Subject: Re: dev_t changes & partitions
To: Manuel Bouyer <bouyer@antioche.lip6.fr>
From: Manuel Bouyer <bouyer@antioche.lip6.fr>
List: tech-kern
Date: 01/16/1998 11:13:29
On Jan 16, I wrote
> On Jan 15, Charles M. Hannum wrote
> > If you did, then it should be obvious that the (old, which I
> > pointed out in text you didn't quote) MAKEDEV just wrote a `32-bit'
> > device node using the old major and minor number.  (So it's now
> > pointing to the wrong disk device.  When I run newfs(8), it blows away
> > my other disk.)
> > 
> 
> If we renumber the majors (which I think should be done at the same time),
> it's likely that the nodes created don't point to a disk driver any more
> (or at last it should be made so). So you don't trash your disk, but your
> machine will not reboot. 

Hum, I think I forgot one point here: new major numbers will be > 255, 
in the MAKEDEV too. So an old MAKEDEV will create majors < 255, which
are valid old-style devs, with either the old or new mknod. That's the
important point of Charles's proposal.

--
Manuel Bouyer, LIP6, Universite Paris VI.           Manuel.Bouyer@lip6.fr
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