From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S264936AbUGZG6j (ORCPT ); Mon, 26 Jul 2004 02:58:39 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S264937AbUGZG6i (ORCPT ); Mon, 26 Jul 2004 02:58:38 -0400 Received: from zasran.com ([198.144.206.234]:21948 "EHLO zasran.com") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S264936AbUGZG6h (ORCPT ); Mon, 26 Jul 2004 02:58:37 -0400 Message-ID: <4104AB98.8070506@bigfoot.com> Date: Sun, 25 Jul 2004 23:58:32 -0700 From: Erik Steffl User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.7.1) Gecko/20040722 Debian/1.7.1-3 X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: Future devfs plans References: <200407261445.i6QEjAS04697@freya.yggdrasil.com> <410450CA.9080708@hispalinux.es> In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Andreas Jellinghaus wrote: > On Mon, 26 Jul 2004 00:34:51 +0000, Ramón Rey Vicente wrote: > >>With udev you can do that, and without important bugs :). And the more >>important thing is _udev is in active development_ > > > devfs has the "open /dev/somefile" to load $somedriver > mechanism. it is said to be racy, as far as I know. > > udev works very differently. mostly, the idea is kernel detects hardware, > kernel calls hotplug, hotplug loads driver, driver registers device > structure in kernel, kernel calls hotplug for the new device, udev creates > the device in /dev. > > with this mechanism, the kernel always has all drivers for hardware > currently available loaded, and udev provides the /dev devices. > > devfs allowes you to not have the driver loaded till you try to use it. > so udev _cannot_ do what devfs does. > > still I agree that the way kernel/hotplug/udev work is much better and > supporting the old style devfs works is not necessary. but please be > honest about the differences. which means that now iPod automatically connects to firewire (and looses info on random tracks, sometime some other settings), instead of only connecting when I try to actually access it (the device). it looks like there is no user level (end user, not admin) control on when the device drivers are loaded anymore - or is there? Is there any way to load drivers on demand (obviously it's not job of udev but whose job it is?). What about unloading them - I unmount the disk and i think the iPod is disconnecred but it still says connected - is there any way to disconnect it (I guess similar problems arise with other hotplug devices) erik