Re: Debian should not modify the kernels!
On Sun, Sep 28, 2003 at 01:10:27PM +1000, Herbert Xu wrote:
> I do not believe that this patch has caused excessive grief for the
> benefits that it brings. In fact, conflicts between the Debian kernel
> source and random kernel patches floating around are a fact of life.
>
> For example, the grsecurity patch has had a history of conflicts with
> various patches in the Debian kernel source. Most of those patches that
> caused conflicts were in fact essential security fixes. You can review
> this for yourself by visiting to the BTS entry for the grsecurity
> package.
That has more to do with the fact that grsecurity is an intrusive pile of
garbage, splashed pretty much all over the tree (which, incidentally, is
a large part of reasons why it is unfit for upstream kernel).
For crying out loud, it's a half-megabyte monolitic patch. Even devfs
was slightly smaller when it had finally dripped into the tree. If
somebody wants to play with it - they'll have to either
a) split the damn thing into series of localized chunks and enjoy
relatively easy resolution of conflicts with other patches or
b) wear "I'm a sadomasochist and proud of it" T-shirt and leave
everybody else alone.
Look, it's that simple - authors of patch had chosen to be antisocial and
kept it a monolit; that makes it a second-class citizen as far as merges
are concerned. Less intrusive patches get precedence. End of story.
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