kernel pre-emption and software speech

[Samuel Thibault]

Michael Whapples, le Thu 05 Oct 2006 18:23:02 +0100, a écrit :
> Samuel Thibault writes:
> 
> > Michael Whapples, le Wed 04 Oct 2006 22:47:11 +0100, a écrit :
> >> In some cases we have to accept less than perfect code. By this I mean that 
> >> it may function correctly with out no problems, but may need tidying up and 
> >> other techniques may be more effecient, but if it is the only software that 
> >> offers those functions then you should accept for what it gives, unless you 
> >> are prepared to sort it out. Just leaving it definitely doesn't resolve the 
> >> issues.
> > 
> > I'm sorry, but that's not how things work with Linux. The Reiser4 code
> > has been waiting for a long time for instance, and won't be merged
> > unless the required cleaning up happens.
> In your example there are alternatives, can you name another system that 
> gives me speech from the moment the OS takes control of the computer, to the 
> moment it turns off?

Kernel hackers just won't take this as a reason for including code that
they consider not clean enough.

> >> The other thing is that speakup seems to be good enough for some distros to 
> >> include speakup in the default kernel and some others have it as an 
> >> optional kernel but still in the main distro, and are they less stable than 
> >> others? (these include slackware, gentoo, grml). I always found it strange 
> >> that Redhat said how good speakup is, but never had it included on the main 
> >> distro media.
> > 
> > The problem is not a stability problem, but a code correctness / style
> > / ... You may have code that works, but if it is unmaintainable, some
> > day it won't work any more.
> OK maybe it is to do with maintaining code, but still there is the question 
> of distros using speakup, surely they should be having problems or likely 
> to have problems sometime?

Yes, I guess they are having troubles (and cope with them, since they
are faced to their users, while kernel hackers aren't).

Samuel