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To: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
From: "H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@zytor.com>
Subject: Re: Booting a modular kernel through a multiple streams file
Date: 18 Dec 2001 12:35:31 -0800
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Copyright: Copyright 2001 H. Peter Anvin - All Rights Reserved
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Followup to:  <59885C5E3098D511AD690002A5072D3C42D804@orsmsx111.jf.intel.com>
By author:    "Grover, Andrew" <andrew.grover@intel.com>
In newsgroup: linux.dev.kernel
> 
> Implicit in the use of initrd is that you have to *make a ramdisk image*,
> and then tell your bootloader to load it. If you have a bootloader that can
> load multiple images (i.e. the modules themselves) you can skip the first
> step.
> 

initramfs will do this just fine.

> Again, even the new scheme will still involve the creation of an initrd. I'm
> saying, as a user, it would be easier for me to not do this, and just modify
> a .conf file to have the driver loaded early-on.

See above.

> I'm not arguing that the new initrd won't be better than the old initrd
> (because obviously you are right) I'm arguing that no matter how whizzy
> initrd is, it's still an unnecessary step, and it's one that other OSs (e.g.
> FreeBSD) omit in favor of the approach I'm advocating.

Doing things in multiple steps is often appropriate.

	-hpa
-- 
<hpa@transmeta.com> at work, <hpa@zytor.com> in private!
"Unix gives you enough rope to shoot yourself in the foot."
http://www.zytor.com/~hpa/puzzle.txt	<amsp@zytor.com>
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