title: Accessing Linux /dev/USB as standard files to communicate with USB device
body: <p>I'm researching ways to communicate with a USB device in Linux and would prefer to not write a Linux Kernel driver. I understand that libusb exists and is a user-land library that would work, but our embedded device doesn't support usbfs ( and would be really a pain to change kernels to add the support ).</p>
  
  <p>So my question is basically this: Is it possible / advisable to communicate with a USB device by directly reading and writing to the /dev/USB or the udev file corresponding to the USB device thus bypassing the need for a custom Linux Driver and usbfs?</p>
  
  <p>I'm hoping it's possible to communicate using the USB devices protocol just by reading / writing protocol packets directly through file-type read/write commands once the /dev/USB or udev device file is open.</p>
  
  <p>Thoughts and suggestions please.</p>
  
  <p>FOLLOW UP:</p>
  
  <p>Since the USB device I needed to talk to is a USB HID class device, I was able to use libudev and the standard Linux USB HID RAW driver by reading / writing directly to /dev/hidraw0  ( or the appropriate /dev/hidraw device ). It wasn't necessary to write a custom driver for a simple USB HID device.</p>