Re: default udev rules

[David Zeuthen <david@fubar.dk>]

On Mon, 2008-08-11 at 16:42 +0100, Scott James Remnant wrote:
> But surely that means cases where we need NAME= rules are now better
> fixed by fixing the kernel to give it the right name in the first place?

The kernel name is most of the time useless - it's simply just a damn
cookie. FWIW, my view is that any application depending on the kernel
name is always almost broken (except for singleton devices
like /dev/mapper/control etc.) except for when the user hasn't
configured what device to use (e.g. use the first webcam, the first
optical drive etc. etc.).

So this is why udev ships code (not user configurable settings!) in udev
rules for persistent naming. Unfortunately we don't have persistent
names for everything (and for some things it of course won't make
sense). Send patches.

Also, I would like to propose that whenever someone adds a subsystem to
the kernel they also need, for the subsystem to be merged, to send a
patch to udev for persistent naming (in cases where it makes sense).
Such a patch would some of the time need to include a user space tool
for investigating the device (for the cases where persistent naming make
sense) if device not in sysfs is needed (sometimes it doesn't make sense
for the kernel to collect all data in sysfs)

I would really like to see the kernel adopt such a requirement for new
subsystems. Greg?

     David