Bug 4748 - Kprobes marked EXPERIMENTAL
Summary: Kprobes marked EXPERIMENTAL
Status: RESOLVED FIXED
Alias: None
Product: systemtap
Classification: Unclassified
Component: kprobes (show other bugs)
Version: unspecified
: P2 normal
Target Milestone: ---
Assignee: Ananth Mavinakayanahalli
URL:
Keywords:
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2007-07-07 00:32 UTC by Jim Keniston
Modified: 2007-07-17 11:30 UTC (History)
1 user (show)

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Description Jim Keniston 2007-07-07 00:32:21 UTC
If you run make menuconfig (or a sibling thereof), you'll see that kprobes is
labeled "EXPERIMENTAL".  Kprobes has been in Linus's kernel since 2004, so this
label is rather cautious.  One explanation is that KPROBES is in the
Instrumentation submenu, which itself depends on EXPERIMENTAL.  But does that
mean we have to explicitly mention it in the 'bool "Kprobes..."' line in
arch/*/Kconfig?

Here's a related discussion on LKML:
http://www.uwsg.indiana.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/0707.0/0069.html
Comment 1 rpjday 2007-07-07 11:38:32 UTC
Subject: Re:  New: Kprobes marked EXPERIMENTAL

On Fri, 7 Jul 2007, jkenisto at us dot ibm dot com wrote:

> If you run make menuconfig (or a sibling thereof), you'll see that kprobes is
> labeled "EXPERIMENTAL".  Kprobes has been in Linus's kernel since 2004, so this
> label is rather cautious.  One explanation is that KPROBES is in the
> Instrumentation submenu, which itself depends on EXPERIMENTAL.  But does that
> mean we have to explicitly mention it in the 'bool "Kprobes..."' line in
> arch/*/Kconfig?
>
> Here's a related discussion on LKML:
> http://www.uwsg.indiana.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/0707.0/0069.html

i'm tempted to submit a patch that removes the top-level EXPERIMENTAL
dependency from the Instrumentation menu in all those Kconfig files.
if something is truly experimental, it makes more sense that it be
tagged that way individually on a feature-by-feature basis.

want me to do that as a starting point?

rday
Comment 2 Ananth Mavinakayanahalli 2007-07-09 04:47:51 UTC
Subject: Re:  Kprobes marked EXPERIMENTAL

> i'm tempted to submit a patch that removes the top-level EXPERIMENTAL
> dependency from the Instrumentation menu in all those Kconfig files.
> if something is truly experimental, it makes more sense that it be
> tagged that way individually on a feature-by-feature basis.
> 
> want me to do that as a starting point?

I agree that the tag needs to be granular. On the kprobes front, we need
to take a call on an arch basis. I'd say, based on testing over the past
couple of years, the EXPERIMENTAL tag can be removed from i386, x86_64,
powerpc and IA64.

Arch maintainers of sparc64, avr32 and s390 need to take a similar call.

Ananth
Comment 3 Jim Keniston 2007-07-09 17:26:22 UTC
rday has submitted the patch proposed in Comment #1:
http://www.uwsg.indiana.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/0707.1/0286.html
Thanks!

I agree with Ananth's assessment in Comment #2.  Ananth, assigning this PR to
you.  I suggest you, as prominent kprobes maintainer, are the best one to post a
patch removing the EXPERIMENTAL label from kprobes on the indicated architectures.
Comment 4 Ananth Mavinakayanahalli 2007-07-10 05:22:25 UTC
Subject: Re:  Kprobes marked EXPERIMENTAL

On Mon, Jul 09, 2007 at 05:26:22PM -0000, jkenisto at us dot ibm dot com wrote:
> 
> ------- Additional Comments From jkenisto at us dot ibm dot com  2007-07-09 17:26 -------
> rday has submitted the patch proposed in Comment #1:
> http://www.uwsg.indiana.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/0707.1/0286.html
> Thanks!
> 
> I agree with Ananth's assessment in Comment #2.  Ananth, assigning this PR to
> you.  I suggest you, as prominent kprobes maintainer, are the best one to post a
> patch removing the EXPERIMENTAL label from kprobes on the indicated architectures.

Patch posted to lkml: http://marc.info/?l=linux-kernel&m=118404438621258&w=2

Thanks Robert for following this up.

Ananth
Comment 5 rpjday 2007-07-10 07:03:52 UTC
Subject: Re:  Kprobes marked EXPERIMENTAL

On Tue, 10 Jul 2007, ananth at in dot ibm dot com wrote:

>
> ------- Additional Comments From ananth at in dot ibm dot com  2007-07-10 05:22 -------
> Subject: Re:  Kprobes marked EXPERIMENTAL
>
> On Mon, Jul 09, 2007 at 05:26:22PM -0000, jkenisto at us dot ibm dot com wrote:
> >
> > ------- Additional Comments From jkenisto at us dot ibm dot com  2007-07-09 17:26 -------
> > rday has submitted the patch proposed in Comment #1:
> > http://www.uwsg.indiana.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/0707.1/0286.html
> > Thanks!
> >
> > I agree with Ananth's assessment in Comment #2.  Ananth, assigning this PR to
> > you.  I suggest you, as prominent kprobes maintainer, are the best one to post a
> > patch removing the EXPERIMENTAL label from kprobes on the indicated architectures.
>
> Patch posted to lkml: http://marc.info/?l=linux-kernel&m=118404438621258&w=2
>
> Thanks Robert for following this up.

no problem.  ur welcome.

rday
Comment 6 Ananth Mavinakayanahalli 2007-07-17 11:30:29 UTC
Andrew has pushed the patch removing the EXPERIMENTAL tag on kprobes.