Messages in this thread |  | | Date | Mon, 6 May 1996 01:52:29 -0400 (EDT) | From | Kevin M Bealer <> | Subject | kerneld |
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I have an idea concerning kerneld. Would it be possible to create a modular kernel so that it loads, at boot time, a 'monolithic' kernel by grabbing all the 'complex' modules, installing and configuring them, then putting them on the '[autoclean]' status.
But instead of just wiping them, save their configuration?/state?/entire core? into a swappable chunk. When they are needed they can be reloaded, but since all the probing and configuration is done at boot, the module loading would avoid the probing conflict/order problems, as well as the problem of passing device modes and configuration arguments around.
In essence, the kernel would behave as a monolithic kernel, except that parts of it could disconnect and page out. (But the normal insmod rmmod could still be used.)
This could give the benefits of modularity such as experimental modules, conflicting modules (lp and ppa) and the slight memory savings ... and might clean up stability problems... (if your ne2000 didn't crash/burn at boot-up, you won't risk it again by reloading under different machine and device states).
Some parts of course would not need this feature... anything which does not need configuration can just be yanked in from the .o file anytime.
(Of course, some of the stability can be gotten by just keeping the less well-behaved stuff in the monolithic part.)
__kmb203@psu.edu_________________________Debian__1.1___Linux__1.3.97___ Parents: this version of Linux contains small components that new users may pick up and put in their mouth.
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