Writing Device Drivers?

[Benjamin Perrault]

Hi all.

Just for reference, how difficult is it to write device drivers for
IRIX versus other UNIXs (Namely Solaris and Linux)?
I just finished reading the O2 Device Driver Programming Manual, and it
doesn't seem horribly bad. Do the contents of that manual apply to
writing device drivers on say, an Octane for example? I working on a
project that requires my to write some SCSI Driver stuff for a project
hear at school, and an Octane will be what I'll working with. Since I
have the hardware all speced out, I just need to build a driver for it.
Any comments from experience or help would be appreciated.

Thanks Much,

Benjamin Perrault
Western Michigan University
Computer Science Department
Email: ben.pe...@wmich.edu
Phone: (616) 387-1403

[Alexis Cousein]

Benjamin Perrault wrote:
>
> Hi all.
>
> Just for reference, how difficult is it to write device drivers for
> IRIX versus other UNIXs (Namely Solaris and Linux)?

Relatively easy. In 6.5, there are also quite a few user-level libraries
that you can use (and that makes it a lot easier than if you have to
write a kernel-level driver).

If you have a kernel-level device driver, the stuff to get devices into
the hardware graph may sometimes be a bit hairy (but elegant ;) ),
though.

--
<standard disclaimer: these are my personal views, not SGI's>
Alexis Cousein a...@brussels.sgi.com
Systems Engineer SGI Belgium

[Richard Masoner]

In article <37E8C4DC...@wmich.edu>,
Benjamin Perrault <ben.pe...@wmich.edu> writes:

> Just for reference, how difficult is it to write device drivers for
> IRIX versus other UNIXs (Namely Solaris and Linux)?

I've been writing/maintaining SCSI target drivers (and other drivers)
for IRIX for six years now. IMHO, SCSI drivers are easier in IRIX than
in Solaris or Linux (I've messed with them as well as AIX, Next, and a
few others).

The hardware graph information can be a bit tricky to understand, but
once you've grasped the concept and have figured out the nuances
between all the functions you use for manipulating the hwgraph it's all
really very cool.

I own an IRIX device driver mailing list. Look at
http://www.prairienet.org/~rmasoner/iris-garden for more information.
There are some developers on that list, so feel free to post your
questions there. It's an extremely quiescient list right now, so
I'm sure there are people willing to jump at the chance to help
somebody.

--
Richard Masoner <rich...@dgii.com> Digi International