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From: wes@indirect.com (Barnacle Wes)
Subject: Re: How to write a driver...
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Date: Tue, 8 Nov 1994 03:15:13 GMT
References: <1994Nov3.200755.3849@rhrk.uni-kl.de> <39ei1e$nqc@news.cc.utah.edu> <1994Nov5.231633.13495@rhrk.uni-kl.de>
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weber@rhrk.uni-kl.de (Christoph Weber-Fahr [KIT]) writes:
] I was thinking about having a look at the interface for NIC drivers
] in FreeBSD and maybe doing some programming. Since I only have general
] Unix programming Experience, can somebody suggest literure to get
] started ? Or is reading the source code the only entry point to get
] information on the driver interface in the OS ?
By way of reply, terry@cs.weber.edu (Terry Lambert) smarted off:
> My perpetual suggestion on this is Novell NetWare Server ODI drivers.
> They are 32 bit drivers.
To which KIT replied:
: Hm... while I'm always grateful for good advice, I'm afraid I have phrased
: the question wrongly (or maybe I didn't understand the answer... :-).
:
: I am indeed looking for information on drivers for
: FreeBSD, an would appreciate if somebody good point me to some starting
: points for reading.
You didn't understand the answer, because it was intentionally
obfuscated. Terry happens to work for that N-company, and seems
to think there is some value in their work... ;^)
> Never write another ethernet driver as long as you live unless you work
> for a card vender. 8-).
^^^^^^ Spelling error! You've read JMJr too much! ;^)
: Oh well... no, my interest is not an ethernet driver. And since nobody
: seems to able to convince IBM, SMC or TCC to write FreeBSD drivers for
: their cards, I guess ther's not much of an alternative around.
Since when does NIC != Ethernet for FreeBSD? Are you wanting to
produce token-ring drivers? Arcnet? (gag!) Or just "generic"
driver study? Your original message specifically stated NIC drivers.
Terry does present an interesting point here, though. Instead of
writing the next great NIC driver for FreeBSD, just write a kernel
segment that can load (and link an et pseudo-ethernet driver to)
an ODI driver for DOS. Terry, of course, is the logical choice
for this work, but he's in the process of moving. Any other takers?
Wes Peters