Re: CD writing in future Linux (stirring up a hornets' nest)

[Bill Davidsen <davidsen@tmr.com>]

Daniel Barkalow wrote:

> I don't think it needs to be a class, but I think that there should be a 
> single place with a directory for each device that could be what you want, 
> with a file that tells you if it is. That's why I was looking at block/; 
> these things must be block devices, and there aren't an huge number of 
> block devices.
>
> I suppose "grep 1 /sys/block/*/device/dvdwriter" is just as good; I hadn't 
> dug far enough in to realize that the reason I wasn't seeing anything 
> informative in /sys/block/*/device/ was that I didn't have any devices 
> with informative drivers, not that it was actually supposed to only have 
> links to other things.

It would be nice to have one place to go to find burners, and to have 
the model information in that place. I would logically think that place 
is sysfs, and I know the kernel has the information because if I root 
through /proc/bus/usb and /proc/scsi/scsi, and /proc/ide/hd?/model I can 
eventually find out what the system has connected.

I not entirely sure about having classes other than cdrom, just because 
we already have CD, DVD, DVD-DL, and are about to add blue-ray and 
HD-DVD, so if I can tell that it's a removable device which can read 
CDs, the applications have a fighting chance to looking at the device to 
see what it is. As a human I would like the model information because 
the kernel has done the work, why should people have to chase it when it 
could be in one place?

--
   -bill davidsen (davidsen@tmr.com)
"The secret to procrastination is to put things off until the
 last possible moment - but no longer"  -me
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