Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id ; Sat, 22 Dec 2001 19:40:19 -0500 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id ; Sat, 22 Dec 2001 19:40:12 -0500 Received: from embolism.psychosis.com ([216.242.103.100]:46084 "EHLO embolism.psychosis.com") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id ; Sat, 22 Dec 2001 19:40:02 -0500 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII From: Dave Cinege Reply-To: dcinege@psychosis.com To: "H. Peter Anvin" , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: Booting a modular kernel through a multiple streams file Date: Sat, 22 Dec 2001 19:39:57 -0500 X-Mailer: KMail [version 1.3.2] In-Reply-To: <9vo4b3$iet$1@cesium.transmeta.com> In-Reply-To: <9vo4b3$iet$1@cesium.transmeta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7BIT Message-Id: Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org On Tuesday 18 December 2001 14:10, H. Peter Anvin wrote: > Note that Al is working on a replacement; he's not just bitching. The > replacement is called "initramfs" which means populating a ramfs from > an archive or collection of archives passwd by the bootloader. With > that in there, lots of things can be done in userspace. Already done for many months (actully years) now. If I thought it would be accepted, I'd gut rd.c and fully merge it into a 2.5 patch. ftp://ftp.psychosis.com/linux/initrd-dyn/ Initrd Dynamic supercedes Initrd Archive. This function subset was first written in January 1998 and has progressed in features since then. Developed for the Linux Router Project, it is in wide spread use in various Linux embedded systems and thin OS's. Initial RAM disk dynamic creation support CONFIG_BLK_DEV_INITRD_DYN Initrd Dynamic allows you to use tar.gz archive(s) instead of those nasty raw images. It works by dynamically creating a filesystem at boot, mounting it as '/', then extracting the archive(s) loaded into the initrd memory space. If your bootloader can load multiple archives sequentially (IE a patched GRUB) all archives will be extracted in the order they where loaded. Optionally Initrd Dynamic can create the /dev directory and some failsafe console files. You must select at least one of the available filesystems below. You probably want to use tmpfs if it's available in your kernel. The kernel parameter to specify options is: initrd_dyn=fstype[,fssize[k|m]][,mkdev] fstype == One of the supported dynamic mkfs filesystems. fssize == Limits the size of the filesystem created. tmpfs: If not speced it's equal to the real memory space. minix: If not speced it's equal to ramdisk_size. mkdev == /dev is created after archive untar. Useful even if devfs=mount. Examples: initrd_dyn=tmpfs load_ramdisk=1 initrd_dyn=tmpfs,4096k load_ramdisk=1 initrd_dyn=tmpfs,16m,mkdev load_ramdisk=1 initrd_dyn=minix,8m ramdisk_size=20480 root=/dev/ram0 load_ramdisk=1 initrd_dyn=minix,,mkdev root=/dev/rd/0 load_ramdisk=1 -- The time is now 22:54 (Totalitarian) - http://www.ccops.org/ - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/