Messages in this thread |  | | | Date | Thu, 17 Jun 1999 00:02:32 -0400 | | Subject | Re: UUIDs (and devfs and major/minor numbers) | | From | tytso@mit ... |
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Date: Wed, 16 Jun 1999 22:58:00 +1000 From: Richard Gooch <rgooch@atnf.csiro.au>
So here we are, arguing about names, because suddenly Ted admitted that a virtual FS might be good. But then he says he doesn't like the names. Before that he was denying to the hilt that a virtual FS had any merit.
Sigh. Let me try again. The fact that people are arguing about names means that it is clear the kernel should *not* be dictating what shows up in /dev. That should be done by a user-mode daemon. Like it or not, the names in /dev *are* policy, and kernel should not be dictating policy. Therefore, the kernel should not be deciding what names appear in /dev. Q.E.D.
Now, how the user-mode daemon gets the information about what devices are in the system is different design question. It could get them via a flat file in /proc, or it could get it via sysctl(), or any number of other approaches. If you're in love with virtual filesystems, then fine, do it that way; I don't have a strong distaste of virtual filesystems per se, which is why the claims of hypocrisy vis-a-vis procfs don't stick.
The issue is not virtual FS versus some other kernel interface. The issue is what appears in /dev, and whether the kernel code should be hard coding what happears in /dev. It shouldn't. That's policy. The kernel shouldn't be dictating policy.
Instead, the kernel should be exporting sufficient information so that a user-mode daemon can provide whatever interesting naming scheme (and that naming scheme might include device names based on the UUID or the fslabel in the ext2 device, or something else far more general than what kernel-space code can provide.)
- Ted
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