On Wed, 25 May 2005, Crispin Cowan wrote: > >Note: out of tree kernel code does not count for anything. It's not > >really part of the Linux kernel. Mainline maintainers don't care about it > >and should not be expected to. If you want them to care, for people to > >fix bugs in it for free, and for more people to use it, then submit the > >module for upstream inclusion. It seems rather strange that you haven't. > > > I find this to be a very odd perspective. I find it odd that you find it odd :-) > I think of LSM as an API. Its purpose is precisely to provide a layer of > abstraction so that kernel maintainers do *not* have to maintain the > modules. Linus said *very explicitly* that he did not want to maintain > security modules, and that was the point of LSM. He wanted to avoid deciding on the "correct" access control model: http://mail.wirex.com/pipermail/linux-security-module/2001-April/0005.html (I would argue that his "truly generic" requirement was fulfilled by SELinux). > I know of a large number of LSM modules in development all over the > place, and discounting them just because they have not been imposed on > the kernel community seems arbitrary. So this "does not count" stuff > sounds like a contrivance to me. This is fundamentally how Linux kernel development works. If you develop code off in a corner and don't submit it to mainline, it's not part of the mainline kernel. Exactly like how this email is not part of Wikipedia. > I had *assumed* that the Linux kernel community was not interested in > maintaining and bugfixing my module, and so I deliberately avoided > submitting it as a courtesy. That's a common misperception. By getting code included upstream, the kernel developers are taking some responsibility for your code. If they change something which affects your code, they'll then usually update your code at the same time. More people will use it. You'll get more bug reports and patches. > I similarly do not submit my applications for mainline inclusion just > because they use some Linux syscalls. Please also refrain from submitting your keyboard and mouse, thanks. > However, if mainstream kernel inclusion is required to "count" as a > user, then I'm happy to do that. The module code is GPL anyway, and > we'll start looking at what it will take to push it to mainstream. This > seems like a weird requirement to me, but if it is what's required, I > don't have a problem with it. Great. - James -- James Morris <jmorris@private>
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