xref: /illumos-gate/usr/src/man/man4fs/devfs.4fs (revision dd72704bd9e794056c558153663c739e2012d721)
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20.Dd November 29, 2021
21.Dt DEVFS 4FS
22.Os
23.Sh NAME
24.Nm devfs
25.Nd Devices file system
26.Sh DESCRIPTION
27The
28.Nm
29filesystem manages a name space of all devices in the operating environment and
30is mounted during boot on the
31.Pa /devices
32name space.
33.Pp
34The
35.Pa /devices
36name space is dynamic and reflects the current state of accessible devices.
37The names of all attached device instances are present under
38.Pa /devices .
39.Pp
40The content under
41.Pa /devices
42is under the exclusive control of the
43.Nm
44filesystem and cannot be changed.
45.Pp
46The system may be configured to include a device in one of two ways:
47.Bl -enum
48.It
49By means of dynamic reconfiguration
50.Pq DR ,
51using, for example,
52.Xr cfgadm 8 .
53Several different hardware buses such as PCIe and USB automatically discover and
54enumerate devices that they encounter.
55.It
56For devices driven by
57.Xr driver.conf 5
58enumeration, edit the
59.Pa driver.conf
60file to add a new entry, then use
61.Xr update_drv 8
62to cause the system to re-read the
63.Pa driver.conf
64file and thereby enumerate the instance.
65.El
66.Pp
67The device may be attached through a number of system calls and programs,
68including
69.Xr open 2 ,
70.Xr stat 2 ,
71and
72.Xr ls 1 .
73During device attach, the device driver typically creates minor nodes
74corresponding to the device via
75.Xr ddi_create_minor_node 9F .
76If the attach is successful, one or more minor nodes referring to the device are
77created under
78.Pa /devices .
79.Pp
80Operations like
81.Xr mknod 2 ,
82.Xr mkdir 2 ,
83and
84.Xr creat 2
85are not supported in
86.Pa /devices .
87.Pp
88This file system is not present in a non-global zone.
89.Sh FILES
90.Bl -tag -width Pa
91.It Pa /devices
92Mount point for
93.Nm
94file system in the global zone.
95.El
96.Sh SEE ALSO
97.Xr vfstab 5 ,
98.Xr devfsadm 8 ,
99.Xr attach 9E
100.Sh NOTES
101The
102.Pa /devices
103name space cannot be unmounted.
104.Pp
105All content at or below the
106.Pa /devices
107name space is an implementation
108artifact and subject to incompatible change or removal without notification.
109Generally, user programs should leverage the device name space under
110.Pa /dev .
111