X-Git-Url: http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/ucgi/~ianmdlvl/git?p=elogind.git;a=blobdiff_plain;f=README;h=b4c0ee051faa4f014b6fb454ea7b999d2326b7db;hp=ecb520b2fda066a4aa725ad1b75418f8d578f0d5;hb=456719b6f941d917e7c9444fa6149f35a188d785;hpb=8553cf06b93739c859534a85cc7ef1bdd8e33a5c diff --git a/README b/README index ecb520b2f..b4c0ee051 100644 --- a/README +++ b/README @@ -1,48 +1,66 @@ udev - userspace device management -For more information see the files in the docs/ directory. +Integrating udev in the system has complex dependencies and differs from distro +to distro. All major distros depend on udev these days and the system may not +work without a properly installed version. The upstream udev project does not +recommend to replace a distro's udev installation with the upstream version. -Important Note: - Integrating udev in the system has complex dependencies and differs from distro - to distro. All major distros depend on udev these days and the system may not - work without a properly installed version. The upstream udev project does not - recommend to replace a distro's udev installation with the upstream version. +Tools and rules shipped by udev are not public API and may change at any time. +Never call any private tool in /lib/udev from any external application, it might +just go away in the next release. Access to udev information is only offered +by udevadm and libudev. Tools and rules in /lib/udev and the entire content of +/dev/.udev/ is private to udev. Requirements: - - Version 2.6.22 of the Linux kernel for reliable operation of this release of - udev. The kernel must not use the CONFIG_SYSFS_DEPRECATED* option. + - Version 2.6.25 of the Linux kernel with sysfs, procfs, signalfd, inotify, + unix domain sockets, networking and hotplug enabled: + CONFIG_HOTPLUG=y + CONFIG_UEVENT_HELPER_PATH="" + CONFIG_NET=y + CONFIG_UNIX=y + CONFIG_SYSFS=y + CONFIG_SYSFS_DEPRECATED*=n + CONFIG_PROC_FS=y + CONFIG_TMPFS=y + CONFIG_TMPFS_POSIX_ACL=y + CONFIG_INOTIFY=y + CONFIG_SIGNALFD=y - - The kernel must have sysfs, unix domain sockets and networking enabled. - Unix domain sockets (CONFIG_UNIX) as a loadable kernel module is not + - For reliable operation, the kernel must not use the CONFIG_SYSFS_DEPRECATED* + option. + + - Unix domain sockets (CONFIG_UNIX) as a loadable kernel module is not supported. - The proc filesystem must be mounted on /proc/, the sysfs filesystem must be mounted at /sys/. No other locations are supported by udev. - The system must have the following group names resolvable at udev startup: - disk cdrom floppy tape audio video lp tty kmem + disk, cdrom, floppy, tape, audio, video, lp, tty, dialout, kmem. Especially in LDAP setups, it is required, that getgrnam() is able to resolve - these group names while no network is available. + these group names with only the rootfs mounted, and while no network is + available. + + - To build all udev extras, libacl, libglib2, libusb, usbutils, pciutils, + gperf are needed. These dependencies can be disabled with the + --disable-extras option. Operation: Udev creates and removes device nodes in /dev/, based on events the kernel sends out on device discovery or removal. - - Very early in the boot process, the /dev/ directory should get a 'tmpfs' - filesystem mounted, which is populated from scratch by udev. Created nodes - or changed permissions will not survive a reboot, which is intentional. + - Early in the boot process, the /dev/ directory should get a 'tmpfs' + filesystem mounted, which is maintained by udev. Created nodes or changed + permissions will not survive a reboot, which is intentional. - The content of /lib/udev/devices/ directory which contains the nodes, symlinks and directories, which are always expected to be in /dev, should be copied over to the tmpfs mounted /dev, to provide the required nodes to initialize udev and continue booting. - - The old hotplug helper /sbin/hotplug should be disabled on bootup, before - actions like loading kernel modules are taken, which may cause a lot of - events. - - - The udevd daemon must be started on bootup to receive netlink uevents - from the kernel driver core. + - The old hotplug helper /sbin/hotplug should be disabled in the kernel + configuration, it is not needed, and may render the system unusable + because of a fork-bombing behavior. - All kernel events are matched against a set of specified rules in /lib/udev/rules.d/ which make it possible to hook into the event