4 ms·

> Linux has a reputation for Not Invented Here (NIH) syndrome, and these licensing issues certainly contribute to that I don't think the author understands wit

by ink_13 8y ago

> Linux has a reputation for Not Invented Here (NIH) syndrome, and these licensing issues certainly contribute to that I don't think the author understands with NIH means in practise, and this completely misplaces the blame. It's not as though the kernel team was completely unwilling to consider porting ZFS or DTrace, it's that for legal reasons they were unable.

lelf 8y ago
No (unfortunately) it's NIH and nothing more. https://youtu.be/TgmA48fILq8?t=4266 https://youtu.be/TgmA48fILq8?t=4266 https://marc.info/?l=linux-kernel&m=154714516832389&w=2 https://marc.info/?l=linux-kernel&m=154714516832389&w=2
- simcop2387 8y ago
  You've also missed what was said on the mailing list message. Sun specifically made a new license to make it legally impossible to include DTrace and ZFS (and other things) into a GPL licensed project. That's a huge difference to what NIH means, which is that just because I didn't make it, I'm not going to use it, I'll make my own version instead. They couldn't ever use the original version of things because they're legally bound to not do so. The kernel has had a long standing policy of not keeping APIs that either they or userspace aren't using to reduce their burden and the case of keeping that API just for ZFS since literally nothing else in the kernel was using it wasn't a good enough argument to keep it. ZFS on Linux has now worked around the removal of the API.
  - pmoriarty 8y ago
    "ZFS on Linux has now worked around the removal of the API." I'm just curious: how did they do that?
    - Arnavion 8y ago
      https://github.com/zfsonlinux/zfs/commit/0c593296e98e3ac95f14704e4cee6cedb2134990 https://github.com/zfsonlinux/zfs/commit/0c593296e98e3ac95f1... + https://github.com/zfsonlinux/zfs/commit/26a856594f731db62446cf537659f9360261fe97 https://github.com/zfsonlinux/zfs/commit/26a856594f731db6244...
      - yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
        > Linux 5.0 compat: Disable vector instructions on 5.0+ kernels Isn't that going to kill performance?
        simcop2387 8y ago
        Probably not going to be very noticeable, most of the cost in calculating the checksums is in IO, but it will mean that there's a lower ceiling on total possible performance. That also assumes though that the cost for handling the vector instructions in-kernel isn't higher than doing it without them. I believe that was part of the reason that the kernel started removing this from within drivers and other parts to begin with, the cost of saving all the floating point registers and other state is actually surprisingly expensive. So it may be a complete wash in the end anyway. If the kernel is no longer having to worry about saving those registers it can mean that the userspace doesn't pay that extra cost and now your compute ability is better for it without seriously affecting any of the rest of the system.
- grumpydba 8y ago
  Linux guys did not invent xfs or jfs, yet they happily merged it. No NIH here. It is pretty silly to talk about that. If zfs license was compatible, they would have done the same.
bsder 8y ago
The author also points out that "epoll" is a broken "kqueue". There are many other examples of this. For example, because of the broken way Linux did file locking, NFS was terribly broken on Linux for a very long time. Linux is popular, but that doesn't always make it correct.
- pjmlp 8y ago
  Sadly the way it has grown, many take Linuxisms as how every UNIX does it.
cryptonector 8y ago
The SystemTap people did not even try to copy any part of DTrace. Now the eBPF stuff is... pretty much a copy of the best parts of DTrace. So, yeah, it was NIH.

by ink_13 8y ago

lelf 8y ago

No (unfortunately) it's NIH and nothing more. https://youtu.be/TgmA48fILq8?t=4266 https://youtu.be/TgmA48fILq8?t=4266 https://marc.info/?l=linux-kernel&m=154714516832389&w=2 https://marc.info/?l=linux-kernel&m=154714516832389&w=2

simcop2387 8y ago
You've also missed what was said on the mailing list message. Sun specifically made a new license to make it legally impossible to include DTrace and ZFS (and other things) into a GPL licensed project. That's a huge difference to what NIH means, which is that just because I didn't make it, I'm not going to use it, I'll make my own version instead. They couldn't ever use the original version of things because they're legally bound to not do so. The kernel has had a long standing policy of not keeping APIs that either they or userspace aren't using to reduce their burden and the case of keeping that API just for ZFS since literally nothing else in the kernel was using it wasn't a good enough argument to keep it. ZFS on Linux has now worked around the removal of the API.
- pmoriarty 8y ago
  "ZFS on Linux has now worked around the removal of the API." I'm just curious: how did they do that?
  - Arnavion 8y ago
    https://github.com/zfsonlinux/zfs/commit/0c593296e98e3ac95f14704e4cee6cedb2134990 https://github.com/zfsonlinux/zfs/commit/0c593296e98e3ac95f1... + https://github.com/zfsonlinux/zfs/commit/26a856594f731db62446cf537659f9360261fe97 https://github.com/zfsonlinux/zfs/commit/26a856594f731db6244...
    - yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
      > Linux 5.0 compat: Disable vector instructions on 5.0+ kernels Isn't that going to kill performance?
      - simcop2387 8y ago
        Probably not going to be very noticeable, most of the cost in calculating the checksums is in IO, but it will mean that there's a lower ceiling on total possible performance. That also assumes though that the cost for handling the vector instructions in-kernel isn't higher than doing it without them. I believe that was part of the reason that the kernel started removing this from within drivers and other parts to begin with, the cost of saving all the floating point registers and other state is actually surprisingly expensive. So it may be a complete wash in the end anyway. If the kernel is no longer having to worry about saving those registers it can mean that the userspace doesn't pay that extra cost and now your compute ability is better for it without seriously affecting any of the rest of the system.
grumpydba 8y ago
Linux guys did not invent xfs or jfs, yet they happily merged it. No NIH here. It is pretty silly to talk about that. If zfs license was compatible, they would have done the same.

bsder 8y ago

The author also points out that "epoll" is a broken "kqueue". There are many other examples of this. For example, because of the broken way Linux did file locking, NFS was terribly broken on Linux for a very long time. Linux is popular, but that doesn't always make it correct.

pjmlp 8y ago
Sadly the way it has grown, many take Linuxisms as how every UNIX does it.

cryptonector 8y ago

The SystemTap people did not even try to copy any part of DTrace. Now the eBPF stuff is... pretty much a copy of the best parts of DTrace. So, yeah, it was NIH.