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From: "H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@zytor.com>
Subject: Re: Where is it written?
Date: 10 Nov 2000 17:33:34 -0800
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Followup to:  <11198.973906134@ocs3.ocs-net>
By author:    Keith Owens <kaos@ocs.com.au>
In newsgroup: linux.dev.kernel
>
> On 10 Nov 2000 17:10:00 -0800, 
> "H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@zytor.com> wrote:
> >We can mess with the ABI, but it requires a wholescale rev of the
> >entire system.
> 
> AFAICT, there is nothing stopping us from redoing the kernel ABI to
> pass the first few parameters between kernel functions in registers.
> As long as the syscall interface is unchanged, that ABI change will
> only break binary modules (care_factor == 0).  The ABI type would need
> to be added to the symbol version prefix, trivial.
> 

Yes, the kernel is very different; however, the big win for an ABI
change is in user space.

AFAIK, I think Linus tried this once, but ran into bugs in gcc.  We
might very well try again in 2.5.

	-hpa
-- 
<hpa@transmeta.com> at work, <hpa@zytor.com> in private!
"Unix gives you enough rope to shoot yourself in the foot."
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