Re: updating kernel to 2.6.13-rc1 from 2.6.12 + CONFIG_DEVFS_FS +empty /dev

[Eric Valette]

Greg KH wrote:
> On Thu, Jun 30, 2005 at 03:12:41PM +0200, eric.valette@xxxxxxx wrote:
> 
>>Quoting Greg KH <greg@xxxxxxxxx>:
>>
>>
>>>On Wed, Jun 29, 2005 at 11:03:56PM +0200, Eric Valette wrote:
>>>
>>>>For years now my /dev has been empty. When upgrading to 2.6.13-rc1 from
>>>>2.6.12, and updating my kernel config file via "make oldconfig" I got no
>>>>visible warning about CONFIG_DEVFS_FS options being set (or at least did
>>>>no see it).
>>>
>>>devfs has been marked OBSOLETE for a year now.  It has also been
>>>documented as going away.  Because of this, you should not have been
>>>supprised at all.
>>
>>I knew it! I just the announce for 2.6.13-rc1 did not contain this fact and I
>>did not realize booting this new kernel will fail on my machine which is bad for
>>a stable serie.
> 
> 
> As there is no longer a "development series" calling 2.6 a "stable
> series" isn't really true :)

Curious to wait until 2.6.13 pops up to see how much people will end up
having non working systems either because :
	1) They removed entries in their /dev
	2) Did not maintain their /dev for years because anyway it was not
directly accessed
	3) modified their /etc/fstab to put devfs names rather than FHS/LSB
compliant names...
	4) other weird /dev-devfs interaction I cannot imagine yet

BTW speaking of initramfs to hold the minimal /dev, in the embedded
world initramfs has to be stored in flash as udev binary and eventually
additionnal scripts, this represent flash memory (OK very little I have
to admit but when you need to find 10K of flash or change the flash
size...).

I hope someone will pick-up your nano defvs proposal and enhance it to
support a  version enabling to boot a system without anything in /dev.
Unfortunately no time yet on my side.

Thanks for all the things you have done in linux,

-- eric




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