[DEVELOPERS] [Fwd: /dev/static/.dev has been removed]

Hopefully the first of many.

James

-------- Forwarded Message --------
From: Scott James Remnant <scott@ubuntu.com>
To: ubuntu-devel@lists.ubuntu.com
Subject: /dev/static/.dev has been removed
Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 12:55:46 +0000

During Ubuntu's development we've transitioned from a static /dev
installed as part of the base system to a dynamic /dev populated on boot
according to the hardware you have installed.

With the dynamic /dev, it's not necessary for packages to create devices
in their maintainer scripts. However some still wished to do so in case
you uninstalled udev (an action not supported in Ubuntu, but supported
in Debian).

These packages could access the original static /dev through
the /dev/.static/dev path. As many noted, this broke when the kernel
gained the ability to have separate access for bind mounts, and this was
actually read-only.

In agreement with Debian, this path has now been removed. It is no
longer possible to access the old static /dev tree while udev is
running.

Fixes should be available for any package from Debian, in general the
rules are:

- Packages should not depend on makedev
- Packages should not call MAKEDEV or mknod in maintainer scripts

- Packages may install udev rules to change the ownership, group or
mode of devices
- Packages may use chown, chgrp and chmod in maintainer scripts to
apply these new permissions if the device already exists
(this is preferred to attempting to "trigger" the device)

- Packages should not install udev rules that change the name of a
device. If the name is wrong, the rule should be submitted to udev
upstream for inclusion by default.

Scott

--
Ubuntu-news-team mailing list
Ubuntu-news-team@lists.ubuntu.com
Modify settings or unsubscribe at: https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-news-team