[agwa]

The author says the device is a USB modem. So, under Linux, the author could have simply written a udev rule to use the name "whiteboard" for that particular USB modem's device file.

[m-ou-se]

Indeed. It's just a udev rule with: SYMLINK+="whiteboard

[seryoiupfurds]

And even under plain-Jane Unix, you can name a device file whatever you want.