this post was submitted on 07 Sep 2023
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The problem is that GLIBC is the only serious attempt at a libc on Linux. The only competitor that is even trying is MUSL, and until early $CURRENTYEAR it still had worldbreaking standard-violating bugs marked WONTFIX. While I can no longer name similar catastrophes, that history gives me little confidence.
There are some lovely technical things in MUSL, but a GLIBC alternative it really is not.
DNS-over-TCP (which is required by the standard for all replies over 512 bytes) was unsupported prior to MUSL 1.2.4, released in May 2023. Work had begun in 2022 so I guess it wasn't EWONTFIX at that point.
Here's a link showing the MUSL author leaning toward still rejecting the standard-mandated feature as recently as 2020: https://www.openwall.com/lists/musl/2020/04/17/7 ("not to do fallback")
Complaints that the differences are just about "bug-for-bug compatibility" are highly misguided when it's useful features, let alone standard-mandated ones (e.g. the whole complex library is still missing!)