Re: [9fans] USB developments

[Richard Miller <rm@hamnavoe.com>]

> My immediate question is whether it makes sense and is even possible
> to imitate the behaviour of ip/ipconfig in the case of USB and, in
> the instance I have in mind, mount the IDE driver (or the SCSI
> driver or the generic "sd" driver, whichever comes closest after
> making the necessary adjustments) on the appropriate desired port,
> as ipconfig does with etherx and the TCP/IP stack?

There's a /dev/sdctl file which appears to be provided just this
sort of purpose.  But I found with the usb mass storage driver that
(nearly) everything can be done quite comfortably outside the kernel.
The awkward part of course is hot plugging.

I think usbd is already doing all the necessary work of noticing
when usb devices come and go.  If it communicated this information
to the rest of the world with attach/detach messages on a plumbing port,
then either individual drivers could watch for their devices appearing,
or a "hotplug manager" could load the relevant driver on demand (maybe
this could be accommodated within the plumber itself with "plumb start"
rules).

-- Richard