[RFC] randomized major and minor numbers

[Carl-Daniel Hailfinger <c-d.hailfinger.kernel.2004@gmx.net>]

Hi,

IIRC it was debated during 2.5 development to make the kernel
hand out randomized major/minor numbers to better test handling
of dynamic major/minor numbers. Is there a patch available
to test?

Background: I want to make sure that userspace can handle
arbitrary device numbers for disks in my quest for a unified
/dev/diskXpY naming and numbering scheme. This would unify
all the different naming schemes (hd*, sd*, ub*, etc.),
remove arbitrary limits like 15 partitions max on SCSI disks
and achieve most of this in userspace with udev.

In the end, there would be only one block major number >256
with dynamically allocated major numbers for all disks in the
system if LANANA agrees with such a concept. Why would I
want a major >256 registered? Because that way we can make
sure the software accessing these devices can handle a large
dev_t and it doesn't only work by luck.

Comments?

Regards,
Carl-Daniel
-- 
http://www.hailfinger.org/