der Mouse  <mouse@Rodents.Montreal.QC.CA> writes:
> Nevertheless, uniformity of
> semantics with other syscalls (especially socketpair(), it seems to me)
> and uniformity of implementation with almost all other syscalls strike
> me as reasons enough to do the change.

On the other side of this:

* some, perhaps many, other UNIXes still do it like we do (and some
even list EFAULT in the pipe() error returns).

* fixing it wastes both kernel code space and pipe() execution cycles.
granted, not much of either, but some of each.

* it's worked this way for how many years, why "fix" it?  8-)



cgd
-- 
Chris Demetriou - cgd@netbsd.org - http://www.netbsd.org/People/Pages/cgd.html
Disclaimer: Not speaking for NetBSD, just expressing my own opinion.