[$] Gathering multiple system parameters in a single call

Running a command like lsof,which lists the open files on the system along with information about theprocess that has each file open, takes a lot of system calls, mostly to read asmall amount of information from many /proc files. Providing anew interface to collect those calls together into a single (or, at least,fewer) system calls is the target of Miklos Szeredi's getvalues()RFC patch that was posted on March 22. While the proposal doesnot look like it is going far, at least in its current form, it did sparksome discussion of the need-or lack thereof-for a way to reduce this kindof overhead, as well as to explore some alternative ways to get there via code thatalready exists in the kernel.