*BSD News Article 37448


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From: wes@indirect.com (Barnacle Wes)
Subject: Re: FreeBSD 2.0 - a status report.
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Date: Wed, 2 Nov 1994 16:07:31 GMT
References: <38j31l$6nf@agate.berkeley.edu> <38to0m$k6d@fw.novatel.ca> <3937bd$l19@masala.cc.uh.edu> <395qr4$msb@pdq.coe.montana.edu> <396peg$f41@orion.cc.andrews.edu>
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Andrew Gillham (gillham@andrews.edu) wrote:
: Here's my opinion:  If you want MSDOSFS, run MSDOS... :-) :-)

I feel the same about PC emulators under UNIX.  Use os-bs or something
like that...  ;^)


: What I would like to hear more about, is the LKM-based device drivers
: in FreeBSD v2.0!

Cool.  Is this based on the work Terry Lambert did on NetBSD 0.9?

: we really need though is for FreeBSD & NetBSD to use the *same* LKM
: drivers, so the master-hacker-device-driver-writer only has to create
: one LKM for both OSes. (or source for one LKM at least, I'm not
: advocating object-only drivers)  

Definitely.

: Some questions:
: [...]
: 2.  Can "boot device" drivers be LKMs with some sort of
:     "pre-linking" or "binding" of the LKM to the kernel file?
:     i.e. bootstrap loads /*bsd, jumps into kernel which then
:     initializes LKM drivers that are bound into the /*bsd file,
:     which then probe/attach/mount the root device?
: 3.  Is #2 a stupid idea?  Seems like it would be slick for
:     creating a "kernel link kit" similar to how the XFree86
:     server link kit works.  For a binary install, you wouldn't
:     even need the kernel source, just the "core", the LKMs and
:     the "binder" utility.

Solaris (and presumably other SVR4 systems) do this, with some
limitations.  It tends to make the boot loader program kindof
monstrous, but *all* boot loaders are beasts, aren't they?

	Wes Peters