On Thu, Aug 05, 1999 at 08:19:38PM -0700, Jon Pennington wrote:
> On Fri, 6 Aug 1999 13:02:15 +1000, CaT wrote:
>
> > On Thu, Aug 05, 1999 at 07:41:59PM -0700, Jon Pennington wrote:
>
> > > Modularize it! Things like ethernet cards, sound cards, and PPP
> shouldn't
> > > need to be built into the kernel. If your / partition resides on a
> SCSI
> > > disk, then you can build IDE disk support as a module. Conversely, if
> your
> > > / is on an IDE disk, SCSI should be a module.
> >
> > That's one way to do things. Personally though, I'd only recommend
> > modules for when you can't make a bzlilo, or your system configuration
> > is such that you need two+ copies of a driver to make all your h/w
> > funciton properly.
>
> That's not true. The modules are exactly that: Modules. The kernel is
> built with hooks for the modules to grab, but there are no unnecessary
> 'copies' of drivers.
Erm. Frommemory I thought that you may need to insert a module twice
if say, you had two ethernet cards in your box.
> > Overmodularisation is, IMO, pointless and doesn't gain you anything.
> > the only thing that's modular in my kernel is the ppp compression
> > and that's only because I can't compile it in. Everything from IDE,
> > SCSI, my filesystems and even sound is compile din and works great
> > and with no mess.
>
> True, monolithic kernels are simpler, but there is speed to be gained by
> modularization. If a module is not needed, it is unloaded, which means that
> the kernel is smaller. Smaller means faster. You might not notice any
> speed difference on anything faster than, say, 200 Mhz, but it's there. If
> we were all still running 25Mhz 386's, nobody would still use a monolith.
Erm.. where's the speed advantage come from? How does making the
kernel smaller speed it up?
> > Anyways, that's just another POV. :) Roll with whichever makes your day.
>
> You said it. :) My last boss used to say the following,"There is no such
> thing as a right way or a wrong way. There are simply ways that work, and
> ways that don't work, albeit some ways work better than others." That's the
> cool thing about Linux, we have choices! :)
Yup. :)
--
CaT ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) URL: http://www.zip.com.au/dev/null
