4 ms·

The Case of the Supersized Shebang: Kernel Regression from a Series of Errors

• mncharity 8y ago
  > And yes, it's sad that people apparently had cases that depended on this odd behavior, [Linus] That strikes my ear as very odd. I suggest twenty years ago, perl taking devops by storm, that sentiment would have been nuts. So what's changed? An increased emphasis on security (so a characterization of "corrupt" vs "truncated"). A shift in development focus away from shell level. What else? So a preference now for say a better foundation, better low-level glue for other tooling (where the action is), "crippled but dependably strict". Over say more usable, shell as a hands-on abstraction level, "here's a workaround for yet another bit of unix brokenness so you can better build with it". Curious. That's a fun aspect of history we don't teach well. All the things, which if you were dropped back in time, you'd do a double-take of "Wait, WAT?!?"