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Re: install latest debian 2.4.16 kernelimage has devfs activated, why?



On Wed, Jan 30, 2002 at 06:52:07AM +0800, csj wrote:
| On 29 Jan 2002 11:03:07 -0800
| Dave Carrigan <dave@rudedog.org> wrote:
| 
| > Walter Tautz <wtautz@math.uwaterloo.ca> writes:
| > 
| [...]
| > 
| > > Just curious to hear other people's opinions on this matter, i.e.
| > > don't use devfs. It seems to me the debian kernel should have 
| > > CONFIG_DEVFS_FS=n. 
| > 
| > Some people want devfs. Devfs can't be created as a module. Hence, the
| > logical choice is to build the kernel with devfs support. Nothing's
| > forcing you to use devfs, even if your kernel has devfs support, and the
| > overhead is not very much.
| 
| But, let's say I just want to play with devfs, could I still go back to
| my old disk-based setup? Could I still boot my old devfsd-disabled
| kernel after using a devfsd-enabled kernel?

The only hiccup I think you'll see if you do this is :

Suppose you decide you like the devfs name so you edit your fstab to
use devfs names for all partitions.  Now you boot your static-dev
kernel, and, oops! those device names don't exist.  

You could, of course, create static directories in /dev and stick
inodes there so the old-style kernel works with new-style paths.  A
better solution is to use devfsd with your devfs kernel to provide
compatibility links and keep the old-style paths in your application
config files.

(this reminds me, one of these days I gotta boot with a floppy and
clean out /dev and /tmp since I'm using devfs and tmpfs now)

-D
 
-- 

Micros~1 :  
 For when quality, reliability 
  and security just aren't
   that important!



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