Bigger process IDs and "dev_t"s (was: Re: RISC v. CISC...)

[David Collier-Brown]

>From article <422 at auspex.UUCP>, by guy at auspex.UUCP (Guy Harris):
[ re major/minor numbers]
|>correct me if i'm wrong, but isn't the <major, minor> manufactured
|>by the client?  <255, index-in-mnttab>?
| 
| The "st_dev" is manufactured by the client, in the fashion you indicate
| (more-or-less - I think it may be different in 4.0 so that multiple
| distributed file systems can be supported); however, the "st_rdev",
| which is what we're talking about, isn't manufactured by the client -
| major/minors for special files living on a server are interpreted in the
| same way as if they were local to the client (literally - the "specfs"
| code handles special files, regardless of whether the special file is
| gotten locally or over NFS).

  That sounds suspiciously like someone forgot that the mapping was
going to be many-to-many and let it be one-to-one for the st_rdev.

--dave c-b
  Any problem in computer science can be solved by using one more
  level of indirection -- attributed to Morven Gentleman, Waterloo.
-- 
 David Collier-Brown.  | yunexus!lethe!dave
 Interleaf Canada Inc. |
 1550 Enterprise Rd.   | HE's so smart he's dumb.
 Mississauga, Ontario  |       --Joyce C-B