In <20000116100820.B5427@metastasis.f00f.org> Chris Wedgwood (cw@f00f.org) wrote:
> AlanC > /proc/sys/kern/max_pid ?
>> I do not think that would be meaningful.
>> A new distribution comes with recompiled applications.
> Which one hopes would support the full 32-bit range of pids
It's not that hard. You should recompile only applications with IPC usage.
>> People installing things themselves can choose between
>> recompiling the applications or configuring with CONFIG_15BIT_PID.
> Most people cannot recompile a kernel, my guess is less than 10% of
> linux installations use a kernel other than what the vendor shipped.
If they are using ancient programs they can recompile kernel for sure :-)
>> If the default is to use 31 bits instead of 15 bits, then I cannot
>> see any need for dynamically adjusting max_pid.
> Sure -- for now we could have the default as 32767 -- but I see no
> reason why a sysctl shouldn't exist for those who want to change it.
Hmm. Now I can understood Andries :-(( It was never worked before and will
not work here. Peoples are LAZY. Program authors are lazy as well. So they
WILL NOT fix programs if they are works "by default". THE ONLY way to go is
to make default max_pid > 32767 (8323071 or 4161535 perhaps to help make
clusters). Then old programs will be broken and will be recompiled. If default
will not break them they'll not be recompiled and fixed forever.
>> (And I would prefer things to be right by default, not that we
>> all have to add stuff to our rc scripts with
>> echo 2147483647 > /proc/sys/kern/max_pid
>> or so. Before you know it this will grow into an entire industry,
>> with scripts trying to determine whether some old ipc using stuff
>> still exists, and to use an appropriate echo.)
> If we fix it now -- allow >32k PIDs for those who want it but leave
> it to default as is, then within a year or two, most applications
> that will break will have been spotted at fixed by people who will
> tweak this sysctl to a larger value.
No. It will not happen. If default will not be >32767 then even 10 years
later we'll have "developers" who will be asking "How so ? PIDs > 32767 are
suddenly allowed ? We did not hear anything about this :-(". Latest version
of Adobe Acrobat are still libc5-based, for example :-/
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Sun Jan 23 2000 - 21:00:13 EST