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From: Terry Lambert <terry@lambert.org>
Message-Id: <199604022141.OAA17274@phaeton.artisoft.com>
Subject: Re: Hacked kernel with option to disable "green" mode
To: Brett_Glass@ccgate.infoworld.com (Brett Glass)
Date: Tue, 2 Apr 1996 14:41:09 -0700 (MST)
Cc: terry@lambert.org, bde@zeta.org.au, freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org,
        freebsd-hardware@freebsd.org
In-Reply-To: <9603028284.AA828478763@ccgate.infoworld.com> from "Brett Glass" at Apr 2, 96 01:53:41 pm
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> > It should be a standalone command using the wdcontrol()
> > interface
> 
> This would prevent any user with a disk like the ST5660A from being able to
> install FreeBSD. Inactivity timeouts need to be turned off early, before
> the drive can spin down. A kernel config option can do this, but a user
> command might be executed too late (and wouldn't be executed during an
> install).

It could be executed by the user early on.  But it probably wouldn't
be.

We aren't talking about "fixing" the problem, we're talking about
providing an option.  It just so happens that the option is a kludge
fix for some systems.

Actually "fixing" the problem requires making the driver aware of drive
spin downs and making it deal with it transparently instead of screwing
up by passing an error to higher level code.

Disabling the spindown is not what I'd call "making the code 'green
aware'"...


					Terry Lambert
					terry@lambert.org
---
Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present
or previous employers.