In message <200512021607.LAA18254@Sparkle.Rodents.Montreal.QC.CA>, der Mouse wr
ites:
>>> I think that doing this is cleaner by using sysctl(), much like how
>>> we use sysctl() for the network PCBs, for example.
>> Let's see.  You want to read and write control and bulk data, from a
>> special-to-the-kernel node in a hierarchical namespace.  This totally
>> smells like reinventing /dev.
>
>It is.  sysctl is.  I've often considered building a sysctlfs, which
>would present the sysctl hierarchy and data in a filesystem form.
>

Very much the Plan 9 approach -- put stuff in the file system, where we 
have generic tools for talking to them, and where we have 
well-understood permission mechanisms.

		--Steven M. Bellovin, http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb