[$] C library system-call wrappers, or the lack thereof

User-space developers may be accustomed to thinking of system calls as direct
calls into the kernel. Indeed, the first edition of The C Programming
Language described read() and write() as 'a
direct entry into the operating system'. In truth, user-level
'system calls' are just functions in the C library like any other. But what
happens when the developers of the C library refuse to
provide access to system calls they don't like? The result is an
ongoing conflict that has recently flared up again; it shows some of the
difficulties that can arise when the system as a whole has no ultimate
designer and the developers are not talking to each other.