what is a tapset? [RE: Skeleton detailed design document]

[Frank Ch. Eigler]

Hi -


> A couple issues/questions occurred to me around the
> notion that tapset implementations would consist solely 
> of script code and could not use C code:
> [...]
> My preference: following the DTrace lead, encourage/force 
> tapsets to be defined separately from Systemtap scripts.

Remember my references to a "script library"?  Would such a library of
scripts, each of might define a higher-level probing interface, be
sufficiently separate from end-user probe scripts for your taste?


> - Portable scripts. To what degree do we want to 
>   encourage portability of Systemtap scripts across
>   different instruction sets?

Clearly the scripts should be generally portable,
especially the end-user ones.

>   [...]
>   My preference: Isolate machine dependent code in
>   tapset implementations by excluding features from
>   the script langauge that expose machine dependent
>   features.

For safe-mode end-user ones, certainly.

But, all this may be jumping the gun.  I have only outlined a vague
possibility for putting some system extensibility into special
systemtap scripts.  Until there is an alternative that is at most as
vague, there is little point stating a preference between them.


- FChE