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From: ark@alice.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: /dev/stdin:  why not call it "-"?
Message-ID: <6991@alice.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 16-Jun-87 15:08:57 EDT
Article-I.D.: alice.6991
Posted: Tue Jun 16 15:08:57 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 18-Jun-87 03:45:32 EDT
References: <7359@brl-adm.ARPA> <5856@brl-smoke.ARPA> <15318@onfcanim.UUCP> <1098@hropus.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Liberty Corner NJ
Lines: 19

In article <1098@hropus.UUCP>, ka@hropus.UUCP writes:
> Of course this requires that your programs be recompiled if you don't
> have shared libraries, but it's a lot cleaner than mucking around with
> file descriptors from within a device driver.  Even if you want a kernel
> solution and prefer the name "/dev/stdin" I would still be inclined to
> stick a check in nami rather than using a device driver, just as a matter
> of style.

It depends on what you want.  If you want to turn "-" into a reserved
name, fine.  But while you're at it, why not build the names of all
special files into the kernel?  The reason, of course, is that the list
of names is open-ended, so it would be necessary to change nami every
time you wanted to add a new special file.

I therefore think, just as a matter of style, that it's better to
use the same mechanism for "/dev/stdin" that one uses for, say,
"/dev/mem" -- a new major device number, a new entry in the switch
table, and then use mknod to create special files with whatever name
you like.