x86_64_defconfig and i386_defconfig: What is the difference?

[pebolle@tiscali.nl (Paul Bolle)]

On Tue, 2014-09-09 at 09:21 -0400, Valdis.Kletnieks at vt.edu wrote:
> On Tue, 09 Sep 2014 07:58:49 -0000, Rajat Jain said:
> > Can someone tell me if the i386 one is to be used when we want to build for a
> > 32bit machine and the x86_64 is to be used for 64 bit machine?
> 
> I wouldn't run either one on an actual machine.  Defconfigs are *example*
> configs, only useful as a template for customizing for actual hardware.

It is probably easiest to take the .config file of the latest kernel of
the distribution you are using as a starting point. In that case you
know that this starting point at least works on your machine.

(I remember seeing tutorials that show you how to generate a .config
from scratch. I wonder whether anyone actually does that. It should be
quite a bit of work for an uncertain outcome. Ie, you might end up
trying quite a few configurations before hitting one that works
reasonably for your machine.)

Hope this helps,


Paul Bolle