Date: Thu, 4 Jun 1998 13:49:17 -0500 (EST) From: "John S. Dyson" <dyson@FreeBSD.ORG> To: nate@mt.sri.com (Nate Williams) Cc: dyson@FreeBSD.ORG, mike@smith.net.au, hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: kernfs/procfs questions... Message-ID: <199806041849.NAA02023@dyson.iquest.net> In-Reply-To: <199806041650.KAA02787@mt.sri.com> from Nate Williams at "Jun 4, 98 10:50:51 am"
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Nate Williams said: > > In other words, *MORE* esoteric stuff to remember, making FreeBSD/unix > that much harder to administer. > kernfs is just as esoteric. > > Do I have a better solution Jordan asks? The FS interface is *harder* > for the kernel developer, but easier for the administrator. > Little or no difference... How many times do you need to do a sysctl??? Sysctl is meant as a peek/poke into the kernel. Of course, the file-person's ultimate scheme '/dev/kmem' is better??? Not!!! > > Doing a job poorly or making the users memorize esoteric namespaces just > for the sake of 'checking off a feature box' is not doing the user-base > any favors. Anyone motivated enough to figure it out how to configure a > specific machine may like you, but the general user population will > never benefit from that work since they don't have the time or ability > to figure it out. In other words, you'll end up working really hard for > 1-2 sites, and no one else will aprreciate/use the resulting hard-work > put in. For a volunteer project, this is a shame. :( > Sorry, /kernfs is just as esoteric. The thing that you are complaining about is missing documentation on the hierarchy (filesystems don't provide that automatically.) However, our sysctl does have such a scheme (but isn't fully implemented.) It is *sad* when people see a scheme and adopt it blindly and forever. This is the "everything is a file" syndrome, oops, "everything is a hammer" :-). We'll be staying with sysctl until someone invents a kernfs that is just as usable, flexible and backwards compatible, with the documentation hooks. Hint... Hint... -- John | Never try to teach a pig to sing, dyson@freebsd.org | it just makes you look stupid, jdyson@nc.com | and it irritates the pig. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-hackers" in the body of the message
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