Re: [patch 1/2] Validate itimer timeval from userspace

[Andrew Morton <akpm@osdl.org>]

"Jesper Juhl" <jesper.juhl@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > It would be strange to set an alarm for 0xffffffff seconds in the future
>  > but yeah, unless we can point at a reason why nobody could have ever been
>  > doing that, we should turn this into permanent, documented behaviour of
>  > Linux 2.6 and earlier, I'm afraid.
>  >
> 
>  How about 0xffffffff seconds into the future being the same as 136
>  years (unless I botched the math)... That means that if any Linux
>  application ever did that it's still waiting for the alarm and will be
>  for at least another century...
>  I'd say that makes it pretty certain that noone are doing or have been
>  doing that without spotting the problem somehow - apps with such a bug
>  are unlikely to be in production and actually working correctly.

We just don't know.  People do all sorts of things.

How about this?

	$ cat /etc/my-expensive-app.conf
	#
	# Interval polling timer.  Set this to -1 to disable
	#
	interval_polling_timer=-1

We just don't know.