Re: /dev permissions
Ian, this poses an interesting problem. When one is running mgetty,
minicom and diald (with ppp/slip). There are problems locking the
modem device. Without a consistent locking convention the modem
simply will not work since there are devices competing for it. Things
all work together with mgetty since one standardizes on ttyS?. The
author of mgetty makes it clear that the 2 devices do behave
differently enough to make a difference in which one mgetty works
right on. It will not function correctly on cua.
Mgetty runs on many different Unix systems. I think it is too
important a package to declare that it must be written wrong since it
disagrees with the philosophy espoused below. I have copied Gert
Doering, the author of mgetty, hoping to get more knowledgable input
than mine into this.
I have been hoping to release an mgetty package after our release
since Debian and Mgetty will both release about the same time.
This is a philosophical stumbling block I would like to get out of the
way before I try to package mgetty.
You do point out that ttyS* should be used by login and thus
getty. Does this make the case that since the port is essentially
owned by a modem getty it would be acceptable to use ttyS* for all the
outgoing modem use as well?
Alternatives would be to modify all dialout programs to write lock
files for both devices or to see if they would tolerate a symlink from
the cua* to the ttyS*.
Lock files have got to be consistent across the board for all debian
packages that use the modem. So far, I expect that list to be uucp,
kermit, minicom, mgetty, diald, efax, slip and ppp.
Thanks for your time,
Costa
--
Constantine Rasmussen 508-750-7500 x7020 cdr@sme.siemens.com
Date: Wed, 20 Sep 95 20:59 BST
From: Ian Jackson <iwj10@cus.cam.ac.uk>
To: debian-devel@Pixar.com
Subject: Re: /dev permissions
J. H. M. Dassen writes ("/dev permissions"):
> Aleph One wrote in c.o.l.a.:
> --
> [...]
> On a side note many
> distributions have the correct premission in the /dev/cua devices
> but not on their equivalent /dev/ttyS devices. This is the case of
> debian 0.93. To fix chown root.dialout /dev/ttyS*; chmod o-rwx
> /dev/ttyS*. Make sure that this does brake your other serial devices
> such as your mouse.
> [...]
> --
>
> Can someone check if this is true?
The ttyS* devices are not for dialout. Dialout should use the cua*
devices.
ttyS* devices are for dialin and login (and sometimes for mice) should
generally be owned by root. They should not be owned by dialout.
If the person telling you this wrote it in cola (.answers? .announce?)
they probably need to be informed that it's wrong so that they can
change their document.
Ian.
- ------- end -------
------- End of Forwarded Message
Reply to: