On Tue, 8 Jan 2019, Warner Losh wrote:
The name seems obvious because I've seen it for
the last 30 years. But
I've not seen it used elsewhere, nor have I seen it documented except in
relationship to Unix. It could have been called blkio or bufio or bio or
even just work or morework and still been as meaningful. VMS uses the
FDT table to process the IRPs sent down. RT-11 has a series of entry
points that have boring names. Other systems have a start routine
(though more often that is a common routine used by both the queue me
and isr functions). There is a wide diversity here...
I must admit that this is an interesting thread, just as long as it wasn't
called XXoptimize() unless you wanted a backlash from British English
speakers :-)
In hindsight I suppose that XXstrategy() is obvious, but back then, as you
ask? Dunno, but Ken might (if he's reading this thread).
One of my favo[u]rites is sched(); some pronounce it as "shed" and others
as "sked". Another American/British thing, I think...
Wasn't it Mark Twain who said "Two nations divided by a common language"?
I no longer have my Lions books on me, sadly enough (lost in a house move)
but there certainly were some peculiar names in the kernel...
ObGripe: Could anyone replying to the digest version please take the
trouble to update the Subject: line accordingly? I've now put the
original back as a courtesy to others, but I shouldn't have to; it's as
bad as top-posting.
-- Dave