From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: itz@very.loosely.org (Ian Zimmerman) Date: Wed, 7 Feb 2018 11:07:59 -0800 Subject: [TUHS] Device special files In-Reply-To: <20180207183607.E3NiH%steffen@sdaoden.eu> References: <1517946499.3717582.1261737872.3DC598F2@webmail.messagingengine.com> <20180207012556.GL30690@eureka.lemis.com> <20180207021405.CF19B156E812@mail.bitblocks.com> <20180207183607.E3NiH%steffen@sdaoden.eu> Message-ID: <20180207190759.7sjrf6ta4m7sct3d@matica.foolinux.mooo.com> On 2018-02-07 19:36, Steffen Nurpmeso wrote: > Going from ``hardware only changes when the DEC Field engineer is > here'' to ``my toaster has USB'' has put serious strain on the rather > crude implementation of the ``devices as files'' concept Well, if you don't try to connect your toaster to the computer, you don't have this problem :-) I had a self-maintained Linux system (ie. no distribution) until about 2000. I had no problem understanding what the two dozen /dev/ entries were for. I even wrote a better (table driven) makedev implementation and I tried to get it into Debian, but by that time rumors of devfs were already on the way so it wasn't worth a transition to them. The real problem with static /dev is on the development side IMO - managing the namespace of device names and major/minor numbers. -- Please don't Cc: me privately on mailing lists and Usenet, if you also post the followup to the list or newsgroup. To reply privately _only_ on Usenet, fetch the TXT record for the domain.