Re: Yes, we have bugs

[Mike Hommey <mh@glandium.org>]

On Wed, Apr 15, 2009 at 11:02:16PM +0200, Luca Niccoli wrote:
> 2009/4/15 David Nusinow <david@gravitypulls.net>:
> 
> > Please see the reply I just posted to the bug for a partial explanation of
> > why using hal is important for more than just hotplugging. I'll be writing
> > up a more complete explanation soon.
> 
> I understand that hal fills an important gap in linux; I think that
> from an architectural point of view, an abstraction layer is the way
> to go.
> The problem is that, in my experience, hal is a horrible piece of
> software. It makes my (computing) life worse. Its obscure, erratic
> behaviour and the lack of documentation make me feel like when I was
> using windows 98. (ok, not *that* bad, but kind of)
> I am willing to pay the price to avoid it as long as possible
> (hopefully it will get better, or replaced, in the future), and since
> it looks like it's possible ATM, I would really be happy if X did not
> depend on that.
> (I see you've written that probably X dependency on hal will be
> demoted, I appreciate.)
> 
> 2009/4/15 Tollef Fog Heen <tfheen@err.no>:
> 
> > A machine without USB or PCI is not a particularly common sight those
> > days.  Heck, even machines without SATA are becoming uncommon.
> 
> I should have stated more clearly that I meant hot plugging for X.
> I hotplug my USB disks since when hal didn't exist.
> I never hot plugged a SATA disk, but I don't think you need hal to do that.
> Anyway, you are being PC-centric. Debian is getting on many low power
> devices that often don't have USB, nor PCI, nor SATA, though they have
> a graphical interface (e.g. mobile phones).
> And a bloat like hal hurts even more there.

Maybe you missed the part where X without hal is actually the bloat.
See http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?msg=91;bug=515214

Mike