Re: fs-independent quotas

[Thor Lancelot Simon <tls%panix.com@localhost>]

On Tue, Nov 15, 2011 at 11:54:12AM +0100, Manuel Bouyer wrote:
> 
> An error is still better than a crash.

Why is a text-based format inherently less likely to cause a crash?

Do we expect NetBSD developers to be checking in handlers for
functionally equivalent binary formats that are *more* likely to cause
a crash if invalid data are presented?  That does not seem good.

Whether text or binary, the data have to be validated before being
used.  Text or binary, code that doesn't do that is simply buggy.

> And I still think a text-based format is better than a binary format for
> backward compatibility.

I think that if we aren't _actually_ going to provide backward
compatibility in some way _now_, it doesn't matter.  Either way, to
actually get sane semantics, versioning is required.

I really don't much care either way but I do think it is worth note
that -- as far as I can tell -- the arguments in favor of the text
based format really don't seem to be right.

Thor