>The API does not *need* to set the FD_CLOEXEC flag, >and so it should not. It is the height of arrogance to >assume that something has no use simply because you >can't imagine using it.
there's a little detail you're forgetting. unless the hw supports multi-open and the current number of subunits is below the limit of the number of opens, then having the descriptor will cause all other attempts to access the device to block (unless they explicitly request non-blocking open, which means they then have to unset that flag for normal application operation). this means that even if the parent has closed the ALSA device, the child still (unwittingly) has it open. its easy to imagine situations where the user will be completely puzzled to find that another program cannot start up because they believe they exited from the previous audio program. they don't understand that the child process it started (say, a bug reporting system) still has the device open. this is quite different from how file descriptors that refer to disk files, ttys and most other devices operate. of course, its questionable whether the block-on-open approach is correct, but so far discussions on this list have supported it. --p ------------------------------------------------------- This SF.NET email is sponsored by: SourceForge Enterprise Edition + IBM + LinuxWorld = Something 2 See! http://www.vasoftware.com _______________________________________________ Alsa-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/alsa-devel
