The last time that I remember re-compiling a Linux kernel was in 1995 using Caldera OpenLinux 1.0 and also with whatever version of Slackware was the rage then. It was a real pain for me then, and to this day, I was never sure that I got things working quite right. Has compiling a kernel and mating it to the modules and all of its dependencies really gotten that much easier and more fool proof?
Does Mandrake have a current set of instructions specific to their distro on their Web site or already on our installations? It's my biggest peeve with Linux in the that the information found doesn't always apply to your particular distro. I have two MDK 8.2 workstations that are subject to being reclassified as my place to play. ;-) The one that is running a P133 w/ 64 MBs of RAM is for kids and guests. If tweaking and shrinking the kernel of junk makes it running better, faster, KDE would be more "acceptable" on it. I realize that the best improvement would be to up the RAM to 128 MBs or better, but it will probably stay as it is until I replace the whole system with something better. I would love to get another 64 MBs in, but the slots are 72-pin SIMMs and I am using all four to get 64, now. The box isn't worth the cost of the memory. Besides, it's for kids and guests, neither of which come often. <heh-heh> T ----- Original Message ----- From: "Stephen Kuhn" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Friday, November 15, 2002 6:14 AM Subject: Re: [newbie] KSPREAD AND GKRELLM MEMORY USAGE On Fri, 2002-11-15 at 22:08, John Richard Smith wrote: > > > So if I understand this correctly , koffice may not be getting it's > share of available > resources due to the way koffice is compiled into the kernel. Well > something of the > such must be to do with the case, for I have an 1800 Athlon cpu with > 512mb DDR > memory , and kspread takes 20 seconds to load 125kb kspread file from > hard drive, > not floppy. However, I have to say I CAN load a hefty kword document > file into kword > in only a fraction of a second, so to my , admitedly inexperienced mind > , this suggests > that it is something to do with the way the kspread aspect of koffice is > loaded, rather > than koffice as a whole. This disparity between loading files into each > application > is a real pitty because kword is shaping up to become an outstanding piece > of application software. I had hoped the kde team would of done some work to > improve the way kspread loads files , but it does not seem to be, not in > M9.0 which > I am quoting the above performance figures for. > > I am not currently sufficiently capable to compile my own kernels. I > would be more > likely to screw it up than succeeed, however I suppose , provided that I > retained the > old kernel, and merely wrote a new stanza in /etc/lilo.conf then I could > always go back > to it again if my creation didn't work, but I really don't know how to > go about > such a piece of technical wizardry, I'm the kind of person who would really > want to download someone elses work and configure it into the bootscript. > > Anyway thanks for your help and guidance. > > John > > -- > John Richard Smith > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > In Mandrake v9, re-compiling the kernel really isn't quite as hard, or as "scientific" as you might think - it's relatively easy. I've found that by default, the kernel has quite literally everything possible under the sun compiled into it - hence making it rather "chunky" for most of us that merely have an ethernet connection, a modem, a sound card, a video, a monitor, keyboard and mouse. Heaps of "features" are put into the default kernel - I suppose the main reason being that they would like the kernel to be as "wide-spread and general" as possible so that it works on any machine. By recompiling the kernel (and of course tweaking some things here and there) I was able to gain quite a bit of speed from Mandrake v9 (ALMOST as fast as my RedHat installation on the same machine) - so it might behoove you to give it a go if you want to gain more speed for your applications. You can also try changing the default runlevel - mostly we use either runlevel 3 or runlevel 5 - runlevel 1 is for a standalone non-networked workstation - so the ONLY console is the console in front of you... Meanwhile, if you want the instructions on how to re-compile the kernel, it's not that hard to do. Really. Just time consuming because it does take a fair bit of time for the process - but YOU only have to do a few things - the computer does the rest. (You will, of course, need to have the kernel sources loaded onto your machine - they'd be in /usr/src/linux - and if they're not there, I can tell you which RPMs to install to get it there...) -- Fri Nov 15 22:05:00 EST 2002 -------------------------------- | __ __ | | / \ /| |'-. | | .\__/ || | | | | _ / `._ \|_|_.-' | | | / \__.`=._) (_ |kuhn media australia | |/ ._/ |"""""""""| |http://kma.0catch.com | |'. `\ | | |stephen kuhn | ;"""/ / | | |email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | smk ) /_/| |.-------.| |mobile: 0410-728-389 | ' `-`' " " |linux user:267497 -------------------------------- We was playin' the Homestead Grays in the city of Pitchburgh. Josh [Gibson] comes up in the last of the ninth with a man on and us a run behind. Well, he hit one. The Grays waited around and waited around, but finally the empire rules it ain't comin' down. So we win. The next day, we was disputin' the Grays in Philadelphia when here come a ball outta the sky right in the glove of the Grays' center fielder. The empire made the only possible call. "You're out, boy!" he says to Josh. "Yesterday, in Pitchburgh." -- Satchel Paige ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
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