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Date: Sun, 12 Sep 2004 15:20:47 -0600 (MDT)
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To: phk@phk.freebsd.dk
From: "M. Warner Losh" <imp@bsdimp.com>
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cc: arch@freebsd.org
Subject: Re: [BIKESHED] Giving abort(2) a reason 
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In message: <61109.1095023635@critter.freebsd.dk>
            "Poul-Henning Kamp" <phk@phk.freebsd.dk> writes:
: In message <20040912.142552.83283958.imp@bsdimp.com>, "M. Warner Losh" writes:
: 
: >: Given that we are usually pretty stumped when we get to call abort(2)
: >: it needs to work without malloc or anything like it and varargs into
: >: the kernel is not at all in my future.
: >
: >Only in malloc.  Everywhere else, people have enough state to cope.
: >Do we really want to have another kernel API just to support malloc
: >failures?
: 
: Well, the problem is that practically nothing else works once malloc
: fails, and people seem to find the lack of visible explanation a
: problem.
: 
: syslog() or anything else using varargs is not going to work...

Wouldn't it be better to have a more generic 'Put this into dmesg'
thing that doesn't require malloc to work?  It seems silly to bloat
the kernel for only a malloc failure case...

Warner