From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
Message-Id: <200406170753.i5H7r4F23190@zamenhof.cs.utwente.nl>
To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs <9fans@cse.psu.edu>
Subject: Re: [9fans] any success with current plan9port on sunos5.8?
In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 16 Jun 2004 22:33:30 -0400."
	<200406170233.i5H2XUR02533@plg2.math.uwaterloo.ca> 
References: <200406170233.i5H2XUR02533@plg2.math.uwaterloo.ca> 
From: Axel Belinfante <Axel.Belinfante@cs.utwente.nl>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Content-ID: <23186.1087458784.1@zamenhof.cs.utwente.nl>
Date: Thu, 17 Jun 2004 09:53:04 +0200
Topicbox-Message-UUID: a4b4d9ce-eacd-11e9-9e20-41e7f4b1d025

> > The point I'm trying to make is:
> > in this dirread case, the fact that something is broken
> > kind of hits you in the face as soon as you run acme,
> > or even plain ls: no files at all. However, there could be
> > a zillion things that are broken in a more subtle way.
> > Having to find those by stumbling over them I would find painful.
> 
> I'm not sure I agree.  The code hasn't been in use long enough to
> convince me that it isn't broken in subtle ways, even with _EXTENSIONS_
> enabled.  And my experience in trying to write portable code on
> UNIX-ish systems has led to a deep distrust of feature-test macros.
> But you're the one doing the work (at least, right now), and if you
> can make it work then more power to you.

Ok. I see your point. Let me try to phrase be a bit more accurately.
what I basically meant was:

with a previous ports release (where the yield problem was not present)
things (at least those that I tried, used) were working more or less ok.

Now I tried to get rid of the yield problem by playing with
the __EXTENSIONS__ macro, and it seems that there are places where
it is really necessary -- but the compiler does not help to
find all of those, for some (at least one) you only notice
the need because programs behave in a different way.
For me that means, to have reasobly trust in the result,
I either have to know what I am doing (I don't), or test all
programs to a certain extent. That seems tough
Just leaving on __EXTENSIONS__ and fixing yield in a different
way seems for me the easy way out.
Don't know if it is the best way, but for me, with no knowledge
whatsoever about where __EXTENSIONS__ is needed and where not
(apart from what I learned by trying to get things working),
it really seems for me the easiest, and the one giving me the most
reliable result.
Someone in know about all this surely can do a better job,
but, I guess for me it boils down to:
if it ain't broke, don't fix it
(or: only fix the small thing that you see breaking,
 but avoid touching those (scary) bits that
 (for all I can tell, seem to) work)

Axel.