>>>>> On Mon, 5 Jan 1998 12:35:00 +0100
>>>>> Pavel Machek <pavel@atrey.karlin.mff.cuni.cz> said:
Pavel> Ok. You have device 'foobar' which you can load module for. It
Pavel> is not loaded, now. Which means /dev/foobar entry is not
Pavel> there. Now, some broken app goes and looks if /dev/foobar
Pavel> exists. If it does not, it will bail out, instead of opening
Pavel> it (which would cause /dev/foobar to be loaded.)
You said it: broken.
Normally, apps are broken because of programmer lazyness. I can't see
a lazy programmer going through the readdir()-routine, when a simple
stat(), access(), or open() would suffice.
Perhaps there is a real use for scanning the /dev directory, and I
just can't think of one...
Robbe
-- Robert Bihlmeyer reads: Deutsch, English, MIME, Latin-1, NO SPAM! <robbe@orcus.priv.at> <http://stud2.tuwien.ac.at/~e9426626/sig.html>