X-Recipient: archive-cygwin@delorie.com X-Spam-Check-By: sourceware.org Message-ID: <48D93F9A.12855EB9@dessent.net> Date: Tue, 23 Sep 2008 12:12:26 -0700 From: Brian Dessent X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.79 [en] (Windows NT 5.0; U) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: cygwin@cygwin.com Subject: Re: [OT] polite response to polite response - Brian... References: <48D3B01F.5080200@oracle.com> <9721D18815A74E3790E86A5BC19A461A@collinsdirect.com> <48D74687.80002@oracle.com> <48D83EF8.5040401@cwilson.fastmail.fm> <29E315C686404A6D8696F355E283DD56@collinsdirect.com> <48D8F8AC.F1774B58@dessent.net> <124BDC78EB534CE084916FC3E6C2A96B@collinsdirect.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-IsSubscribed: yes Reply-To: cygwin@cygwin.com Mailing-List: contact cygwin-help@cygwin.com; run by ezmlm List-Id: List-Subscribe: List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: , Sender: cygwin-owner@cygwin.com Mail-Followup-To: cygwin@cygwin.com Delivered-To: mailing list cygwin@cygwin.com Barry Smith at SourceLink wrote: > > That doesn't mean that 'run' was at fault. > Yet it could have been at fault, or the cygwin memory > allocation could be at fault, or Windoze, or the tool > that you're RUN-ing. The "Cygwin memory allocation" most certainly could not be at fault, nor could the tool being run. Again, the one and only thing that is culpable when a BSOD occurs is code running in kernel mode. Any attempt from user-space to do anything untoward simply results in a software fault, with a default handler installed by the OS which terminates the process if it does not handle the fault itself. Thus the very worst a process can ever do is get itself terminated. Anything more is simply not possible, as enforced by the processor which is running in protected mode. That's not to say that a BSOD cannot result from the action of running user-space code, but when it does the underlying reason for the BSOD cannot possibly be in the user-space code, it must be a bug in kernel-mode code because by definition it is charged with disallowing any process from destabilizing the system, and it has failed. (And please, it's spelled Cygwin, not CygWIN.) Brian -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://cygwin.com/docs.html FAQ: http://cygwin.com/faq/