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Re: [PATCH] locks: rename file-private locks to file-description locks
- From: Rich Felker <dalias at libc dot org>
- To: Theodore Ts'o <tytso at mit dot edu>, "Michael Kerrisk (man-pages)" <mtk dot manpages at gmail dot com>, Jeff Layton <jlayton at redhat dot com>, linux-fsdevel at vger dot kernel dot org, linux-kernel at vger dot kernel dot org, samba-technical at lists dot samba dot org, Ganesha NFS List <nfs-ganesha-devel at lists dot sourceforge dot net>, Carlos O'Donell <carlos at redhat dot com>, libc-alpha <libc-alpha at sourceware dot org>, "Stefan (metze) Metzmacher" <metze at samba dot org>, Christoph Hellwig <hch at infradead dot org>
- Date: Mon, 21 Apr 2014 14:51:44 -0400
- Subject: Re: [PATCH] locks: rename file-private locks to file-description locks
- Authentication-results: sourceware.org; auth=none
- References: <1398087935-14001-1-git-send-email-jlayton at redhat dot com> <20140421140246 dot GB26358 at brightrain dot aerifal dot cx> <535529FA dot 8070709 at gmail dot com> <20140421161004 dot GC26358 at brightrain dot aerifal dot cx> <5355644C dot 7000801 at gmail dot com> <20140421184841 dot GA5105 at thunk dot org>
On Mon, Apr 21, 2014 at 02:48:41PM -0400, Theodore Ts'o wrote:
> On Mon, Apr 21, 2014 at 08:32:44PM +0200, Michael Kerrisk (man-pages) wrote:
> > So, can you *please* answer this question: what do you call (i.e.,
> > what everyday technical language term do use for) the thing
> > that sits between a file descriptor and an i-node?
> >
> > (Please don't say 'struct file' -- that is not is an implementation
> > detail, and does not qualify as the kind of term that I could use
> > when documenting this feature in man pages.)
>
> At least in a few places, if you are going to use "file description",
> could you at least add a parenthetical comment:
>
> (commonly called a "struct file" by Linux kernel developers)
>
> Yes, it's an implementation detail, but it's one that's been around
> for over two decades, and IMHO highly unlikely to change in the
> future. So if you really want to use the POSIX terminology, it would
> probably be a good idea to also use the term of art which is in common
> use by the kernel developers, and I suspect has leaked out beyond
> that.
I don't think "struct file" has any meaning to any userspace
developers, and as such doesn't belong in documentation for userspace
programming. It's an implementation detail of the kernel that
userspace developers have no need to be aware of. There's already
enough leakage of broken kernel internals (e.g. tid vs pid vs tgid)
into userspace documentation that's immensely confusing for new
developers without adding more of it.
Rich