[techtalk] RE: [issues] Standards?? PHOOEY!!!

[Jeff Frasca]

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On Fri, 30 Jun 2000, Lothan wrote:

> The American National Starndards Insititute (ANSI) and the International
> Standards Organization (ISO) have several standards (and authority) on
> computer devices and languages (QIC tape hardware and protocols, and the C
> and C++ languages are examples of ANSI standards). The Internet Engineering
> Task Force (IETF) also has authority to set standards for Internet protocols
> (IPv4). Like it or not, Microsoft is the standards authority for Windows
> protocols (OLE, ActiveX controls).
> 
So what?  Ever seen the man page for __clone() (man clone to see the man
page)?  Totally linux specific call, there are others too, like ioperm()
&& iopl().  These are completely linux specific calls.  __clone() can be
used to create really *crude* multithreading (in fact, it is there to
build standards compliant libraries on top of it).  ioperm() && iopl()
exist to control userland access to io addresses -- which is a very
hardware specific thing and totally non-portable.  They conform to *no*
standards.  One of them is there in contradiction to the POSIX standard
- -- which says use pthreads instead, for portability.  

I can write programs based on these calls all day long.  ANSI and ISO
can't stop me.  I don't, because they aren't portable, and aren't
standards compliant.  

They can't stop you from innovating.  However, if you don't eventually
get some kind of ``standard'' (as in an agreement/protocol, which is a
standard), it won't play nicely with anyone else's toys.  

Jeff

My Geekcode has moved to my .plan file.
finger phaedrus at 24.5.73.229 for that and other Junk

My Public Key -- http://24.5.73.229/pubkey.txt 


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