NEWBIE question Re: static or dynamic /dev

[Richard Owlett <rowlett@cloud85.net>]

Roger Leigh wrote:
> On Fri, Apr 05, 2013 at 05:42:32AM -0700, sting wing wrote:
> > Question: how does a person know if their /dev is a static or dynamic /dev

What does it mean when /dev is said to be static? dynamic?
What should I be reading about?


> % findmnt /dev
> TARGET SOURCE   FSTYPE   OPTIONS
> /dev   devtmpfs devtmpfs rw,size=249844k,nr_inodes=62461,mode=755
>
> Unless you have taken very special steps to avoid it, you will
> always have a dynamic /dev.  This has been the case for many
> many years now.  udev uses a tmpfs mounted on /dev (and more
> recently a devtmpfs mounted on /dev).
>
> If there's nothing mounted on /dev, then you will have a static
> /dev.  However, if using Linux, the chances of having a static
> /dev on a contemporary system are vanishingly small--you'd have
> to intentionally alter the boot scripts to avoid a dynamic /dev.