1.155. udev

Updated udev packages that fix several bugs and add various enhancements are now available.

The udev packages implement a dynamic device-directory, providing only the devices present on the system. This dynamic directory runs in user-space, dynamically creates and removes devices, provides consistent naming, and a user-space API. udev replaces devfs, providing greater hot plug functionality.

These updated udev packages provide fixes for the following bugs:

* Previously, the udev helper application 'vol_id' ran several times if a device was unreadable. This caused a massive delay for the bootup process on some machines. With this update, 'vol_id' checks whether a device is readable only once and no longer causes a delay. ( BZ#456447)

* Previously, 'cciss' devices did not have an entry in the udev database. This was caused by the fact that these devices do not provide information in the /sys file system, making it hard to create persistent symbolic links in '/dev/disk'. With this update, the 'scsi_id' utility is used to query the ID of 'cciss' devices, so that udev can create the database entries as expected. ( BZ#515566)

* Prior to this update, renaming a network device with udev rules could fail. This was caused by a faulty retry-loop in the code. With this update, renaming a network device works as expected. ( BZ#520453)

* The udev daemon could die with an unhandled SIGBUS error if a 'rules' file was removed while udev was reading it. This was caused by a race condition between the 'fstat/mmap/loop' process and another process that is modifying the file. With this update, the race condition is removed and udev no longer fails. ( BZ#521318)

* Updating the udev packages caused udev not to run after the update. This was caused by the udevd process not being shut down cleanly before the update. When the new udevd process attempted to start, it failed because the original udevd process was still running. With this update, the update mechanism works as expected. ( BZ#567406)

* Setting a 'umask' to a non-default value could cause some devices to not be readable by other processes. This update sets an explicit 'umask' for the udev daemon. ( BZ#596774)

* Prior to this update, udev renamed the '/dev/sr*' device nodes to '/dev/scd*'. This caused some sr* devices nodes (referenced by kernel information such as '/proc/sys/dev/cdrom/info') to be missing. This update creates symbolic links to /dev/scd* and creates the /dev/sr* device nodes. ( BZ#610897)

In addition, these updated packages provide the following enhancements:

* Previously, udev did not create '/dev/tape/by-path' symbolic links for tape devices. With this update, the 'by-path' symbolic links are created. ( BZ#611664)

* The virtio-console driver has been updated to handle generic communication in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.6. For any named virtio-serial ports, this update now creates symbolic links in '/dev/virtio-ports/'. ( BZ#624928)

Users are advised to upgrade to these updated udev packages, which resolve these issues and add these enhancements.

Updated udev packages that fix a bug are now available.

The udev packages implement a dynamic device-directory, providing only the devices present on the system. This dynamic directory runs in user-space, dynamically creates and removes devices, provides consistent naming, and a user-space API. udev replaces devfs, providing greater hot plug functionality.

These updated packages fix the following bug:

* previously, cciss devices did not have an entry in the udev database. This was caused by the fact that these devices do not provide information in the /sys file system, making it hard to create persistent symbolic links in /dev/disk. With this update, the scsi_id utility is used to query the ID of cciss devices, so that udev can create the database entries as expected. ( BZ#615270)

Users of udev are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which resolve this issue.