>    Erik> I'm beginning to wonder if it wouldn't be quicker to do minimal
>    Erik> changes to NetBSD to support an MP (not SMP) configuration, where

>  I would agree.

>  Linux started that way, then moved the semaphores on each syscall slowly
> downwards...

That kind of haphazard software ``design'' is why I run NetBSD, not Linux.
If I wanted "ship it, then fix it", I'd be running Windows.

(I've spent much of the past 8 years fixing busted locking hierarchies in
one multithreaded system or another.)