Re: Aunt Tillie builds a kernel (was Re: ISA hardware discovery -- the elegant solution)

H. Peter Anvin
2002-01-15T00:47:31Z

Followup to: <20020115080218.7709cef7.bruce@ask.ne.jp>
By author: Bruce Harada <bruce@ask.ne.jp>
In newsgroup: linux.dev.kernel
>
> On Mon, 14 Jan 2002 17:34:23 -0500
> "Eric S. Raymond" <esr@thyrsus.com> wrote:
>
> > Therefore I try to stay focused on Aunt Tillie even though I know
> > that you are objectively correct and her class of user is likely
> > not to build kernels regularly for some years yet.
>
> Change that last line to read "her class of user will never build kernels ever,
> and would be aggressively disinterested in the possibility of doing so", and
> you might be closer to the truth.
>
> Aunt Tillie just DOESN'T CARE, OK? She can talk to her vendor if she gets
> worried about whether her kernel supports the Flangelistic2000 SuperDoodad.
>

I would make this an even stronger statement:

We (yes, we) should make sure Aunt Tillie doesn't ever have to build a
kernel, ever. If we have designed our kernels so that:

a) A distributor needs more than a handful of kernels (UP, SMP,
SMP+PAE, perhaps CMOV or not) on their install CD, or;

b) It's not possible to add a driver without rebuilding the kernel, or;

c) It's not possible to autodetect the module set needed AT RUNTIME;

then we have screwed up. Kernel compile autoconfiguration is a red
herring in that respect; I would argue if anything it hides the real
issue. We're currently crappy at both (b) and (c) -- a monolithic
kernel does (c) a lot better, and that is quite frankly unacceptable.

-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>