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Subject: Re: [Y2038][time namespaces] Question regarding CLOCK_REALTIME
 support plans in Linux time namespaces
To:     Thomas Gleixner <tglx@linutronix.de>,
        Zack Weinberg <zackw@panix.com>, Cyril Hrubis <chrubis@suse.cz>
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        GNU C Library <libc-alpha@sourceware.org>,
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From:   Carlos O'Donell <carlos@redhat.com>
Organization: Red Hat
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Date:   Thu, 5 Nov 2020 12:25:09 -0500
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On 10/30/20 9:38 PM, Thomas Gleixner wrote:
> Coming back to your test coverage argument. I really don't see a problem
> with the requirement of having qemu installed in order to run 'make
> check'.

Cost. It's is cheaper and easier to maintain and deploy containers.

A full VM requires maintaining and updating images, and kernel builds
independent of what the developer is using for their development system.
This goes out of date quickly and needs a lot of resources to maintain.

When you get away from a VM you can then engage the entire developer
community to just run your userspace testing on *their* hardware on *their*
kernels. So I can go to Arm, Intel, AMD, IBM, SUSE, Red Hat, etc. and say:
"All you need to do is run 'make check' and the tests will verify your
hardware and kernel are working correctly." Those developers don't want their
system clocks adjusted during testing, and they are as busy as you and I are.

Container registries and tooling are much lighter weight and support layering
changes on top of base images in ways which allow different testing scenarios.
I don't have any desire to build a similar ecosystem for VM images or wait for
VM+container (kata) tooling to grow up.

If kata grows up quickly perhaps this entire problem becomes solved, but until
then I continue to have a testing need for a distinct CLOCK_REALTIME in a
time namespace (and it need not be unconditional, if I have to engage magic
then I'm happy to do that).

> If you can't ask that from your contributors, then asking me to provide
> you a namespace magic is just hillarious. The contributor who refuses to
> install qemu will also insist to run on some last century kernel which
> does not even know about name spaces at all.

I don't disagree with you, it is *absolutely* a VM tooling issue, and that
containers are easier to maintain, and deploy. With namespaces I can build
glibc, a sysroot, and run it in isolation very quickly.

Just so I understand, let me reiterate your position:

* Adding CLOCK_REALTIME to the kernel is a lot of work given the expected
  guarantees for a local system.

* CLOCK_REALTIME is an expensive resource to maintain, even more expensive
  than other resources where the kernel can balance their usage.

* On balance it would be better to use vm or vm+containers e.g. kata as a
  solution to having CLOCK_REALTIME distinct in the container.
 Thanks for your feedback.

-- 
Cheers,
Carlos.