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Message-ID: <500EE977.70205@purdue.edu>
Date: Tue, 24 Jul 2012 14:29:11 -0400
From: Gregor Richards <gr@...due.edu>
To: musl@...ts.openwall.com
Subject: Re: [PATCH 9/10] GLIBC ABI patches

On 07/24/12 14:23, Igmar Palsenberg wrote:
>
>>>>> Just nonsense aliases GNU uses...
>>>>> Needed for ABI compatability.
>>>> could we mark them as such? at least with a comment.
>>>> I really like that musl is so readable. This patch adds some obfuscation that can simply be countered by marking it as "ok this is only here for reason X."
>>> I would like to see those options behind a compile time option : It bloats musl with in many cases unneeded code. I test my compiles with musl, and I like it lean and mean.
>> These are just aliases, not code. There's no bloat there.
>>
>> One of the advantages of musl is its LACK of configurability: If you have “musl”, you know what precisely you're getting.
>>
>> With valediction,
>> - Gregor Richards
>>
> While I agree with the above, I still have a few objections :
>
> - We don't want glibc compatibility. We want a good libc.
> - That we even need those aliases is usually a case of bad automake / autoconf / bad feature detection.
>
> Why bloat code with stuff to provide glibc compatibility ?
>
>
> 	Igmar

“That we even need those aliases is usually a case of bad automake / 
autoconf / bad feature detection”

These are for ABI compatibility, not API compatibility. Nobody using 
glibc uses these symbols intentionally, they are renamed and aliased by 
the library. Last I checked, musl is shockingly close to ABI 
compatibility with glibc, and like it or not, that's a valuable feature. 
If you don't like the “bloat” of it, you'll have to dig out a lot of the 
existing aliases too.

With valediction,
  - Gregor Richards

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