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Re: Questions about launchd


On Aug 26, 2007, at 12:44 PM, Terry Lambert wrote:

But my point was that you could trust command line output a heck of a lot more than data interfaces. I more or less promise we won't intentionally break things unless the standards change or our upstream providers change things on us for no reason. That would be work. 8^).

I'm really not sure what you mean by "data interfaces" in this context. but my point was that we don't promise anything with respect to "command API" (and never have), whereas we do make a substantial effort with actual APIs. Moreover, the fact that we discourage static linking also gives us a lot more leeway in providing API backwards compatibility via symbol decoration/versioning, app-specific conditional hacks, interpositioning tricks, etc. When it comes to the output of ps(1), however, we can't do a heck of a lot for you if you've buried it in some script and expect the contents of column 25 for arguments "-ef" to mean something very specific. Maintaining compatibility at that level has little to do with "avoiding work" and more to do with "avoiding any number of things which could potential perturb the output" (like, say, the PTY naming syntax changing).

- Jordan

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References: 
 >Questions about launchd (From: Michal Taurich <email@hidden>)
 >Re: Questions about launchd (From: Dave Zarzycki <email@hidden>)
 >Re: Questions about launchd (From: Terry Lambert <email@hidden>)
 >Re: Questions about launchd (From: "Finlay Dobbie" <email@hidden>)
 >Re: Questions about launchd (From: Terry Lambert <email@hidden>)
 >Re: Questions about launchd (From: "Finlay Dobbie" <email@hidden>)
 >Re: Questions about launchd (From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" <email@hidden>)
 >Re: Questions about launchd (From: "Finlay Dobbie" <email@hidden>)
 >Re: Questions about launchd (From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" <email@hidden>)
 >Re: Questions about launchd (From: "Finlay Dobbie" <email@hidden>)
 >Re: Questions about launchd (From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" <email@hidden>)
 >Re: Questions about launchd (From: Steve Checkoway <email@hidden>)
 >Re: Questions about launchd (From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" <email@hidden>)
 >Re: Questions about launchd (From: Terry Lambert <email@hidden>)



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