On Tue, Jan 18, 2011 at 01:39:31AM -0500, der Mouse wrote: > >> True. What I use the timestamp for (when I use it at all, that is) > >> is answering "is the bootloader (or whatever) I'm getting the one I > >> just built and think I installed, or did something go wrong?". The > >> difference between ten minutes old and two weeks old is important; > >> the difference between two weeks old and six months old is not. > > BTW, the kernel version is still included, so at least on -current > > you can normally detect the case of "pretty recent" and "a few month > > old" from that as well. > > Except that tells me whether the kernel being booted is recent, not > whether the bootloader doing the booting is.
No. It is the version in src/sys/sys/param.h. It doesn't have any relation to the kernel you are running or booting. The point is that it is a non-changing, human readable identifier of the source tree that hopefully changes often enough to be able to tell two versions apart. > However, based on the discussion, it sounds as though this is not an > issue: it appears the datestamps are still there unless turned off (as > anyone wanting bit-for-bit-repeatable builds presumably will), meaning > the issue I raised simply does not exist. That depends. Some platforms dropped them completely. It is much simpler to consistently drop it. Joerg