FS#24259 - [kernel26] AUFS2 is against "The Arch Way"
Attached to Project:
Arch Linux
Opened by Jamie Nguyen (jnguyen) - Friday, 13 May 2011, 15:03 GMT
Last edited by Thomas Bächler (brain0) - Sunday, 03 July 2011, 21:12 GMT
Opened by Jamie Nguyen (jnguyen) - Friday, 13 May 2011, 15:03 GMT
Last edited by Thomas Bächler (brain0) - Sunday, 03 July 2011, 21:12 GMT
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Details
The Arch Linux kernel is currently patched with aufs2. This
is against "The Arch Way". Quotes:
"Arch provides non-patched, vanilla software; packages are offered from pure upstream sources, how the author originally intended it be distributed. Patching only occurs in extremely rare cases, to prevent severe breakage in the instance of version mismatches that may occur within a rolling release model." "Arch Linux defines simplicity as without unnecessary additions, modifications, or complications..." "clean, correct, simple code, rather than unnecessary patching" "Software patches are therefore kept to an absolute minimum; ideally, never." Judging from these quotes, either the aufs2 patches need to be removed, or the above quotes need to be modified. Not only is aufs2 an unneccessary modification, it is modification to the kernel itself which is the very heart of what makes Arch Linux a Linux distribution. I know there are people that use aufs2, but aufs2 should never have been in the kernel in the first place. It should be an AUR kernel and people that need it should build their own kernel instead, just like users that build kernel26-ck or kernel26-pf or kernel26-ccs. Those are patches that are _not_ mainline, and consequently they are in the AUR. I accept that this might be marked as "won't fix" and aufs2 users will vote against this, but one can't deny that it's contradictory to say "no unnecessary patching" but then to patch the Linux kernel. Don't worry, I don't plan to start a massive flamewar campaign (it's not that big a deal)... consider this as just a reminder that maybe we shouldn't forget the ideals that Arch Linux is built on, and if those ideals have changed (which I hope they haven't), then the Wiki should reflect this. |
This task depends upon
Allow me to retort: http://mailman.archlinux.org/pipermail/arch-dev-public/2011-January/019080.html
The patchs called "aufs2*" just only makes some functions visible for buildtime and runtime of external modules & There is no aufs2 code in these patchs. => There is no "aufs2" patch in kernel26 package. QED.
> I will skip the "philosophical" part.
I suppose the debate over whether the aufs2* patches count as patches is itself another philosophical debate :p . For the record, I still do count them as unnecessary modifications. From the ML link above, it seems that tpowa wanted aufs2 to be dropped and brain0 seemed indifferent (the two main kernel devs AFAIK). I don't know if they still have the same opinion.
Jamie, what you are doing is what I call "destructive criticism". You want something to be removed for ideological reasons, yet you provide no alternative solutions. And you do not seem to care for the reason why we actually have aufs2. Please do your research, then complain.
> Please do your research, then complain.
Hi Thomas, I tried my best not to be inflammatory, honest ;-) I do realise that the ISO requires aufs2. The mailing list thread I posted above I declare as my prior research. In hindsight, I should have mentioned this in the original bug report (if only my skills of foresight were as great as my skills of hindsight!). I apologise that I appeared to "not seem to care for the reason why we actually have aufs2", but that is simply not true.
Thomas wrote:
> yet you provide no alternative solutions
I believe you yourself provided a solution:
Thomas wrote:
> We could maintain an extra kernel only for the live CD if that is easier.
I would of course not always be so willing to suggest a solution that requires the developers to perform more work than they already are, especially considering this is a voluntary project done in free time for no money, but it was you yourself that suggested this solution :-) Perhaps you no longer consider that solution as viable, but I was unable to find any further public communication related to this.
[#1] http://podgorny.cz/moin/UnionFsFuse
Let me retort:
as per aufs webapge:
'Note: it becomes clear that "Aufs was rejected. Let's give it up."
According to Christoph Hellwig, linux rejects all union-type filesystems
but UnionMount.'
:: http://aufs.sourceforge.net/
Unfortunately the "kosher" approach is in no better condition:
'Union mounts require patches to the kernel, e2fsprogs, and util-linux.'
:: http://valerieaurora.org/union/
The last modification was nearly a year ago, and only support ext2, jffs2 and tmpfs.
So either approach seems to offer philosophical quandaries.
As for the practical aspect, I need to create a read-only overlay from multiple directories. The more generic, the simpler the approach, the better.
You wanted to remove the kernel patch of AUFS2, to be more "KISS rules" conform, well.
I thought firstly It was a temporary remove of aufs2 and aufs2-tool packages because the kernel was updated to 2.6.39.
I manage a french ArchLinux Live-CD community project... And now I can't simply build any working .iso. with the standard kernel26 package, and there is no more aufs2 aufs2-toom official packages...
I haven't worked on an alternative solution yet. Is there another simple solution to make AUFS2 works ?