Re: flexfax: faxgetty and internet simultaneously

[Nico Kadel-Garcia <raoul@cirl.meei.harvard.edu>]

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On Sat, 14 Aug 1999, David Woolley wrote:

> > It's close enough: in terms of software locking the serial port, the
> > symbolic link should act the same way. In terms of lock files, they
> > can be addressed as /var/lock/LCK..modem as easily as
> > /var/lock/LCK..ttyS1, and it's a vastly easier way to configure serial
> 
> But, whereas /dev/modem accesses the same inode (and device) as
> /dev/ttyS1, /var/local/LCK..modem is a completely  different file
> form /var/local/LCK..ttyS1, so any software using the normal conventions
> will fail to see the /dev/modem software.
> 
> This is Microsoft like thinking; make things easy for the simple case,
> and totally confusing for the general one.

Gentleman, please: let's not descend to calling each other Micro$oft-like,
or we'll have to invent a new form of Godwin's law  (i.e., any Usenet
discussion will eventually involve someone being called a Nazi).

The problem that using /dev/modem as a symbolic link is that it is an
easy mnemonic for default configuration of modem-handling software.
RedHat Linux, at least, has used this for some time in the modemcfg
control-panel tool for setting that link, and in the minicom and other
software. The actual name of the normally used serial port is extremely
OS dependent, and can change for all sorts of reasons. But this is 
*precisely* what a symbolic link is for! It provides an easier-to-find
and remember pathway to the same file (in this case, a serial port).

It is completely reasonable to use the device names of /dev/ttyS1
or whatever instead: but when walking up to one of several maintained
Linux boxes, it's a lot easier to just remember "/dev/modem" and work
with that....

			Nico Kadel-Garcia
			Senior Engineer, CIRL 
			Mass. Eye and Ear Infirmary
			raoul@cirl.meei.harvard.edu

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