From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S932304AbWFDXEs (ORCPT ); Sun, 4 Jun 2006 19:04:48 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S932308AbWFDXEr (ORCPT ); Sun, 4 Jun 2006 19:04:47 -0400 Received: from terminus.zytor.com ([192.83.249.54]:11965 "EHLO terminus.zytor.com") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S932304AbWFDXEr (ORCPT ); Sun, 4 Jun 2006 19:04:47 -0400 Message-ID: <448366FB.1070407@zytor.com> Date: Sun, 04 Jun 2006 16:04:27 -0700 From: "H. Peter Anvin" User-Agent: Thunderbird 1.5.0.2 (X11/20060501) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Andrew Morton CC: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: klibc (was: 2.6.18 -mm merge plans) References: <20060604135011.decdc7c9.akpm@osdl.org> In-Reply-To: <20060604135011.decdc7c9.akpm@osdl.org> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Andrew Morton wrote: > > git-klibc.patch > > Similar. This all appears to work sufficiently well for a 2.6.18 merge. > But it's been so long since klibc was a hot topic that I've forgotten who > wanted it, and what for. > > Can whoever has an interest in this work please pipe up and let's get our > direction sorted out quickly. > klibc (early userspace) in its current form is fundamentally a cleanup. What it does is unload code from the kernel which has no fundamental reason to be kernel code (written during kernel rules, with all the problems it entails.) The initial code to have removed is the root-mounting code, with all the various ugly mutations of that (ramdisk loading, NFS root, initrd...) The original idea was due Al Viro; obviously, the implementation is mostly mine. It is of course my hope that this will be used for more than just plain initialization code, but that in itself is a significant step, and one has to start somewhere. Part of the reason it has taken as long is it has is just to try to make it as drop-in as at all possible. -hpa