So what's the origin of the name 'strategy' for the I/O routine in Unix that drivers provide? Everything I've found in the early papers just says that's what the routine is called. Is there a story behind why it was chosen? My own theory is that it's in the sense of 'coping strategy' when the driver needs to service more I/O for the upper layers, but that's just a WAG.
I always thought it had to do with computing the optimal strategy for writing blocks to the disc device.... I wonder where I got that impression from. Perhaps reading Bach?
- Dan C.