Re: extended partitions

fuZZy (tjimenez@site.gmu.edu)
Wed, 18 Oct 1995 13:51:06 -0400 (EDT)

> > From: Jim Nance <jlnance@isscad.com>
> > > If the names in /dev are generated directly by the kernel, like /proc
> > > is, this problem disappears.
> >
> > The existance of /dev as a real, rather than a virtual file system allows
> > device permissions to be set, and remain set across reboots. I must admit
> > that I think the idea of a virtual /dev does have an attractive eligance,
> > however, I have never seen any proposal which would fix the device
> > permission problem.
>
> Well, I've been thinking about the usefulness of having a device
> driver I wrote (am writing) create device entries in
> /proc/somewhere. Registering major numbers can be problematic, and I
> was thinking of the driver automatically trying other major numbers,
> if it could not register at the requested major number. The entries in
> /proc/somewhere would automatically have the correct major/minor
> numbers for the installed driver.
>
> The permission bits could be set when the driver module is loaded, or
> on the kernel command line. Also, the /proc filesystem could be
> extended to allow setting permission bits, and customisation of
> permission bits could be performed by a start-up file
> (/etc/rc.d/rc.devices).
> >
> > And what about links like /dev/cdrom, /dev/modem, and /dev/mouse?

how about mounting a virtual file system (ala proc) on top of an
actual (non-virtual) filesystem. mount the virtual /dev on top of the
physical /dev, with container files on the physical /dev that do nothing
more then keep the permissions of devices. and really, the container files
wouldn't be needed except for files with non-standerd permissions (i.e. a
kernel wide permission default could be declared, with any special cases
handeled by setting the permissions on a container file) and links like
cdrom or modem would be handled easily enough by good old-fashoned
filesystem links. the only real problem that I can see with doing it
this way is that barring hordes of links in the /dev directory, we would
go from a major/minor number dependence to a name-space dependence for
devices.

-- 
		-fuZZy


	<did they buy it?>
	<I don't think they bought it.>
	<of course they bought it.>
	<shush, they're looking this way, remember to keep a straight face...>