Subject: Re: codeset recoding engine
To: None <M.Drochner@fz-juelich.de>
From: Jaromir Dolecek <dolecek@ics.muni.cz>
List: tech-kern
Date: 11/12/1999 22:45:52
Matthias Drochner wrote:
> Wouldn't it be possible to pass the filename information to userland
> without loss and do the conversion there, controlled by the user's
> locale settings? Not that I expect strangers to mount my windows
> disks (if I only had any:-) anytime soon, but it would keep bloat out
> of the kernel.

Note it would be much less of bloat to do it in kernel than doing
it in userland - in kernel, the recoding structures can be shared
via pointers; in userland, each process would have to read it into its
own address space.

> With UTF8, this could even work without changes to the system interface.
> (Correct me if I'm wrong!)

Only if ALL pathnames would be in UTF8.

> In any case, it would look strange if we had two code subsystems for
> more or less similar tasks. So if it shows that in-kernel filename
> translation is really necessary, we should try to get this together.

I think it IS necessary. Doing it in userland costs more
cycles and would waste much more system resources than doing it in kernel.

Some way to "upload" the convert maps would be handy, though. Having
to compile the codesets into kernel is kind of uncomfortable. "Future
extension".

Jaromir
-- 
Jaromir Dolecek <jdolecek@NetBSD.org>      http://www.ics.muni.cz/~dolecek/
 "It's IMPOSSIBLE to overcomment any code. It can only be undercommented."
    >>> Wanna a real operating system ? Go and get NetBSD, damn it! <<<