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Date:      Fri, 2 Jun 2000 17:36:20 +0930
From:      Greg Lehey <grog@lemis.com>
To:        "Raymundo M. Vega" <RaymundoVega@home.com>
Cc:        Luke Scharf <luke@vt.edu>, freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: Genreal kernel architecture.
Message-ID:  <20000602173620.T22978@wantadilla.lemis.com>
In-Reply-To: <393758F2.150A1FB2@home.com>
References:  <39374B81.C1C5B591@vt.edu> <393758F2.150A1FB2@home.com>

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On Thursday,  1 June 2000 at 23:49:22 -0700, Raymundo M. Vega wrote:
> Luke Scharf wrote:
>>
>> Does FreeBSD protect drivers from each other?
>
> yes it does not let them break each other noses   ;-)

This is not correct (for some definition of "nose").  Drivers have
free access to kernel memory.

>> I've started playing with the Linux kernel, but my badly written
>> drivers are free to wreak havoc all over kernelspace and take down
>> the entire system...  :)
>
> now seriously, actually this is C, remember it lets you do anything
> (if you have the rights), it is assumed that you know what you are
> doing.

In fact, Luke's question was very valid.  There are good reasons to
give drivers less power than the kernel itself, and most architectures
have hardware support for such a concept.  Unfortunately nobody's
interested enough to change things, though it could make for a more
reliable operating system.

Greg
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