devmatch(8) committed ....

[Chris H]

On Mon, 25 Dec 2017 11:57:10 -0700 "Warner Losh" <imp at bsdimp.com> said

> I've committed devmatch(8) to the tree in r327176. It's a building block
> for automating the loading of modules. While we can load modules today by
> adding FOO_load=YES to loader.conf, there's no easy way to load only the
> modules you need based on the hardware you have in the system. devmatch(8)
> provides the base framework to allow one to do that. It does this my
> looking at the PNP tables recorded in /boot/kernel/linker.hints.
I've been *going* to something like this for a long time.
Thank you!!!

> 
> The version I've committed doesn't have the devd nor the rc.d integration.
> I've committed it for people to play with and give me feedback while those
> parts are finalized (and while other bugs are fixed). I don't intend to
> commit them until the kinks are worked out.
> 
> Some notes:
> 
> (1) You'll need a newly built kernel. Older kernels have minor bugs that
> allowed the terminating sentinel to be included in linker hints. All known
> oens, at least for amd64, have been fixed.
> (2) Lots and lots of drivers need to have their plug and play tables
> decorated. This is where I need people's help. I'll be writing up something
> for those that want to help. ISAPNP, PC Card and USB drivers already have
> this data. A few PCI drivers have it, and almost no ACPI drivers. The data
> is generally there, just not properly decorated for devmatch(8) and
> kldxref(8) to do their thing.
> (3) There's an issue with the USB pnp data. It's too long for the current
> devinfo(3) interfaces. I have fixes in the works to correct this. I could
> just bump the limits, but I want to do something more general and long term.
> (4) The end game for this is a GENERIC with most of the drivers removed
> that loads drivers automatically. Bootable storage drivers will have to
> remain for now until the loader can make use of this code.This is why the
> warning about hinted ISA devices went into the tree this week.
> (5) modules will print more than once. also the if_em/if_igb driver is a
> hard link so both of those will always print.
> 
> Please send me your feedback. Happy Holidays!
Right back at you, and thanks again!

--Chris
> 
> Warner