documentation scheme that isn't a hack. > > Only to a developer, not to a user. Here's some of your log messages > for sysctl's that mean something to you, but don't mean a thing to a > normal user. > > vm_param.h > vm.pageout_algorithm=???? > > vm_zone.c > Add exposure of some vm_zone allocation stats by sysctl. > > And these would be, and would help me by? Where should they be > documented for the user? man 9 tuning? Are they specific to the zone > allocation? > > I'm not saying that kernfs would make this easier, but if I had a tuning > program that allowed me to tune it (man 8 vmtune), then it would be > *better* documented. Maybe I'm not screaming so much for the > implementation, but the interface and the way that new sysctl are added > w/out any regard to documentation/accessing them. :( > You aren't arguing /kernfs vs. sysctl here (other than kernfs is terminally broken regarding the ability of internal documentation being exposed through the interface.) Sysctl can afford a mechanism for exposing the info, and there is even a slot in the existing internal implementation. It might not be exposed yet, but at least it is not as terminally broken as /kernfs is. Note that I have been in the process of adding messages to my local tree over the last few weeks. You can complain that I haven't documented things well, but Nate, you are very capable of helping with the problem. -- John | Never try to teach a pig to sing, dyson@freebsd.org | it just makes you look stupid, jdyson@nc.com | and it irritates the pig. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-hackers" in the body of the message