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Date: Tue, 17 Oct 1995 11:04:05 +1000
From: Bruce Evans <bde@zeta.org.au>
Message-Id: <199510170104.LAA16860@godzilla.zeta.org.au>
To: bde@zeta.org.au, mark@grondar.za
Subject: Re: Creating a /dev/random
Cc: hackers@FreeBSD.org
Sender: owner-hackers@FreeBSD.org
Precedence: bulk

>> To avoid this, use the existing buffer `zbuf', which is freed correctly.
>> There is no need for another variable - local variables are per process.
                                           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>> Perhaps `zbuf' should be renamed `buf'.

>I don't understand something here - what happens if the one process is
>reading both /dev/zero and /dev/random? will the two not then try to
>share buf/zbuf and screw up?

See above

>> is inelegant anyway.  Perhaps there should be a zeroout() function to
>> optimize this important (;-) device.

>...or only c bytes should be zero'ed out?

Good idea.

Bruce