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Date: Tue, 15 Jan 2002 14:04:36 -0700
From: Andreas Dilger <adilger@turbolabs.com>
To: Daniel Phillips <phillips@bonn-fries.net>
Cc: "H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@zytor.com>, Alexander Viro <viro@math.psu.edu>,
        "Eric W. Biederman" <ebiederm@xmission.com>,
        linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
Subject: Re: initramfs buffer spec -- second draft
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On Jan 15, 2002  21:16 +0100, Daniel Phillips wrote:
> On January 15, 2002 09:03 pm, H. Peter Anvin wrote:
> > Daniel Phillips wrote:
> > > Encoding the numeric fields in ASCII/hex is a goofy wart on an otherwise
> > > nice  design.  What is the compelling reason?  Bytesex isn't it: we
> > > should just pick one or the other and stick with it as we do in Ext2.
> > > 
> > > Why don't we fix cpio to write a consistent bytesex?
> > 
> > Because we want to use existing tools.
> 
> It's a mistake not to fix this tool.  I'll post the cost in terms of bytes
> wasted shortly, pretty tough to argue with that, right?

Well, I doubt the difference will be more than a few bytes, if you compare
the cpio archive sizes after compression with gzip.

> > I don't think think this application alone is enough to add Yet Another 
> > Version of CPIO.  However, if there are more compelling reasons to do so 
> >   for CPIO backup reasons itself I guess we could write it up and add it 
> > to GNU cpio as "linux" format...
> 
> Oh, it is, really it is.  It's not just any application, and GNU already
> has its own verion of cpio.

But then every person who wants to build a kernel will have to have
the patched version of cpio until such a time it is part of the standard
cpio tool (which may be "never").  I would much rather use the currently
available tools than save 20 bytes off a 900kB kernel image.

Cheers, Andreas
--
Andreas Dilger
http://sourceforge.net/projects/ext2resize/
http://www-mddsp.enel.ucalgary.ca/People/adilger/

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