On most original Unix systems, /dev was not populated automatically by the kernel.. it simply contained previously generated device nodes.
FreeBSD/Linux switched over to the dynamic technique for various reasons, but they typically preserve the ability to generate device nodes using the classic MAKEDEV/makedev script.
It was once second nature for Unix enthusiasts to generate the additional nodes when they were needed, kids these days are so spoiled.
Fortunately, OpenBSD does not have a "devfs" and /dev is simply a directory of files on /.
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