Igmar Palsenberg wrote: > > For a blocking fd, read(2) has always blocked until some data is > > available. There has never been a guarantee, for any driver, that > > a read(2) will return the full amount of bytes requested. > > I know. Still leaves lot's of people that assume that reading /dev/random > will return data, or will block. > > I've seen lots of programs that will assume that if we request x bytes > from /dev/random it will return x bytes. I find this really humorous honestly. I see a lot of people assuming that if you write N bytes or read N bytes that you will have done N bytes. There are return values for these functions that tell you clearly how many bytes were done. Any programmer who has evolved sufficiently from a scriptie should take necessary precautions to check how much data was transferred. Those who don't..well, there is still tomorrow. There is no reason to add any additional documentation. If we did, we'd be starting the trend of documenting the direction a mouse moves when it's pushed and not to be alarmed if you turn the mouse sideways and the result is 90 degrees off. -d
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