From owner-freebsd-current Mon Feb 16 19:32:50 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id TAA17042 for freebsd-current-outgoing; Mon, 16 Feb 1998 19:32:50 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from sendero.simon-shapiro.org (sendero-fxp0.Simon-Shapiro.ORG [206.190.148.34]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with SMTP id TAA17036 for ; Mon, 16 Feb 1998 19:32:43 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from shimon@sendero-fxp0.simon-shapiro.org) Received: (qmail 5742 invoked by uid 1000); 17 Feb 1998 03:38:41 -0000 Message-ID: X-Mailer: XFMail 1.3-alpha-020998 [p0] on FreeBSD X-Priority: 3 (Normal) Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit MIME-Version: 1.0 In-Reply-To: Date: Mon, 16 Feb 1998 19:38:41 -0800 (PST) Reply-To: shimon@simon-shapiro.org Organization: The Simon Shapiro Foundation From: Simon Shapiro To: Julian Elischer Subject: Re: devfs persistence Cc: current@FreeBSD.ORG Sender: owner-freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG .... [ Lots and lots of wonderful stuff deleted ] ... My $0.02 worth: The non-DEVFS system we have now is manual, with a throttle lever, mixture lever, and remote idle setting. DEVFS introduces computerized fuel injection & automatic transmissions I wholeheartedly agree with DEVFS, but can see where one would want some measure of control. Much of the discussion has been either in the theoretical, or the ``what if'' realm. I think there is a pragmatic, practical side to it too, which Terry seems to represent the most; If ALL devices that actually exist && have a driver to support them are represented in a DEVFS /dev, and if one can chmod, chown, chgrp and mv then (as far as renaming goes), then we can have a very persistent DEVS with a /etc/rc.something script. If you want it to look nicer, make the script a /etc/dev.conf, and ``parse it'' from /etc/rc, at the proper time, by applying all the deltas. this will be, from the system's point of view very persistent. Security? Anyone who can breach one file with proper root ownership & permissions can breach another. Thoughtless/careless/brainless administrators wil alwas exist and will always expose their systems. I say, let them. The only thing not clear to me (I know this is obvious), is; With an all DEVFS, can I still do ``mkdir -p /a/b/c/d;cd /a/b/c/d;mknod foo c 123 456, or its equivalent? If not, then symbolic links are fine too. Oh, a /dev DEVFS mounted, can it create links and/or symlinks? Why not? ---------- Sincerely Yours, Simon Shapiro Shimon@Simon-Shapiro.ORG Voice: 503.708.7858 To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-current" in the body of the message