Subject: Re: The devvp branch
To: None <fvdl@wasabisystems.com, tech-kern@netbsd.org>
From: None <eeh@netbsd.org>
List: tech-kern
Date: 10/02/2001 00:18:14
|
| As you might have seen, I've been working on the thorpej-devvp branch
| that Jason started a while ago.
|
| On this branch, the dev_t argument to most device entry functions has
| been replaced by a struct vnode *, pointing to the vnode associated
| with the device. The exceptions are the 'dump' and 'psize' entries
| for block devices, which still take a dev_t. Replacing this with
| a vnode pointer is hard to do, and not really desirable at this time.

I understand why you want to get rid of dev_t, especially for the 
cdevsw/bdevsw operations, but why replace that with a vnode pointer?
Those routines really want to get at the device's softc, which is a 
device pointer.  What was the rationale behind that?  

If a kernel routine or some other driver wanted to access a device,
all it really needed to do is locate the appropriate devsw and generate
the correct dev_t.  How does this work with the new scheme?

Eduardo