Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id ; Fri, 30 Nov 2001 12:16:01 -0500 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id ; Fri, 30 Nov 2001 12:15:51 -0500 Received: from babsi.intermeta.de ([212.34.181.3]:43538 "EHLO mail.intermeta.de") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id ; Fri, 30 Nov 2001 12:15:34 -0500 Subject: Re: Coding style - a non-issue From: Henning Schmiedehausen To: Jeff Garzik Cc: Larry McVoy , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org In-Reply-To: <3C07B820.4108246F@mandrakesoft.com> In-Reply-To:

<20011128162317.B23210@work.bitmover.com> <9u7lb0$8t9$1@forge.intermeta.de> <20011130072634.E14710@work.bitmover.com> <1007138360.6656.27.camel@forge> <3C07B820.4108246F@mandrakesoft.com> Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Evolution/0.99.2 (Preview Release) Date: 30 Nov 2001 18:15:28 +0100 Message-Id: <1007140529.6655.37.camel@forge> Mime-Version: 1.0 Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org On Fri, 2001-11-30 at 17:47, Jeff Garzik wrote: Hi, > The security community has shown us time and again that public shaming > is often the only way to motivate vendors into fixing security > problems. Yes, even BSD security guys do this :) > > A "Top 10 ugliest Linux kernel drivers" list would probably provide > similar motivation. A security issue is an universal accepted problem that most of the time has a reason and a solution. Coding style, however, is a very personal thing that start with "shall we use TABs or not? (Jakarta: No. Linux: Yes ...) and goes on to "Is a preprocessor macro a good thing or not" until variable names (Al Viro: Names with more than five letters suck. :-) Java: Non-selfdescriptive names suck. Microsoft: Non-hungarian names suck) and so on. And you really want to judge code just because someone likes to wrap code in preprocessor macros or use UPPERCASE variable names? Come on. That's a _fundamental_ different issue than dipping vendors in their own shit if they messed up and their box/program has a security issue. Code that you consider ugly as hell may be seen as "easily understandable and maintainable" by the author. If it works and has no bugs, so what? Just because it is hard for you and me to understand (cf. "mindboggling unwind routines in the NTFS" (I thing Jeff Merkey stated it like this). It still seems to work quite well. Are you willing to judge "ugliness" of kernel drivers? What is ugly? Are Donald Beckers' drivers ugly just because they use (at least on 2.2) their own pci helper library? Is the aic7xxx driver ugly because it needs libdb ? Or is ugly defined as "Larry and Al don't like them"? :-) Flaming about coding style is about as pointless as flaming someone because he supports another sports team. There is no universal accepted coding style. Not even in C. Regards Henning -- Dipl.-Inf. (Univ.) Henning P. Schmiedehausen -- Geschaeftsfuehrer INTERMETA - Gesellschaft fuer Mehrwertdienste mbH hps@intermeta.de Am Schwabachgrund 22 Fon.: 09131 / 50654-0 info@intermeta.de D-91054 Buckenhof Fax.: 09131 / 50654-20 - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/