Node(4) Node(4)
NAME
Node - device node definitions for a device driver
SYNOPSIS
Node
DESCRIPTION
One of the Installable driver/Tunable Parameters kernel
configuration files, a Node file contains definitions used by
the idmknod(1M) command to create the device nodes (block and
character special files) associated with a device driver
module. When the Node component of a module's Driver Software
Package (DSP) is installed, idinstall(1M) stores the driver's
Node file information in /etc/conf/node.d/module-name, where
module-name is the name of the driver being installed.
Package scripts should never access /etc/conf/node.d files
directly; the idinstall command should be used instead.
Each device node for the driver is specified on a separate
line of the form:
module-name node-name type minor user group permissions
All fields are positional and must be separated by white
space. The first four fields are required; the last three
fields are optional. Blank lines and lines beginning with
``#'' or ``*'' are considered comments and are ignored.
The node file fields are:
module-name
Identifies the device to which this node applies.
The name must match the name specified for the
device in the module-name field of the Master(4)
file. The device must be defined as a block and/or
character device (Master file characteristics flag
set to b or c). When the device node is created,
the Master file bmaj or cmaj field values will be
used as the major number for the created node.
node-name Specifies the name of the Node file to be created,
relative to /dev. If this field specifies a
pathname containing subdirectories, idmknod will
automatically create these subdirectories.
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Node(4) Node(4)
type Identifies the type of node to be created. The
character b indicates that the node is a block
device; the character c indicates character device.
The value for this field must match one of the flags
specified for the device in the mdevice file
characteristics field.
In cases where a device has multiple major numbers,
the Node file type field must provide additional
information used to identify which device nodes
belong to which major. To do this, you specify a
value of the form:
type:offset
where type is the type of node (b or c) and offset
gives the offset to this particular device within
the range of major numbers specified for this device
type in the Master file. For example, the value
``c:2'' refers to a character major offset 2, which,
given a major device type specification of ``15-
18'', would translate to a character major number of
17.
minor Specifies the minor device number. This field can
be coded in one of three ways:
If this field specifies a (decimal) numeric
value, the value is used as the minor device
number for the created node.
If this field specifies a non-numeric value,
the value is assumed to be a request for a
clone node, and the minor number will be set
to the major number of the device whose
module-name is the value of the field.
If this field specifies a non-numeric value
and the Node file type field specifies an
offset value, the offset will be applied to
the minor number instead of the major number
when the node is created.
user This field is optional. If used, it specifies the
user ID of the user that will own the node to be
created. The user ID must be specified as decimal
integer value. If user is specified, group and
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Node(4) Node(4)
permissions must be specified.
group This field is optional. If used, it specifies the
group ID of the group that will own the node to be
created. The group ID must be specified as decimal
integer value. If group is specified, user and
permissions must be specified.
permissions
This field is optional. If used, it specifies, in
octal form, the permissions for the node to be
created, as given to the chmod(1) command (example:
0777). If permissions is specified, user and group
must be specified.
USAGE
Examples
The following sample Node file entries are provided as coding
examples.
Make /dev/tty00 for character device asy using minor device 0:
iasy tty00 c 0
Make /dev/net/nau/clone for character device clone. The minor
device number is set to the major device number of device nau:
clone net/nau/clone c nau
Make /dev/imx586_1 for character device clone. The minor
device number is set to the major device number of device
imx586 plus 1:
clone imx586_1 c:1 imx586
REFERENCES
idinstall(1M), idmknod(1M)
Copyright 1994 Novell, Inc. Page 3