[mythtv-users] Loading device at boot time

[Peter Diffey]

Hi

>/ I recently added a QAM HDTV tuner to my slave backend.  When it boots,
/>/ it seems to load the saa7134 V4L driver fine, but I need to load the
/>/ saa7134-dvb driver.  I can do this with a modprobe but I wanted to do it
/>/ with the modules.conf file.  I've done this with ivtv before my aliasing
/>/ the char-major device to it, but I'm not sure how to do this with the
/>/ DVB drivers or if it is even the right place.  I'm running FC4 with the
/>/ latest (2.6.15) kernel.  Please advise how I can get these to load
/>/ without slapping them into an rc.local file.
/
>Can this be done in the way that Jarod has patched rc.sysinit to catch
>the aliases from modules.conf and have them loaded much earlier on in
>the boot process?

As a general rule, it is bad practice to go making changes to things like rc.sysinit, as this is a 
"system file" ie it forms part of the Linux core. A future yum upgrade may overwrite this file and remove 
all your hand crafted changed.

Rc.local is by contention "local" and should never get blown away by upgrades.

If you need something to load earlier, then create your own start script - rip off an existing Sxxyyyy
script and use chkconfig to get it into the correct run levels. If you want it to load really early, 
calling it S0000aabsolutely_the_first_thing should do it. Again that ain't gonna get blown away in an upgrade.

Regarding modules/modprobe.conf entries, there seems to be a lot of hokus-pokus about this file - most of 
which seems to be mis-information, as far as I can see most devices do not need entries in that file.

As long as the hardware identifies itself on loading, then it will get correctly configured, and needs no
modprobe.conf entries at all, all you need to do is identify what it is & do modprobe saa713x or whatever.

As regards putting modprobe commands in rc.local why not ? its "KISS - keep it simple stupid" stuff, why
look for hard solutions if rc.local works.

Pete Diffey
St Albans UK