On Thu, 24 Jun 1999, Jason Thorpe wrote:

> On Thu, 24 Jun 1999 15:02:25 -0700 (PDT) 
>  Matthew Jacob <mjacob@feral.com> wrote:
> 
>  > I was talking about this on linux-kernel, but it also applies to *BSD...
>  > 
>  > What're folks' motions of a settable system unique identifier, available
>  > prior to mountroot? This identifier has to be 64 bits or better and must
>  > be persistent across reboots.
> 
> ...to be used for...?
> 

Specifically in this case a Node WWN for fibre channel fabrics that does
not depend upon an assigned WWN in any particular Fibre Channel card
(multipathing might make it desirable to have a synthetic Node WWN that
can also be passed to partner systems in  a failover configuration).

More generally a system unique identifier available early (pre mountroot)
could be useful for a number of things. Why're you asking?

-matt