> On a somewhat related flag day note, how much of a flag day would
> changing major and minor sizes cause?  [...]  From what I've seen,
> NetBSD uses an 8 bit major and an 8 bit minor, [...]

What you've seen is out of date.  Check out <sys/types.h>.  Here's what
it is in a slightly out-of-date source tree; -current is similar
(appears identical to a quick eyeball scan):

#if !defined(_POSIX_SOURCE) && !defined(_XOPEN_SOURCE)
/* Major, minor numbers, dev_t's. */
#define	major(x)	((int32_t)((((x) & 0x000fff00) >>  8)))
#define	minor(x)	((int32_t)((((x) & 0xfff00000) >> 12) | \
				   (((x) & 0x000000ff) >>  0)))
#define	makedev(x,y)	((dev_t)((((x) <<  8) & 0x000fff00) | \
				 (((y) << 12) & 0xfff00000) | \
				 (((y) <<  0) & 0x000000ff)))
#endif

					der Mouse

			       mouse@rodents.montreal.qc.ca
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