OPEN_MAX and other constants - are they desireable?

[Moderator, John Quarterman]

Date: Sun, 10 Nov 85 16:26:26 PST
From: mordor!lll-crg!sun!guy (Guy Harris)

> [ Seems to me only those critical binaries (/etc/init?)
> that wanted a huge OPEN_MAX would need to be rebuilt.  -Gwyn ]

Nope.  What about programs like shells which want to close every single open
file descriptor?  If OPEN_MAX were a compile-time constant, these programs
would have to be recompiled if you just bought Keg-O-Data's new DBMS which
requires 100 open file descriptors and reconfigured your kernel to up the
max-file-descriptors-per-process limit.

> I suggest deleting all of the constants, and instead specifying
> a library routine...

Yes, and *please* call the one for OPEN_MAX "getdtablesize", so 4.2 programs
won't have to change.

Volume-Number: Volume 3, Number 13