Kernel versioning [was Re: Kernel package and modules]

Andy Green andy at openmoko.com
Tue Aug 5 16:54:41 CEST 2008


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Somebody in the thread at some point said:

| EXTRAVERSION implies it is a version, and versions are sortable. Git
| revisions aren't sortabled and hence unsuited to be using in versions.

This doesn't seem a very strong argument, all kinds of literals are used
in versioning, "alpha", "beta", etc.

The key effect of EXTRAVERSION is its use in /lib/modules path.  We
should use the git hash there or not depending on what we think about
this hard separation of modules from different kernels.

I think it's a good thing enforcing it strictly so we don't get any more
funnies from invalidated modules getting inserted (which has been
reported in the wild).  Mike seems to agree with it being a good thing
but wants to have it under "manual control" if modules are shared or
not.  That's all the difference comes down to as far as I could make out.

I just don't think the hassle of figuring out if you possibly
invalidated any API a module might use by any change you make is worth
being able to use an old kernel's modules sometimes.

- -Andy
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