path: root/usr/src/man/man7/Intro.7

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.Dd January  6, 2020
.Dt INTRO 7
.Os
.Sh NAME
.Nm Intro ,
.Nm intro
.Nd introduction to special files
.Sh DESCRIPTION
This section describes various device and network interfaces available on the
sysstem.
The types of interfaces described include character and block
devices,
.Sy STREAMS
modules, network protocols, file systems, and ioctl requests
for driver subsystems and classes.
.Pp
This section contains the following major collections:
.Bl -tag -width "xxxxx"
.It Pq Sy 7D
The system provides drivers for a variety of hardware devices, such as disk,
magnetic tapes, serial communication lines, mice, and frame buffers, as well
as virtual devices such as pseudo-terminals and windows.
.Pp
This section describes special files that refer to specific hardware
peripherals and device drivers.
.Sy STREAMS
device drivers are also described.
Characteristics of both the hardware device and the corresponding device driver
are discussed where applicable.
.Pp
An application accesses a device through that device's special file.
This
section specifies the device special file to be used to access the device as
well as application programming interface (API) information relevant to the use
of the device driver.
All device special files are located under the
.Pa /devices
directory.
The
.Pa /devices
directory hierarchy attempts to mirror the hierarchy of system
busses, controllers, and devices configured on the system.
Logical device names for special files in
.Pa /devices
are located under the
.Pa /dev
directory.
Although not every special file under
.Pa /devices
will have a corresponding logical entry under
.Pa /dev ,
whenever possible, an
application should reference a device using the logical name for the device.
Logical device names are listed in the
.Sy FILES
section of the page for the device in question.
.Pp
This section also describes driver configuration where applicable.
Many device drivers have a driver configuration file of the form
.Em driver_name Ns \&.conf
associated with them (see
.Xr driver.conf 4 ) .
The configuration information stored in the driver
configuration file is used to configure the driver and the device.
Driver configuration files are located in
.Pa /kernel/drv
and
.Pa /usr/kernel/drv .
Driver configuration files for platform dependent
drivers are located in
.Pa /platform/`uname\ -i`/kernel/drv
where
.Pa `uname\ -i`
is the output of the
.Xr uname 1
command with the
.Fl i
option.
.Pp
Some driver configuration files may contain user configurable properties.
Changes in a driver's configuration file will not take effect until the system
is rebooted or the driver has been removed and re-added (see
.Xr rem_drv 1M
and
.Xr add_drv 1M ) .
.It Pq Sy 7FS
This section describes the programmatic interface for several file systems
supported by SunOS.
.It Pq Sy 7I
This section describes ioctl requests which apply to a class of drivers or
subsystems.
For example, ioctl requests which apply to most tape devices are
discussed in
.Xr mtio 7I .
Ioctl requests relevant to only a specific
device are described on the man page for that device.
The page for the device
in question should still be examined for exceptions to the ioctls listed in
section 7I.
.It Pq Sy 7M
This section describes
.Sy STREAMS
modules.
Note that
.Sy STREAMS
drivers are discussed in section 7D.
.Xr streamio 7I
contains a list of ioctl requests used to manipulate
.Sy STREAMS
modules and interface with the
.Sy STREAMS
framework.
.Xr ioctl 2
requests specific to a
.Sy STREAMS
module will be discussed on the man page for that module.
.It Pq Sy 7P
This section describes various network protocols available in SunOS.
SunOS supports both socket-based and
.Sy STREAMS Ns -based
network communications.
.Pp
The Internet protocol family, described in
.Xr inet 7P ,
is the primary protocol family supported by SunOS, although the system can
support a number of others.
The raw interface provides low-level services, such as
packet fragmentation and reassembly, routing, addressing, and basic transport
for socket-based implementations.
Facilities for communicating using an
Internet-family protocol are generally accessed by specifying the
.Dv AF_INET
address family when binding a socket; see
.Xr socket 3SOCKET
for details.
.Pp
Major protocols in the Internet family include:
.Bl -bullet -offset indent
.It
The Internet Protocol (IP) itself, which supports the universal datagram
format, as described in
.Xr ip 7P .
This is the default protocol for
.Dv SOCK_RAW
type sockets within the
.Dv AF_INET
domain.
.It
The Transmission Control Protocol (TCP); see
.Xr tcp 7P .
This is the default protocol for
.Dv SOCK_STREAM
type sockets.
.It
The User Datagram Protocol (UDP); see
.Xr udp 7P .
This is the default
protocol for
.Dv SOCK_DGRAM
type sockets.
.It
The Address Resolution Protocol (ARP); see
.Xr arp 7P .
.It
The Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP); see
.Xr icmp 7P .
.El
.El
.Sh SEE ALSO
.Xr add_drv 1M ,
.Xr rem_drv 1M ,
.Xr ioctl 2 ,
.Xr Intro 3 ,
.Xr socket 3SOCKET ,
.Xr driver.conf 4 ,
.Xr st 7D ,
.Xr mtio 7I ,
.Xr streamio 7I ,
.Xr arp 7P ,
.Xr icmp 7P ,
.Xr inet 7P ,
.Xr ip 7P ,
.Xr tcp 7P ,
.Xr udp 7P
.Pp
.%T System Administration Guide: IP Services
.Pp
.%T STREAMS Programming Guide
.Pp
.%T Writing Device Drivers