Subject: Re: [PATCH] kill symbol_get & friends
From: Rusty Russell <rusty@rustcorp.com.au>
To: Christoph Hellwig <hch@lst.de>
Cc: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>, Andrew Morton <akpm@osdl.org>,
       adaplas@pol.net,
       lkml - Kernel Mailing List <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>,
       dwmw2@redhat.com
In-Reply-To: <20050112203136.GA3150@lst.de>
References: <20050112203136.GA3150@lst.de>
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Date: Thu, 13 Jan 2005 11:19:33 +1100
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On Wed, 2005-01-12 at 21:31 +0100, Christoph Hellwig wrote:
> Rusty introduced symbol_get as a replacement for inter_module_get, but
> it doesn't really solved the underlying problem.

Sorry, Christoph, I must be particularly obtuse today.

If you don't hold a reference, then yes, the module can go away.  This
hasn't been a huge problem for users in the past.

The lack of users is because, firstly, dynamic dependencies are less
common than static ones, and secondly because the remaining inter-module
users (AGP and mtd) have not been converted.  Patches have been sent
several times, but maintainers are distracted, it seems.  I *will* run
out of patience and push those patches which take away intermodule.c one
day (hint, hint!).

For optional module dependencies, weak symbols can be used, but there
seems to be a desire for genuine dynamic dependencies.  If you can get
rid of those, I'll apply your patch in a second!

Cheers,
Rusty.
-- 
A bad analogy is like a leaky screwdriver -- Richard Braakman

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