Re: cannot create partition entries for /dev/ad3

Poul-Henning Kamp writes:
>In message <3F825BED.8080002_at_ecsd.com>, ecsd writes:
>>with MAKEDEV gone, the mystery is how to use devfs.
>>In /dev I have ad3, but I cannot "disklabel -e /dev/ad3s1d",
>>nor can I "disklabel -e /dev/ad3", and I can't determine
>>what minor device numbers to assign for mknod to create
>>the partition entries.
>
>Try
>	bsdlabel -w /dev/ad3

bsdlabel does not exist on my system as a preinstalled script or program,
or as a port:

FreeBSD 5.0-RELEASE #2

MAKEDEV was the cheese since year zero. Removing it as of 5.0 invalidates everything
written about creating devices in everything in print and in almost all of the online
documentation on freebsd.org. Documentation for devfs is nearly nonexistent. The man
page suggests that now I will be learning a language (!) for specifying what devices
to create, based in some hazy way on the kernel config file. Something I've read
suggests that "devices will be created as needed" using devfs.

I looked for any discussion of devfs in the Release Notes for 5.0 and 5.1 and found
that it was only barely mentioned.

With such a major change - literally invalidating every How-To written to date about
devices - where is a discursive description of the workings of devfs? Might it be a good
idea to provide a stub /dev/MAKEDEV, so that such a thing would exist, for people still
buying FreeBSD books off the shelf today? That script could either just say "sorry,
MAKEDEV is replaced by devfs(8)", or it could use devfs to emulate what MAKEDEV did,
which I think is the preferred option to support the majority of users who'll be happy
when they can use the parlor table book of bsd to set up their home PC as a DVD player.

I have a WintTV card that should be /dev/bktr0. I have tried using "devfs" to remedy this:

host[157] # fxtv
open("/dev/bktr0") failed: No such file or directory

but I cannot see what to do, precisely and in order, to make the device exist.

I can't tell if use of devfs makes permanent changes to a system definition file
so that changes are retained across reboots. I don't see a reference to a system
file I would modify to make devices exist. The man page for devfs does not provide
an example of creating a device - or if it does, it doesn't explain what /other/
commands are needed in tandem to make the device usable (extant.) If devfs will create
devices to correspond to devices defined in the kernel config file, then where is the
bktr device?

Is there any more comprehensive documentation for the DEVFS and devfs and usage
to replace MAKEDEV? As is, I have devices I need to access but can't. Have I left
something out of the kernel gen process? Is 5.0 screwed? ARGH!!