From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id ; Sat, 19 May 2001 19:32:07 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id ; Sat, 19 May 2001 19:31:58 -0400 Received: from panic.ohr.gatech.edu ([130.207.47.194]:37548 "HELO havoc.gtf.org") by vger.kernel.org with SMTP id ; Sat, 19 May 2001 19:31:40 -0400 Message-ID: <3B070257.5632A059@mandrakesoft.com> Date: Sat, 19 May 2001 19:31:35 -0400 From: Jeff Garzik Organization: MandrakeSoft X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.77 [en] (X11; U; Linux 2.4.5-pre3 i686) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Alexander Viro Cc: Linus Torvalds , Ben LaHaise , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, linux-fsdevel@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: Why side-effects on open(2) are evil. (was Re: [RFD w/info-PATCH]device arguments from lookup) In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Are we talking about device arguments just for chrdevs and blkdevs? (ie. drivers) or for regular files too? Speaking about drivers specifically, a controlling miscdev, one per device or one per group of devices depending on your needs, is a much more clean solution for passing ioctl-type data. You are free to come up with whatever method of communication with the driver is most efficient for your needs -- without perverting open(2). Notice also a "metadata miscdev" solves the problem of passing options on open -- just pass those options to the miscdev before you open it... metadata miscdevs are a clean solution to what procfs hacks and ioctls are trying to accomplish. Jeff -- Jeff Garzik | "Do you have to make light of everything?!" Building 1024 | "I'm extremely serious about nailing your MandrakeSoft | step-daughter, but other than that, yes."