devlinks - adds /dev entries for miscellaneous devices and
pseudo-devices
/usr/sbin/devlinks [-d] [-r rootdir] [-t table-file]
devfsadm(8) is now the preferred command for /dev
and /devices and should be used instead of devlinks.
devlinks creates symbolic links from the /dev
directory tree to the actual block- and character-special device nodes under
the /devices directory tree. The links are created according to
specifications found in the table-file (by default
/etc/devlink.tab).
devlinks is called each time the system is
reconfiguration-booted, and can only be run after drvconfig(8) is
run.
The table-file (normally /etc/devlink.tab) is an
ASCII file, with one line per record. Comment lines, which must contain a
hash character (`#') as their first character, are allowed. Each
entry must contain at least two fields, but may contain three fields. Fields
are separated by single TAB characters.
The fields are:
devfs-spec
Specification of devinfo nodes that will have links
created for them. This specification consists of one or more keyword-value
pairs, where the keyword is separated from the value by an equal-sign
(`
='), and keyword-value pairs are separated from one another by
semicolons.
The possible keywords are:
type
name
The name of the node. This is the portion of the
/devices tree entry name that occurs before the first `@' or
`:' character.
addr[n]
The address portion of a node name. This is the portion
of a node name that occurs between the `@' and the `:'
characters. It is possible that a node may have a name without an address
part, which is the case for many of the pseudo-device nodes. If a number is
given after the addr it specifies a match of a particular
comma-separated subfield of the address field: addr1 matches the first
subfield, addr2 matches the second, and so on. addr0 is the same
as addr and matches the whole field.
minor[n]
The minor portion of a node name − the portion of
the name after the `:'. As with addr above, a number after the
minor keyword specifies a subfield to match.
Of these four specifications, only the type specification
must always be present.
name
Specification of the
/dev links that correspond to
the devinfo nodes. This field allows
devlinks to determine matching
/dev names for the
/devices nodes it has found. The
specification of this field uses escape-sequences to allow portions of the
/devices name to be included in the
/dev name,
or to
allow a counter to be used in creating node names. If a counter is used to
create a name, the portion of the name before the counter must be specified
absolutely, and all names in the
/dev/-subdirectory that match (up to
and including the counter) are considered to be subdevices of the same device.
This means that they should all point to the same directory,
name and
address under the
/devices/-tree
The possible escape-sequences are:
\D
Substitute the device-name (name) portion of the
corresponding devinfo node-name.
\An
Substitute the nth component of the address
component of the corresponding devinfo node name. Sub-components are separated
by commas, and sub-component 0 is the whole address
component.
\Mn
Substitute the nth sub-component of the
minor component of the corresponding devinfo node name. Sub-components
are separated by commas, and sub-component 0 is the whole minor
component.
\Nn
Substitute the value of a 'counter' starting at
n.
There can be only one counter for each dev-spec, and counter-values will be
selected so they are as low as possible while not colliding with
already-existing link names.
In a dev-spec the counter sequence should not be followed
by a digit, either explicitly or as a result of another escape-sequence
expansion. If this occurs, it would not be possible to correctly match
already-existing links to their counter entries, since it would not be
possible to unambiguously parse the already-existing /dev-name.
extra-dev-link
Optional specification of an extra /dev link that
points to the initial /dev link (specified in field 2). This field may
contain a counter escape-sequence (as described for the dev-spec
field) but may not contain any of the other escape-sequences. It provides a
way to specify an alias of a particular /dev name.
The following options are supported:
-d
Debugging mode − print out all devinfo
nodes found, and indicate what links would be created, but do not do
anything.
-r rootdir
Use rootdir as the root of the /dev and
/devices directories under which the device nodes and links are
created. Changing the root directory does not change the location of the
/etc/devlink.tab default table, nor is the root directory applied to
the filename supplied to the -t option.
-t table-file
Set the table file used by devlinks to specify the
links that must be created. If this option is not given,
/etc/devlink.tab is used. This option gives a way to instruct
devlinks just to perform a particular piece of work, since just the
links-types that devlinks is supposed to create can be specified in a
command-file and fed to devlinks.
If devlinks finds an error in a line of the
table-file it prints a warning message on its standard output and
goes on to the next line in the table-file without performing any of
the actions specified by the erroneous rule.
If it cannot create a link for some filesystem-related reason it
prints an error-message and continues with the current rule.
If it cannot read necessary data it prints an error message and
continues with the next table-file line.
Example 1 Using the /etc/devlink.tab Fields
The following are examples of the /etc/devlink.tab
fields:
type=pseudo;name=win win\M0
type=ddi_display framebuffer/\M0 fb\N0
The first example states that all devices of type pseudo
with a name component of win will be linked to
/dev/winx, where x is the minor-component of the
devinfo-name (this is always a single-digit number for the win
driver).
The second example states that all devinfo nodes of type
ddi_display will be linked to entries under the
/dev/framebuffer directory, with names identical to the entire minor
component of the /devices name. In addition an extra link will be
created pointing from /dev/fbn to the entry under
/dev/framebuffer. This entry will use a counter to end the name.
/dev
entries for the miscellaneous devices for general
use
/devices
device nodes
/etc/devlink.tab
the default rule-file
It is very easy to construct mutually-contradictory link
specifications, or specifications that can never be matched. The program
does not check for these conditions.