Poettering: Revisiting how we put together Linux systems

Posted Sep 2, 2014 5:59 UTC (Tue) by ibukanov (subscriber, #3942)
In reply to: Poettering: Revisiting how we put together Linux systems by mezcalero
Parent article: Poettering: Revisiting how we put together Linux systems

The question is why Google and Mozilla bundle libraries in the first place. This happens precisely because distributions failed for provide stable interfaces to maintained libraries with CVE fixes. I do not see how the proposal changes the situation.

And that is the reason I am rather skeptical about compatibility claims in the proposal. On the other hand anything that can get 100% reliable and revertible updates together with goodies likes read-only /usr are extremely welcomed.

Poettering: Revisiting how we put together Linux systems

Posted Sep 2, 2014 10:08 UTC (Tue) by roc (subscriber, #30627) [Link] (1 responses)

We bundle libraries for various reasons:
a) To use later versions of libraries than distros are shipping. This lets us fix security and other bugs faster.
b) To expose interfaces and functionality that aren't widely deployed yet and possibly won't ever go upstream.
c) To increase consistency across platforms. This helps reduce our bug load.

Poettering: Revisiting how we put together Linux systems

Posted Sep 7, 2014 17:51 UTC (Sun) by pabs (subscriber, #43278) [Link]

Unfortunately embedding makes more work for distributions, which is why they have policies against it.

https://wiki.debian.org/EmbeddedCodeCopies