Coccinelle:
A Language-Based Approach to Managing the Collateral Evolution
of Linux Device Drivers
Julia Lawall - Gilles Muller
Resume :
The Linux operating system is undergoing continual evolution.
Evolution in the kernel and generic driver modules often triggers the
need for corresponding evolutions in specific device drivers. Such
collateral evolutions are tedious, because of the large number of
device drivers, and error-prone, because of the complexity of the code
modifications involved. We propose an automatic tool, Coccinelle, to
aid in the driver evolution process. In this talk, we examine some
recent evolutions in Linux and the collateral evolutions they trigger,
and assess the corresponding requirements on Coccinelle.