Re: config(8) - remove 'device'

On Thu, 25 Apr 2024 02:49:25 +0100
Lexi Winter <lexi@le-fay.org> wrote:

> hello,
>
> as older BSD users may remember, 'device' when used in a kernel config
> used to have a fairly specific syntax, e.g.:
>
> device foo0 at pci? irq? ... etc ...
>
> nowdays of course this isn't a thing, you just write:
>
> device foo
>
> so, practically this is no different from writing:
>
> options FOO
>
> i propose to remove the 'device' syntax from config(8) and simply use
> 'options' to include various parts of kernel code in the kernel.
>
> i am prepared to create a patch to do this, but of course, i would
> prefer to find out if people would accept this before putting the effort
> in.
>
> the concrete benefit of this is that we don't have two different
> syntaxes in kernel configs that do exactly the same thing.

I personally like having device, since this tells me that it's a driver
and not an option which affects how the kernel is built, like SCHED_4BSD.

For users who use e.g. GENERIC et al. this change wouldn't matter much.

But for users using custom kernel configuration files, like I do, it would
mean some unnecessary churn.

However, I could live with that if the majority considers this change to
be a good idea.

--
Gary Jennejohn