Boris Popov wrote:
> > Pending any significant issues, DEVFS will be made mandatory in
> > -current on july 1st so that we can start reaping the full
> > benefits of having it.
>
> I'm not sure if this move in the right direction.
> Current devfs implementation is weak compared to the static
> device entries in the /dev. And sometimes it is better to
> have a precreated device nodes in the ufs filesystem. Having
> dual interface is not all that hard if you'll spend enough
> time on design.
Really, you want to make specfs "go away", which you
can do, if you have devfs.
Another issue is that it is impossible to netboot a
FreeBSD image from a number of systems, since those
systems can't host a populated FreeBSD /dev, given
that they are unable to do the right MAKEDEV thing
themselves.
It is also not possible for FreeBSD to boot off some
non-native FS, such as VFAT32, since you can't make
device nodes on a VFAT32 or NTFS (etc.) file system.
The backing store issue is totally seperate; it can
be handled with an rc.devfs, which you could write
today.
Eventually, you want to make major and minor numbers
"go away" entriely, and use the vnode for the device
as the device reference itself.
Other than the backing store issue, which would be
made easier if someone were to make VFS stacking for
union FS' actually work (it's only been what, 7 years
now? Do we have to wait out an entire decade?).
-- Terry
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