From owner-cvs-all Mon Nov 15 0:30:34 1999 Delivered-To: cvs-all@freebsd.org Received: from gratis.grondar.za (gratis.grondar.za [196.7.18.133]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 14AA714C2C; Mon, 15 Nov 1999 00:29:46 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from mark@grondar.za) Received: from grondar.za (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by gratis.grondar.za (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id KAA32612; Mon, 15 Nov 1999 10:28:53 +0200 (SAST) (envelope-from mark@grondar.za) Message-Id: <199911150828.KAA32612@gratis.grondar.za> To: Bruce Evans Cc: Peter Wemm , Garrett Wollman , Kazutaka YOKOTA , cvs-committers@FreeBSD.org, cvs-all@FreeBSD.org Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/sys/dev/syscons scmouse.c src/sys/i386/conf options.i386 src/sys/alpha/conf options.alpha Date: Mon, 15 Nov 1999 10:28:52 +0200 From: Mark Murray Sender: owner-cvs-all@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk > > I would think a sysctl option would be better still as that's easily > > changed at runtime.. > > This should be an ioctl. Yukk! "ioctls are the garbage cans of system calls" - Kirk McKusick > sysctl(8) and sysctlbyname(3) are not suitable for device control since > the interface that makes them easy to use for one-off things makes them > hard to use for arrays of things. In order to use an ioctl, you need to write nasty looking code, and in cases like this, that ends up being horrors like rndcontrol(8). One of the nice things about UNIX is its extremely general-purpose tools, and these one-off ioctl-drivers break that. M -- Mark Murray Join the anti-SPAM movement: http://www.cauce.org To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe cvs-all" in the body of the message