Re: new sysfs layout and ethernet device names

[Greg KH <greg@kroah.com>]

On Tue, Mar 27, 2007 at 11:17:43PM -0400, Bill Nottingham wrote:
> Kay Sievers (kay.sievers@vrfy.org) said: 
> > >If you *do* try to use one of these names, the rename will succeed...
> > >partway. The link in /sys/class/net is renamed, the directory is
> > >not (as it obviously can't rename on top of whatever is already there.)
> > >Various networking tools then break in assorted ways due to the
> > >naming disconnect.
> > >
> > >Going back to the deprecated layout makes these names available again -
> > >it's possible (although not necessarily likely) that the new layout
> > >will break someone's device configuration if they upgrade kernels,
> > >even if the rest of their tools are updated for the new layout.
> > 
> > There will be a directory at the bus-device with the name of the
> > class, that glues together the bus-devices and the class-devices in
> > the unified tree:
> >  http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/gregkh/patches.git;a=blob;f=driver/driver-core-fix-namespace-issue-with-devices-assigned-to-classes.patch;hb=HEAD
> > 
> > So the network-interface(s) will be in their own directory "net",
> > below the bus-device, and don't conflict with the existing attributes.
> 
> So, the layout will change again?

If you follow the rules in Documentation/ABI/testing/sysfs-class your
program will not have any problems.

And yes, it will change by adding another subdirectory in the device
tree, but just follow the link from the /sys/class/ directorys and you
will be fine.

thanks,

greg k-h